Just installing a fancy new VMware ESXi host(s) won’t do you any good if you can’t manage it. You need to set up the VMware vSphere Client or the vSphere web client!
The VMware vSphere Client is a web-based application that connects to the vCenter Server so IT administrators can manage installations and handle inventory objects in a vSphere deployment. VSphere Client is a part of VMware’s comprehensive product line.
- VMware vSphere Client 6.0 Update 2a: VMware-viclient-all-6.0.0-4437566.exe; VMware vSphere Client 6.0 Update 3: VMware-viclient-all-6.0.0-5112508.exe; It’s worth noting that the vSphere client tends to be backwards compatible, you can check this out using VMware’s interoperability matrix. VSphere Client 6.5 and vSphere Client 6.7.
- The vSphere Client is a Windows program that you can use to configure the host and to operate its virtual machines. You can download vSphere Client from any host.
In this tutorial, you will learn how to install and set up each type of vSphere client. You will learn which client types exist and how to select the right one for the respective scenario.
Determining Client Compatibility
When you need to connect to and manage VMware ESXi, you must first know what version of ESXi you’re connecting to. Not every version of the vSphere client will work with every version of ESXi.
As of v6.5, VMware no longer releases an installable client or C# client as it’s sometimes referred to. Instead, they’ve moved to a web-based client for subsequent versions.
Before setting up a VMware vSphere client, be sure to check the VMware Product Interoperability Matrix. You’ll see below an example of checking the compatibility of the VMware v6.0 U3 client with each ESXi version using the matrix.
The VMware vSphere Client is always backward compatible within the same major version. For example, version 6.0 U3 will also work for all 6.0.0 releases.
Setting up the VMware vSphere 6.0 Client
Once you know the vSphere client compatibility with your version of ESXi, it’s time to set up the client. For this tutorial, you’ll learn how to set up the vSphere 6.0 U3 installable client, the last available installable client version.
The installable client was around from v4.1 to v6.0 and is still used today. But know that the installable (C#) client will not work with ESXi v6.5 and above.
Prerequisites
- Windows 10 or later matching the following prerequisites – The VMware vSphere client is supported on other platforms, but this tutorial will be focusing on Windows.
- VMware ESXi v4.1 to v6.0
Installing the vSphere Client
To install the vSphere client, download the vSphere 6.0 U3 client, run the installer and accept all defaults. No extra customization is necessary.
Connecting to an ESXi Host
Now that you’ve installed the vSphere client, it’s time to connect to an ESXi host. To do that:
1. Run the VMware vSphere Client shortcut that should now be on your desktop.
2. On the connection page, enter your ESXi host’s IP address or hostname along with the User name and Password. This tutorial will use the root user to log in, but this high-privileged account is unnecessary.
3. Next, click Ignore to skip past the Certificate Warnings. The client displays this warning because the certificate on the ESXi host is not trusted. If the host right after “The certificate received from” matches what you expect your ESXi host to be, the connection is safe.
To prevent this certificate warning from popping up each time you connect to your host, click on the Install this certificate and do not display and security warnings… checkbox.
If everything worked as expected, you should now see the administration interface, as shown below.
Setting up the VMWare vSphere Web Clients
Once you get past using ESXi v6.0 U3, you can’t run the installable client anymore. Instead, you must use the vSphere web client.
The type of vSphere client will vary by the version of vCenter Server you’re running but accessing the client is nearly identical for all versions.
The following instructions apply equally to the vSphere web-based clients below with the exception of the URL you must access.
- vSphere 6.7 Web Client – https://<esxi_host>/vsphere–client
- VMware vSphere Host Client for vSphere 7.0 – https://<esxi_host>/vsphere–client
- VMware HTML5 Web Client for vSphere 7.0 – https://<vcenter_host>/ui
Prerequisites
- A web browser matching the following prerequisites.
- A licensed vCenter Server (excluding the vSphere Host Client for vSphere 7.0)
- VMware ESXi v.6.5 to v7.0
Connecting to an ESXi Host or VMware Cluster
Since the web client requires no installation, you can hop straight to connect to your ESXi host, cluster, or vCenter server. To do so:
Open your favorite web browser and navigate to either https://<esxi_host>/vsphere–client or https://<vcenter_host>/ui depending on your vSphere version.
Provide a User name and Password with access to the vCenter Server and click on Login.
If everything worked as expected, you should now be in the Web Client’s main interface, as shown below.
Conclusion
You should now know how to manage any vSphere environment or individual ESXi host using a vSphere client. Whether you’re unfortunate enough to be running an older version of vSphere or you can use the latest HTML5 client, you should know now know how to connect to your virtualization environment.
Now that you’re in your VMware environment, you can explore all of the features that VMware has to offer, such as vMotion or vSphere High Availability, to name a few!
