Remove Unattached Virtual Machine Disk Volumes

01 Sign in to Azure Management Console.

02 Navigate to All resources blade at https://portal.azure.com/#blade/HubsExtension/BrowseAll to access all your Microsoft Azure resources.

03 Choose the Azure subscription that you want to access from the Subscription filter box.

04 From the Type filter box, select Disk to list the virtual machine (VM) disk volumes provisioned in the selected subscription.

05 Click on the name of the VM disk volume that you want to examine.

06 In the navigation panel, select Overview to view the configuration details available for the selected volume.

07 On the Overview page, check the Disk state configuration attribute value. If the attribute value is set to Unattached, the selected disk volume is not attached to a Microsoft Azure virtual machine. If the unattached volume is not used anymore, the resource can be safely removed from the selected subscription.

08 If required, repeat steps no. 5 – 7 for each detached Azure VM disk volume available in the selected subscription.

09 Repeat steps no. 3 – 8 for each subscription created in your Microsoft Azure cloud account.

01 Run disk list command (Windows/macOS/Linux) using custom query filters to list the ID of each virtual machine (VM) disk volume provisioned within the current Azure subscription:

az disk list
    --query '[*].id'

02 The command output should return the requested VM disk volume identifiers (IDs):

[
"/subscriptions/abcdabcd-1234-abcd-1234-abcd1234abcd/resourceGroups/CLOUD-SHELL-STORAGE-WESTEUROPE/providers/Microsoft.Compute/disks/cc-data-disk1",
"/subscriptions/abcdabcd-1234-abcd-1234-abcd1234abcd/resourceGroups/CLOUD-SHELL-STORAGE-WESTEUROPE/providers/Microsoft.Compute/disks/cc-data-disk2",

...

"/subscriptions/abcdabcd-1234-abcd-1234-abcd1234abcd/resourceGroups/CLOUD-SHELL-STORAGE-WESTEUROPE/providers/Microsoft.Compute/disks/cc-OsDisk-app",
"/subscriptions/abcdabcd-1234-abcd-1234-abcd1234abcd/resourceGroups/CLOUD-SHELL-STORAGE-WESTEUROPE/providers/Microsoft.Compute/disks/cc-OsDisk-web"
]

03 Run disk show command (Windows/macOS/Linux) using the ID of the VM disk volume that you want to examine as identifier parameter to obtain the disk state/status for the selected Azure VM resource:

az disk show
    --ids "/subscriptions/abcdabcd-1234-abcd-1234-abcd1234abcd/resourceGroups/CLOUD-SHELL-STORAGE-WESTEUROPE/providers/Microsoft.Compute/disks/cc-data-disk1"
    --query 'diskState'

04 The command output should return the requested configuration status:

"Unattached"

05 If required, repeat step no. 3 and 4 for each detached Azure VM disk volume created within the current subscription.

06 Repeat steps no. 1 – 5 for each subscription available in your Microsoft Azure cloud account.

01 Sign in to Azure Management Console.

02 Navigate to All resources blade at https://portal.azure.com/#blade/HubsExtension/BrowseAll to access all your Microsoft Azure resources.

03 Choose the Azure subscription that you want to access from the Subscription filter box.

04 From the Type filter box, select Disk to list only the virtual machine disk volumes available in the selected subscription.

05 Click on the name of the detached VM disk volume that you want to delete (see Audit section part I to identify the right resource).

06 In the navigation panel, select Overview to access the selected volume configuration.

07 On the Overview page, click Create snapshot to initiate the disk volume backup process.

08 On the Create snapshot panel, provide a name for your new snapshot, select the necessary account type, then click Review + create to finish the snapshot configuration process. Click Create to take the snapshot.

09 Once the disk volume snapshot is created, go back to All resources blade at https://portal.azure.com/#blade/HubsExtension/BrowseAll and select the unattached Azure VM disk volume that you want to delete.

10 Click on Delete button from the top menu to initiate the removal process.

11 On the Delete Resources panel, type yes for confirmation in the Confirm delete box, then click Delete to remove the selected Azure virtual machine disk volume.

12 If required, repeat steps no. 5 – 11 for each detached disk volume available within the selected subscription.

13 Repeat steps no. 3 – 12 for each subscription created in your Microsoft Azure cloud account.

01 Run snapshot create command (Windows/macOS/Linux) to create a snapshot for the detached disk volume that you want to delete (see Audit section part II to identify the right Azure VM resource):

az snapshot create
    --name cc-detached-data-disk1
    --resource-group cloud-shell-storage-westeurope
    --source "/subscriptions/abcdabcd-1234-abcd-1234-abcd1234abcd/resourceGroups/CLOUD-SHELL-STORAGE-WESTEUROPE/providers/Microsoft.Compute/disks/cc-data-disk1"

02 The command output should return the volume snapshot configuration metadata:

{
  "creationData": {
    "createOption": "Copy",
    "imageReference": null,
    "sourceResourceId": "/subscriptions/abcdabcd-1234-abcd-1234-abcd1234abcd/resourceGroups/CLOUD-SHELL-STORAGE-WESTEUROPE/providers/Microsoft.Compute/disks/cc-data-disk1",
    "sourceUniqueId": "abcdabcd-1234-abcd-1234-abcd1234abcd",
    "sourceUri": null,
    "storageAccountId": null,
    "uploadSizeBytes": null
  },
  "diskSizeBytes": 5368709120,
  "diskSizeGb": 5,
  "encryptionSettingsCollection": null,
  "hyperVgeneration": "V1",
  "id": "/subscriptions/abcdabcd-1234-abcd-1234-abcd1234abcd/resourceGroups/cloud-shell-storage-westeurope/providers/Microsoft.Compute/snapshots/cc-detached-data-disk1",
  "incremental": false,
  "location": "westeurope",
  "managedBy": null,
  "name": "cc-detached-data-disk1",
  "osType": null,
  "provisioningState": "Succeeded",
  "resourceGroup": "cloud-shell-storage-westeurope",
  "sku": {
    "name": "Standard_LRS",
    "tier": "Standard"
  },
  "tags": {},
  "timeCreated": "2018-10-20T18:32:34.902403+00:00",
  "type": "Microsoft.Compute/snapshots",
  "uniqueId": "abcdabcd-1234-abcd-1234-abcd1234abcd"
}

03 Run disk delete command (Windows/macOS/Linux) to remove the unattached Azure virtual machine disk volume that you want to delete (the command does not produce an output):

az disk delete
    --ids "/subscriptions/abcdabcd-1234-abcd-1234-abcd1234abcd/resourceGroups/CLOUD-SHELL-STORAGE-WESTEUROPE/providers/Microsoft.Compute/disks/cc-data-disk1"

04 Type y (yes), then press Enter to confirm the resource removal, i.e.:

Are you sure you want to perform this operation? (y/n): y

05 If required, repeat steps no. 1 – 4 for each detached disk volume provisioned in the selected subscription.

06 Repeat steps no. 1 – 5 for each subscription available in your Microsoft Azure cloud account.