On the 17th April 2018, VMware released ESXi 6.7 Build 8169922, which is known as the general availability build of the product, or GA. Almost two years have now past and 17 new updates have been created. The latest version at the time of writing (21st November 2019) this article is Build 15018017 (U3(a)).
A common problem posted at Experts Exchange are issues with the current version of ESXi 6.7, which have been resolved with the latest release of ESXi 6.7. Although ESXi 6.7 is not Microsoft Windows, VMware does release Critical and Security updates on a regular basis, which need to be applied to production servers.
To get your system up to the recommended standard, this article will show you how to update ESXi 6.7 GA to ESXi 6.7u3(a) quickly and easily (in 2 steps!) if your ESXi host has access to the internet, this method will pull the update direct from the internet and update the ESXi host. If you prefer the slower old fashioned method or your host does not have access to this internet, please follow this article - HOW TO: Update VMware ESXi 6.7 GA to ESXi 6.7U3(a) in 5 easy steps.
Before we get started:
It is important to ensure you have valid backups of your virtual machines before you make any changes to a Production VMware vSphere Hypervisor ESXi 6.7 GA Host server, which is hosting virtual machines. All virtual machines must be powered off with the server in maintenance mode.
Here are the steps to upgrade your software:
1. Connect to the ESXi 6.7 host server via SSH
At the console prompt, type
vmware -l
to confirm the ESXi version. VMware ESXi 6.7 GA or later should be returned, though this will depend upon whether any patches have been applied.
2. Use esxcli at the console command line to update the server
esxcli system maintenanceMode set -e true
this command enables maintenance mode. The host ESXi server must be in maintenance mode to be patched and updated.
esxcli network firewall ruleset set -e true -r httpClient
this command enables httpClient via the firewall.
esxcli software profile update -p ESXi-6.7.0-20191104001-standard -d https://hostupdate.vmware.com/software/VUM/PRODUCTION/main/vmw-depot-index.xml
this command pulls the update direct from the internet and updates the host.
esxcli network firewall ruleset set -e false -r httpClient
reboot
5. Check the ESXi 6.7 GA Host server has been updated.
Congratulations, you have successfully updated your host server from VMware ESXi 6.7 GA to VMware ESXi 6.7u3(a). This method works for all versions of ESXi and updates, you just need to change the updates!
Basic VMware Articles Series:
During this series of articles, VMware released VMware vSphere 5.5 and VMware vSphere Hypervisor ESXi 5.5. These articles are also applicable to VMware vSphere Hypervisor ESXi 5.0 and 5.5. For consistency, I have used VMware vSphere Hypervisor ESXi 5.1 throughout this series:
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