Guide
vSphere 7 end of support: what to do now
Published · 7 min read
Short answer
VMware vSphere 7 (ESXi 7.x, vCenter Server 7.x and vSAN 7.x) reached End of General Support on 2 October 2025, after Broadcom extended the original April 2025 date by six months. Since then Broadcom gives no product support, security patches or updates for 7.x; fixes published before that date stay available as self-service for the rest of your maintenance period. Broadcom's free critical patches for perpetual licence holders without a support contract cover vSphere 8.x only, and vSphere 8 itself reaches End of General Support on 11 October 2027. A small estate on vSphere 7 therefore has three real options: upgrade (which needs an active support contract), move to another hypervisor, or move the workloads onto managed servers and retire the hosts.
The dates
| Product | General availability | End of General Support | End of Technical Guidance |
|---|---|---|---|
| ESXi 7.x | 2 April 2020 | 2 October 2025 | 2 April 2027, valid VMware contracts only |
| vCenter Server 7.x | 2 April 2020 | 2 October 2025 | 2 April 2027, valid VMware contracts only |
| vSAN 7.x | 2 April 2020 | 2 October 2025 | 2 April 2027, valid VMware contracts only |
| ESXi, vCenter Server and vSAN 8.x | 11 October 2022 | 11 October 2027 | None listed: Broadcom says no technical support and no new patches after 11 October 2027 (KB 456708) |
Broadcom's blog marks the End of Technical Guidance date as applying to valid VMware contracts only, not to Broadcom contracts. If you are not sure which you hold, ask your reseller before you plan around it. For 8.x, Broadcom's end of service notice says there is no technical support and no new patches after 11 October 2027.
What end of support means for a vSphere 7 host
- No new patches or support. Broadcom says that after 2 October 2025, customers still on vSphere 7.x cannot receive product support, security patches or updates, and cannot engage Broadcom Support for those releases.
- Old fixes stay available for a while. Under Broadcom's maintenance policy, service packs and fixes published before end of support remain available as self-service for the rest of your agreed maintenance period.
- Free critical patches do not cover 7.x. Broadcom gives perpetual licence customers with expired support access to zero-day patches, meaning Critical Severity alerts with a CVSS score of 9.0 or above, but only for supported versions, which it defines as vSphere 8.x.
- The hosts keep running. For perpetual licences whose support has expired, Broadcom says ESXi hosts and vCenter keep operating normally, virtual machines stay on and licensed features stay unlocked. What stops is access to patches and new releases, and the ability to open support requests.
- Upgrading needs a contract. The same Broadcom article warns not to add new ESXi hosts or attempt a major upgrade, such as 7.x to 8.x, without active support, because both need it for licence conversion.
Your options
| Option | What it involves | Think about |
|---|---|---|
| Upgrade to a supported vSphere release | A current subscription, then an upgrade of vCenter and each host. Broadcom no longer sells perpetual licences. | vSphere 8 support ends on 11 October 2027, and Broadcom points customers to its version 9 bundles, so price the subscription over three years, not one. |
| Move to Hyper-V | Windows Server with the Hyper-V role on your current hosts, then convert or rebuild each VM. | Windows Server core licensing, backup tooling and skills. Compared in our Proxmox vs Hyper-V guide. |
| Move to Proxmox VE | An open-source hypervisor on your current hosts, with an optional paid support subscription. | Storage design, backup tooling and who supports it day to day. |
| Move the workloads, retire the hosts | Rebuild or move each server onto a managed Linux or Windows server, so there is no hypervisor left to run. | Works well when only a handful of VMs matter. Licences tied to hardware IDs need checking. |
Most small estates end up with a mix: a few VMs retired, a few moved as they are, and the business-critical ones rebuilt on supported operating systems. Our broader guide, leaving VMware after Broadcom, walks through a typical migration.
How to decide quickly
- 01
List what runs
Every VM, its owner, operating system and real CPU, memory and disk use. Retire what nobody owns.
- 02
Get the renewal quote
Ask your reseller for a written subscription price for your core count, over three years.
- 03
Price the alternative
Hardware you can reuse, licences, backup tooling and migration effort, over the same three years.
- 04
Check the guests too
Windows Server 2016 guests lose support on 12 January 2027. Moving them once, onto a supported release, beats moving them twice.
Our VMware exit assessment does this for you at a fixed price: £1,365 (list £1,950) for up to 25 VMs or £2,450 (list £3,500) for up to 100. No VAT is added. You get the inventory, the sizing and a three-year comparison, and you decide what to do with it. For a first estimate, try the free migration cost calculator.
Sources
- Broadcom knowledge base 415405: End of General Support for vSphere 7.0 (opens in a new tab)
- Broadcom knowledge base 326984: End of General Support for vSphere 6.5/6.7/7.0 (opens in a new tab)
- VMware blog: Announcing extension of vSphere 7.x and vSAN 7.x general support (25 July 2024) (opens in a new tab)
- VMware blog: Reminder, vSphere 7 to reach End of Service on 2 October 2025 (31 March 2025) (opens in a new tab)
- Broadcom knowledge base 429208: Perpetual licence functionality after support expiration (opens in a new tab)
- Broadcom knowledge base 314603: Zero-day security patches for vSphere 8.x perpetual licence customers (opens in a new tab)
- Broadcom knowledge base 459135: End of General Support for vSphere 8.0 (opens in a new tab)
- Broadcom knowledge base 456708: Upcoming End of Service for vSphere 8, vSAN 8 and related products (opens in a new tab)
- VMware blog: End of availability of perpetual licensing and SaaS services (22 January 2024) (opens in a new tab)
- NCSC: Cyber Essentials Requirements for IT Infrastructure v3.3 (April 2026), PDF (opens in a new tab)
- Microsoft Lifecycle: Windows Server 2016 (opens in a new tab)
Facts were checked against these sources on 21 October 2026. Vendor terms change; check the source before relying on a detail.