diff --git a/lib/vdsm/virt/qemuguestagent.py b/lib/vdsm/virt/qemuguestagent.py
index 90da7f83e4..f96aca98f2 100644
--- a/lib/vdsm/virt/qemuguestagent.py
+++ b/lib/vdsm/virt/qemuguestagent.py
@@ -794,6 +794,9 @@ def _qga_call_get_vcpus(self, vm):
                 'Not querying QEMU-GA for guest CPU info because domain'
                 'is not running for vm-id=%s', vm.id)
             return {}
+        if vcpus is None:
+            self.log.info('Guest CPU count was not returned for vm=%s', vm.id)
+            return {}
         if 'online' in vcpus:
             count = len(taskset.cpulist_parse(vcpus['online']))
         else: