Cycles: Final Render differs from Viewport

Question

I'm attempting to use Cycles to render my procedurally generated planet, but the final render is different from what I see in the viewport. My clouds, generated using noise and a couple of other simple nodes, are reduced to a bunch of triangles of varying transparency.

Viewport:

Render:

Cloud Node Setup:

Link to .blend file: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1YWWlHg8np9970eA50umKagPwdwXuM12m/view?usp=sharing

Some things to take into account.

1. I have shaded all three, the clouds, atmosphere, and planet, smooth.
2. The sample amount for the viewport and render are the same

If any more information is needed, please let me know.

Answer 1

What just happened to your clouds mesh? It looks awful, this topology is far from reasonable mesh.

I kind of know you're probably want to make it thick then a surface ball. That's not how most of the CG render do, if you are making thing in volume rather than surface, the material should connect to output, and also you should use volume shader rather than surface shader (eg. Principled Volume).

You can still use a surface ball to mock the effect with better control, and please aware the problem of "z-fighting" if you setup your earth to three different mesh with little difference distance.

If you still want the thickness of cloud and atmosphere, use solidify modifier instead. It will give you a better control and a more convenience method to manage your object.