qm-destroy

Destroy a specific virtual machine

$ qm destroy 100

$ qm destroy 100 --destroy-unreferenced-disks

$ qm destroy 100 --purge

$ sudo qm destroy 100 --skiplock

qm destroy vmid [options]

qm destroy permanently removes a virtual machine from Proxmox VE. It can optionally remove associated disks and purge the VM from all system locations including backup jobs and high availability configuration.
The skiplock option bypasses safety locks but requires root privileges.

--destroy-unreferenced-disks

Remove disks not referenced in VM configuration

Remove from all locations (inventory, backups, HA, etc.)

Ignore locks and force destruction

Destruction is permanent and cannot be undone. Ensure backups exist before destroying important VMs. Purge option removes all traces including scheduled backups.

Part of Proxmox VE QEMU/KVM management tools for virtual machine administration.

qm(1), qm-create(1), qm-clone(1)