A Comprehensive Guide to OS Image Management in IBM Cloud PowerVS

Introduction 

IBM Cloud PowerVS (Power Virtual Server) brings the flexibility of cloud computing to IBM Power Systems workloads — such as AIX, IBM i, and Linux on Power — with the agility of IBM Cloud.
A foundational concept in PowerVS is the OS Image — the bootable system template used to deploy virtual machines. These images define not only what operating system the instance runs, but also how it’s configured, secured, and maintained.
This blog dives deep into how images behave within PowerVS, covering both Stock and Custom Images, their architecture-level flow, and availability differences.

PowerVS Architectural Context for Image Management

A PowerVS workspace is bound to a designated region and zone. The Global Image Catalog provides IBM-managed OS images (AIX, Linux, IBM i). For availability and provisioning, these images are copied across all storage pools in the respective data-center.

Example:

Catalog images serve as reference images and are available to all workspaces within the data-center for instance deployment. They appear only in the VM deployment window and do not show up as local images in the workspace image list until you create/copy the image
or deploy an instance using the image.

Boot images from VM deployment page:

The above images are from “regional image catalog and custom images  of the workspace.
The above listed stock images are only reference images. They don’t consume any space/storage here. 

OS Image Types in IBM Cloud PowerVS

PowerVS supports two primary types of images:

Stock Images — These are provided and maintained by IBM and include official AIX, IBM i, and Linux distributions. The regional catalog contains only stock images, which can be verified using the CLI command shown below.

PS C:\Users\user-name> ibmcloud pi img list-catalog
Listing catalog images under account cloud _ Account as user  user@ibm.com...
ID                                     Name                                                      Path
37392dc6-d573-4897-ac83-ad15ab1b4757   7100-05-09                                                /pcloud/v1/cloud-instances/cc1b19821e4a429eac6d02cea8e40603/stock-images/37392dc6-d573-4897-ac83-ad15ab1b4757
0ccc913b-4f64-476a-893a-008b5b55f97b   7200-05-08                                                /pcloud/v1/cloud-instances/cc1b19821e4a429eac6d02cea8e40603/stock-images/0ccc913b-4f64-476a-893a-008b5b55f97b
fa12de62-d26c-451e-99f4-5e6d298509e3   7200-05-09                                                /pcloud/v1/cloud-instances/cc1b19821e4a429eac6d02cea8e40603/stock-images/fa12de62-d26c-451e-99f4-5e6d298509e3
a0f5206e-acec-4c72-ace1-dab02e05f157   7200-05-10                                                /pcloud/v1/cloud-instances/cc1b19821e4a429eac6d02cea8e40603/stock-images/a0f5206e-acec-4c72-ace1-dab02e05f157
2d358892-874b-4a13-a4b5-f5aaa1597cb0   7200-05-11                                                /pcloud/v1/cloud-instances/cc1b19821e4a429eac6d02cea8e40603/stock-images/2d358892-874b-4a13-a4b5-f5aaa1597cb0
60dd9dfb-4de0-4bd8-b92c-986549c8e2c1   7300-02-02                                                /pcloud/v1/cloud-instances/cc1b19821e4a429eac6d02cea8e40603/stock-images/60dd9dfb-4de0-4bd8-b92c-986549c8e2c1
bf31ab2f-d4e6-4c1a-8410-b0e29306ce25   7300-03-00                                                /pcloud/v1/cloud-instances/cc1b19821e4a429eac6d02cea8e40603/stock-images/bf31ab2f-d4e6-4c1a-8410-b0e29306ce25

Note-: Above Command only list stock images

Custom Images — These are created, captured, or imported by customers and are typically used for workload migration, environment cloning, or custom OS builds. You can verify custom images through the CLI using the command provided below.

PS C:\Users\user> ibmcloud pi img list
Listing images under account user- Account as user user@ibm.com...
ID                                     Name                         Path
175ab105-069a-4515-9878-66f71188e743   73-AIX-import                /pcloud/v1/cloud-instances/cc1b19821e4a429eac6d02cea8e40603/images/175ab105-069a-4515-9878-66f71188e743
77dae937-ae95-4c45-abcc-70e673fb6729   7300-02-02                   /pcloud/v1/cloud-instances/cc1b19821e4a429eac6d02cea8e40603/images/77dae937-ae95-4c45-abcc-70e673fb6729
1c500db7-bc76-46b4-bae0-17a40f9e2609   7300-03-01                   /pcloud/v1/cloud-instances/cc1b19821e4a429eac6d02cea8e40603/images/1c500db7-bc76-46b4-bae0-17a40f9e2609
dc4c1e0b-2ef7-4c03-a0fe-b8b79961dc28   CaptureNov5                  /pcloud/v1/cloud-instances/cc1b19821e4a429eac6d02cea8e40603/images/dc4c1e0b-2ef7-4c03-a0fe-b8b79961dc28
d8746072-7802-45d3-a7ca-8cef0b179610   RHEL-import                  /pcloud/v1/cloud-instances/cc1b19821e4a429eac6d02cea8e40603/images/d8746072-7802-45d3-a7ca-8cef0b179610

Note-: Above Command list stock and custom images

Local image listings are specific to a workspace and may include both IBM-provided images and user-imported images.
When a user deploys an instance using any of these images, the corresponding boot image is added to the boot image list.

This above image list aligns with what is displayed in the GUI as boot image.

Both the boot image list and the image list retrieved through the CLI represent the same underlying images.
For example, the image ID for “7200-05-09” from the boot image list corresponds to:

This is exactly matched with image id mentioned below in image list.

