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Use image families to simplify image versioning. Add an image to an image family to set it as the most recent image version. If you determine that you must roll back the image family to a previous image version, deprecate the most recent image in the family.
For best practices when working with image families, see Image families best practices.
Optionally, you can specify the image's storage location by using the Google Cloud console, the gcloud compute images create
command with the --storage-location
flag, or the images().insert
method.
Select the tab for how you plan to use the samples on this page:
ConsoleWhen you use the Google Cloud console to access Google Cloud services and APIs, you don't need to set up authentication.
gcloudInstall the Google Cloud CLI. After installation, initialize the Google Cloud CLI by running the following command:
gcloud init
If you're using an external identity provider (IdP), you must first sign in to the gcloud CLI with your federated identity.
Note: If you installed the gcloud CLI previously, make sure you have the latest version by runninggcloud components update
.To use the REST API samples on this page in a local development environment, you use the credentials you provide to the gcloud CLI.
Install the Google Cloud CLI. After installation, initialize the Google Cloud CLI by running the following command:
gcloud init
If you're using an external identity provider (IdP), you must first sign in to the gcloud CLI with your federated identity.
For more information, see Authenticate for using REST in the Google Cloud authentication documentation.
In the Google Cloud console, go to the Create an image page.
Specify the Name of your image. For example, image-v1
.
Specify the Source from which you want to create an image. This can be a persistent disk, a snapshot, another image, or a disk.raw file in Cloud Storage.
If you are creating an image from a disk attached to a running VM, check Keep instance running to confirm that you want to create the image while the VM is running. You can prepare your VM before creating the image.
In the Based on source disk location (default) drop-down list, specify the location to store the image. For example, specify us
to store the image in the us
multi-region, or us-central1
to store it in the us-central1
region. If you do not make a selection, Compute Engine stores the image in the multi-region closest to your image's source location.
Specify the image Family for the new image. For example, add my-image-family
to organize the image as part of an image family.
Optional: specify other image properties:
Specify the encryption key. You can choose between a Google-owned and Google-managed encryption key, a Cloud Key Management Service (Cloud KMS) key or a customer- supplied encryption (CSEK) key. If no encryption key is specified, images are encrypted using a Google-owned and Google-managed encryption key.
Click Create to create the image.
gcloud compute images create image-v1 \ --source-disk disk-1 \ --source-disk-zone us-central1-f \ --family my-image-family
The image family points to image-v1
. Add a second image to the family:
gcloud compute images create image-v2 \ --source-disk disk-2 \ --source-disk-zone us-central1-f \ --family my-image-familyREST
Make a POST
request to the images().insert
method. Specify the image family in the request body.
POST https://compute.googleapis.com/compute/v1/projects/PROJECT_ID/global/images { "name": "image-v2", "sourceDisk": "/zones/us-central1-f/disks/disk-2", "family":"my-image-family", }
The image family points to image-v2
because it is the most recent image that you added to the image family.
You can see which image a family points to by running the gcloud compute images describe-from-family
command.
For example:
gcloud compute images describe-from-family my-image-family family: my-image-family id: '8904691942610171306' kind: compute#image name: image-v2 selfLink: https://compute.googleapis.com/compute/v1/projects/my-project/global/images/image-v2 sourceDisk: https://compute.googleapis.com/compute/v1/projects/my-project/zones/us-central1-f/disks/disk-v2 sourceDiskId: '1677449456001963379' sourceType: RAW status: READYREST
Make a GET
request to the images().getFromFamily
method. Specify the image family in the request body.
GET https://compute.googleapis.com/compute/v1/projects/PROJECT_ID/global/images/family { "resourceId":"my-image-family", }
If you determine that you must roll back the image family so that it no longer points to image-v2
, deprecate image-v2
and the family will again point to image-v1
.
gcloud compute images deprecate image-v2 \ --state DEPRECATED \ --replacement image-v1
Check to make sure that the image family is pointing to image-v1
.
gcloud compute images describe-from-family my-image-family family: my-image-family id: '2741732787056801255' kind: compute#image name: image-v1 selfLink: https://compute.googleapis.com/compute/v1/projects/my-project/global/images/image-v1 sourceDisk: https://compute.googleapis.com/compute/v1/projects/my-project/zones/us-central1-f/disks/disk-v1 sourceDiskId: '1677449456001963379' sourceType: RAW status: READY
Except as otherwise noted, the content of this page is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License, and code samples are licensed under the Apache 2.0 License. For details, see the Google Developers Site Policies. Java is a registered trademark of Oracle and/or its affiliates.
Last updated 2025-08-07 UTC.
[[["Easy to understand","easyToUnderstand","thumb-up"],["Solved my problem","solvedMyProblem","thumb-up"],["Other","otherUp","thumb-up"]],[["Hard to understand","hardToUnderstand","thumb-down"],["Incorrect information or sample code","incorrectInformationOrSampleCode","thumb-down"],["Missing the information/samples I need","missingTheInformationSamplesINeed","thumb-down"],["Other","otherDown","thumb-down"]],["Last updated 2025-08-07 UTC."],[[["Image families simplify image versioning by allowing you to group related images and designate the most recent version."],["Adding a new image to an existing image family automatically sets it as the newest version within that family."],["You can manage the storage location of an image during creation using the Google Cloud console, the `gcloud compute images create` command, or the `images().insert` method."],["Rolling back to a previous image version involves deprecating the most recent image, which then reverts the family's pointer to the prior version."],["The `gcloud compute images describe-from-family` command or the `images().getFromFamily` method allows you to confirm which image a specific image family currently references."]]],[]]
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