More from Adam The Automator & Friends
The VMware vSphere Client is one of the key ways in which you will interact with your VMware vSphere environment. Like most VMware products, the vSphere Client has evolved over time. We are going to take a look at the evolution of the vSphere client, and what it means for you as a VMware vSphere Administrator.
Understanding the VMware vSphere Client
Today when we talk about the vSphere Client, we mean the client you use to connect to VMware vCenter Server. Let’s just set the stage for the terms you may hear today:
- vSphere Client. How you access vCenter Server. This is what we are mostly going to talk about today.
- VAMI. vCenter Server Appliance Web Console. This is for the administration of your VCSA, and where you will kick off VCSA updates.
- VMware Host Client. How you access a single vSphere Host.
These are now all web interfaces, which is a huge step forward for the manageability of a VMware vSphere environment.
How Access to the vSphere Hypervisor Worked over Time
For a long time, the only vSphere Client available was the C# based, or thick client for Windows. This means you had to download the vSphere Client to administer your environment, and had to be using Windows. As the world around us evolved, this became impractical for a number of reasons.
First up was the vSphere Web Client. This took several releases to reach feature parity with the Windows client, and had one fatal flaw. It was based on Flash. While this was a step in the right direction, requiring flash was still a pretty big limitation.
Web technologies went through a pretty big evolution in the last ten or so years, so while we sometimes view the vSphere Web Client as a bit of pain, the fact of the matter is it was pretty much ahead of its time.
It has been a long evolution and a long road, but today the vSphere Client is HTML 5 based, which means you can access your vSphere environment at any time, from any place, with any device. Pretty cool, right?
How to Download vSphere Client for Older ESXi Versions
If you are using a modern version of vSphere, there no way and no reason to try and download the vSphere Client, since it is now HTML5 based.
As of vSphere 6.7, the vSphere Client has full feature parity with previous generations of clients, so there is no VMware vSphere client 6.7 download.
Vsphere Client 6.5
This is especially confusing for people new to VMware vSphere, since we are often conditioned to look for a client when we start using new software.
The only time you really need to download a vSphere Client, is if you need to manage a earlier version of vSphere or ESXi.
You can find the VMware KB article for downloading vSphere clients here. It has downloads for the following versions:
- vSphere 5.0
- vSphere 5.1
- vSphere 5.5
- vSphere 6
It also includes the links for updates for these major vSphere releases. Remember, you can also download the vSphere Client directly from the host or vCenter you want to manage for these earlier versions of vSphere.
You will notice there is no client available after vSphere 6. That is because vSphere 6 was the last release with the thick client. As of vSphere 6.5 or later, you will need to use either the vSphere Web Client or vSphere Client.
vSphere Web Client vs vSphere Client
As we briefly talked about earlier, the major difference between the vSphere Web Client and the vSphere Client are the technologies underneath them.
As of vSphere 6.5, these became your only two options for management. As vSphere continued to progress, more and more features became included in the vSphere Client.
This was important because the vSphere Web Client faced some limitations in usability from a practical standpoint due to its Flash/Flex underpinnings.
For vSphere 6.7 U1 and later, the HTML5 based vSphere Client has all the features and functionality of the vSphere Web Client and more. Thats why as of vSphere 6.7 U3, you see this when you log in:
Just as the C# client for Windows was phased out over time, the vSphere Web Client is being phased out as well. All new features and functionality will now be found in the vSphere Client, which isn’t a bad thing.
Accessing the VMware vSphere Client
As you can see, when you log into vCenter you still have the option to select the vSphere Client or the vSphere Web Client. I encourage everyone to try and use the vSphere Client at this point. First of all, did I mention you can use it from any device, anywhere you are? This is a huge step forward in manageability of vSphere.
Vsphere Client 65
Of course, the vSphere Client does look different than the vSphere Web Client. Since we know the vSphere Web Client is deprecated, it is important to start using the vSphere Client, and begin the process of updating any documentation in our environment that may have screen shots of older clients.
How do I get the VMware vSphere client?
Vsphere Client 5.5 Download
The good news is that there is no longer any vSphere client to download. Simply point your web browser to vCenter’s fully qualified domain name, and you will be able to access the vSphere client.
Accessing VMware from any platform
Vsphere Client Eol
You can access VMware from any platform, since the VMware vSphere Client is now a HTML 5 interface. This means the VMware vSphere Client is available on Windows, Linux, and Mac. This is very helpful when it comes to configuring vSphere.
Vsphere Client Mac
No matter if you are accessing vSphere or ESXi these days, a HTML5 based client is the one being used. This makes huge leaps forward when it comes to the manageability of your VMware environment. From creating a virtual machine to configuring iSCSI, you have everything at your fingertips any time, from and device.
Is the vSphere client free?
Many people ask if the vSphere client is free. The answer is yes, as long as you are using vCenter of course. There are not any additional charges to access your VMware environment from the vSphere client.
The vSphere Client is very intuitive and will allow you to do virtually anything you need to in your vSphere environment. It is very intuitive and easy to use. The best part? No download needed.