Which file system protocol is supported by vSphere?

vSphere supports several file system protocols, one of which is Network File System (NFS). NFS is a distributed file system protocol that allows clients to access files over a network in a manner similar to how local storage is accessed. In a virtualized environment, utilizing NFS enables seamless storage integration and is beneficial for clustering and sharing resources among virtual machines.

NFS simplifies management by providing a centralized location for storing virtual disk files and allows for easy scalability. Integrating NFS within a vSphere environment can enhance the flexibility of storage configurations while supporting features such as VMotion, which enables live migrations of virtual machines.

While vSAN, iSCSI, and SAN are also storage solutions used within VMware environments, they serve different purposes and are not classified as file system protocols in the same sense. vSAN is part of the software-defined storage architecture specifically for vSphere environments, iSCSI is a network protocol that enables the transport of block-level storage, and SAN typically refers to Storage Area Networks used for fast and reliable access to block storage. Thus, in the context of file system protocols, NFS is the correct choice supported by vSphere.