PS C:\Users\User> ibmcloud  pi img ls
Listing images under account User- Account as user user@in.ibm.com...
ID                                     Name                                  Path
d504be5b-11d7-4a4c-90e4-89278ea70add   7200-05-08                            /pcloud/v1/cloud-instances/50dcebdb457e497a99220ac38382dbc0/images/d504be5b-11d7-4a4c-90e4-89278ea70add
9c669bb8-5b90-4c4c-9269-d0e5332f5ca6   7200-05-09                            /pcloud/v1/cloud-instances/50dcebdb457e497a99220ac38382dbc0/images/9c669bb8-5b90-4c4c-9269-d0e5332f5ca6

The boot image list shown in the GUI and the image list retrieved through the CLI represent all images that have been created/copied, imported, captured, or stock image that are used to deploy a VM.

Image Visibility and Availability

IBM Cloud distinguishes between catalog-level and workspace-level images.

Image Import operations

Pre-requisite:

The user must have access to the COS bucket and must possess the required HMAC access key and secret key to perform any COS-related operations.
Only the account owner is authorized to generate these HMAC keys.

Image import involves replicating the image into the workspace storage pool and updating its metadata. Once imported, the image becomes available for use as a boot image. In PowerVS, images are typically imported from a COS bucket. This operation consists of two key elements — the Source and the Destination.

The source requires the following details:

• The type of image being imported
• The region of the COS bucket from which the image will be imported
• The name of the image file (supported formats: .ova, .ova.gz, .tar, .tar.gz, .tgz, .ova.tgz)
• The COS bucket name where the image is currently stored
• The HMAC access key and secret key

Example of importing image via GUI:

 NOTE-:Use the actual user-defined COS bucket name, Access Key, and Secret Key in the sections mentioned above

Destination-side requirements:

• Custom image name: A unique name that will appear in the boot image or image list.
• User tag (optional): Can be used to group or organize resources using tags.
• Tier: The storage tier where the image will be deployed.
• Storage pool: The specific pool into which the image should be imported.

Image Export operation:

This operation also involves two key components: the capture source and the destination. The option can be accessed under the Virtual Server Instances section of the workspace

Example:
virtual server instance-->view action-->Capture & export

A virtual server instance may contain either only a rootvg or a combination of rootvg and datavg. Based on this, the appropriate disk must be selected for capture. In this case, the VM contains only a rootvg, so we proceed with capturing and exporting the rootvg.

The destination section includes three main options:

• Capture: Select Image Catalog only.
• Capture and Export to COS: Select both Image Catalog and COS as destinations.
• Export to COS: Select COS only.

In this example, I have chosen the Capture and Export option.

 NOTE-:Use the actual user-defined COS bucket name, Access Key, and Secret Key in the sections mentioned above

Once the operation is initiated, event logs are generated and updated with the final status after the job completes.

Example:

For every capture, export, or import operation, a unique job ID is generated.
This job ID can be used to check the status of the operation.

Example:
You can list the recent jobs using the command below, which displays the last five jobs for the workspace.

PS C:\Users\User> ibmcloud pi job ls
Listing jobs under account owner Account as user user@ibm.com...

Job ID               d56356c0-2f76-4cbc-b0c8-df8dabca8027
Creation Timestamp   2025-11-14T06:28:15.983Z
Operation ID         e03c8b67-8f51-4aeb-947e-616a6403ade5
Operation Target     pvmInstance
Operation Action     epaVMCapture
State                completed
Progress             capture
Message              capture vm has successfully completed

Job ID               a18ccae3-d4e3-4384-9ef1-5362e6b237c4
Creation Timestamp   2025-11-13T12:39:14.045Z
Operation ID         24af5727-8236-4755-8516-cc62f87d1e0d
Operation Target     pvmInstance
Operation Action     epaVMCapture
State                failed
Progress             capture
Message              capture of vm failed

Job ID               b937b216-5188-4c19-b605-83293d1ca167
Creation Timestamp   2025-11-13T12:35:23.410Z
Operation ID         7427794c-23e3-4691-a5e2-071235169d6b
Operation Target     pvmInstance
Operation Action     epaVMCapture
State                completed
Progress             capture
Message              capture vm has successfully completed

Job ID               dda1218d-26f3-44cd-b759-c0de7a91c1e3
Creation Timestamp   2025-11-13T06:59:28.920Z
Operation ID         01c58141-093e-455f-a6e5-598c795e456d
Operation Target     pvmInstance
Operation Action     epaVMCapture
State                completed
Progress             capture
Message              capture vm has successfully completed

We can also verify the status of the specific job, using job id:

PS C:\Users\User> ibmcloud pi job get d56356c0-2f76-4cbc-b0c8-df8dabca8027
Getting job d56356c0-2f76-4cbc-b0c8-df8dabca8027 under account owner Account as user user@ibm.com...

Job ID               d56356c0-2f76-4cbc-b0c8-df8dabca8027
Creation Timestamp   2025-11-14T06:28:15.983Z
Operation ID         e03c8b67-8f51-4aeb-947e-616a6403ade5
Operation Target     pvmInstance
Operation Action     epaVMCapture
State                completed
Progress             capture
Message              capture vm has successfully completed
PS C:\Users\user>

Billing:
Both export and import operations incur associated costs.
The cost depends on the size of the volume being processed (rootvg and any additional datavg, if applicable) during export.
For image import, the cost also varies based on the selected storage tier and storage pool. Along with the COS also associated with separate pricing.

IAM and Access Control

IBM Cloud IAM policies define who can view or manage images.

 Troubleshooting

References:

- IBM Cloud PowerVS Documentation: https://cloud.ibm.com/docs/power-iaas

- IBM Cloud IAM Overview: https://cloud.ibm.com/docs/account?topic=account-iamoverview