How to upgrade VMware Tools in vSphere

VMware Tools is a suite of utilities that enhances the performance of the virtual machine’s guest operating system. It improves the management of the virtual machine. It is worth noting that, the guest VM can run without VMware Tools. But some core VMware features will not be available until you install VMware Tools. For instance, if you do not have VMware Tools installed on your virtual machine. You cannot use the shutdown or restart options from the toolbar. You can use only the power options etc. In this article, you will learn How to upgrade VMware Tools in vSphere. Please see the Differences between vSphere and ESXi and Center, and How to enable Hyper-V on a VMware Workstation.

Note: If you don’t update VMware Tools as frequently as possible. You will be prompted with a warning message that “A new version of VMware Tools is available for this version”. This means, the version of VMware Tool you are running is outdated and you will also be missing the improved performance and compatibilities available in the newer version. Here are some exciting articles: How to solve VMware workstation .lck error, and How to install Windows Server 2022 on VMware Workstation.

Update VMware Tools in vSphere

To do this, open the VMware vSphere web client and log in to your vSphere environment.

As mentioned above already, when a new version of VMware Tools is available. you see a notification in the status bar of the guest operating system as shown below. You can directly click on the Upgrade VMware Tools link as shown below.

Alternatively, you could click on the Action Menu, select Guest OS and then click on Upgrade VMware Tools. Please see How to remove recent connections from the vSphere Client.

I do not want an interactive upgrade, therefore, I will proceed with the Automatic Upgrade. Next, click on Upgrade. In this manner, the VM will be automatically rebooted. To avoid this, kindly add this command in the Advanced Options window as shown below.

/s /v "/qn REBOOT=ReallySuppress"

As you can see below, the VMware Tool upgrade has been initiated and the progress will be visible shortly in the status under the Recent Task.

Shortly, the upgrade will be completed, and that is all. Please see OOBEZDP: Something went wrong during the Windows deployment, how to backup and restore a Windows DHCP Server via the DHCP Manager and PowerShell, and Lifecycle rules: Transition to Glacier still appears in s3

Note: You can install VMware updates via the In-guest updates, and PowerCLI etc. Now, you have successfully updated. This latest version of VMware Tools enhances the performance of the virtual machine’s guest operating system and improves virtual machine management.

I hope you found this blog post helpful on how to upgrade VMware Tools in vSphere If you have any questions, please let me know in the comment section.