If you blinked, you might have missed it: VMware, the virtualization juggernaut, has pulled a plot twist more dramatic than a soap opera season finale. The company quietly revived its free ESXi hypervisor, a move that has set the virtualization and IT communities abuzz. For those following VMware’s not-so-ordinary journey under Broadcom’s stewardship, this unexpected resurrection feels like a tech world cliffhanger – equal parts relief and confusion, garnished with just a pinch of suspicion.
Let’s back up. When Broadcom acquired VMware, the sighs from IT admins and virtualization fans could have powered a medium-sized datacenter. Known for its reliability, feature richness, and – until recently – consumer-friendly approach, VMware’s ESXi hypervisor became the platform of choice for everything from lab enthusiasts to small business server closets. ESXi’s free tier was especially beloved, giving everyone a taste of virtualization magic without the cost.
Then came the plot twist. In early 2024, VMware wielded the axe, discontinuing the free ESXi offering. The move sent shockwaves rippling across forums, blogs, and social media threads. Virtualization hobbyists, home lab aficionados, educators, and shoestring-budget startups felt the sting most acutely. Without a free ESXi, entry into the world of enterprise-class virtualization suddenly felt far more exclusive—and expensive.
But here’s where the underdog chorus crescendos. Rather than moving quietly into obscurity or shifting en masse to alternatives like Proxmox, XCP-ng, or even Microsoft’s Hyper-V (gasp!), the community kept the pressure on. Petitions circulated. Angry-yet-witty memes circulated. And, most importantly, a conversation began to (forcefully) make its way to VMware’s executive suite.
Is the timing coincidental? Hardly. There’s no mistaking that VMware’s about-face was motivated by a combination of mounting user backlash and a realization that goodwill in IT circles is tough to rebuild once lost. After all, what’s a virtualization titan without a legion of loyal fans tinkering after-hours and spreading the gospel of ESXi?
Cutting off free ESXi wasn’t just a question of dollars and cents; it was a blow to education, innovation, and community engagement. Sure, large enterprises pay the bills, but the grassroots crowd are the tastemakers and troubleshooters who make VMware technology look good.
Under Broadcom, there were whispers of aggressive license enforcement, leaner product portfolios, and a laser focus on enterprise revenues. Many speculated this spelled the end of VMware’s long-standing courtship of the independent IT crowd. The free ESXi’s sudden disappearance seemed to confirm that suspicion.
Now, with its surprise return, some are wondering aloud: Is this a genuine reversal, or a shrewd PR move? The answer probably lies somewhere in the virtual appliance that powers VMware’s own risk calculations.
Plenty of users have already moved onto alternative platforms, burned by the rug-pull of early 2024. Proxmox, in particular, saw a surge in tutorials and migration guides. Some die-hards, though, never fully abandoned ESXi—they kept their home labs on life support, holding out for a comeback. Their faith, it seems, was partially rewarded.
Enterprise features, naturally, remain locked behind paywalls, as they always have. But for most non-commercial users, the essential experience remains: deploy, experiment, snapshot, break things, fix them, repeat. This, in the end, is the heartbeat of technical progress.
Proxmox VE, for instance, is open-source, community-driven, and rapidly maturing. The same goes for XCP-ng, with its Xen-based underpinnings and solid community support. Even Microsoft, whose Hyper-V technology rides atop every Pro and Enterprise install of Windows, found favor with spurned VMware devotees.
In other words, pulling ESXi back from the market wasn’t just a misguided business move—it was potentially a strategic blunder that could have cost VMware its core influencer network. The return of free ESXi signals a recognition of this risk. It’s difficult to build industry dominance on lock-ins and license fees alone; you need evangelists, tinkerers, and, yes, the occasional grumpy Redditor.
First: never underestimate the power of your enthusiast base. Professional IT buyers arguably make the final purchasing decisions for big-ticket infrastructure, but it’s the hands-on techies, the after-hours homelabbers, who set the trends and unearth the bugs. Ignore them at your peril.
Second: transparency and communication matter. VMware’s low-key about-face may have prevented another round of drama, but clearer messaging about why the free tier was killed – and what factors led to its revival – would go a long way to rebuilding trust.
Third: in a world brimming with open-source alternatives, brand loyalty is fragile. Remove the perks that fostered your early fans, and you’ll quickly discover how readily they’ll evangelize your competitors.
What VMware does next will be telling. Will there be new community initiatives or beta programs? Will there be robust support channels for individual users? Or will the strategic focus remain on squeezing maximum value from the enterprise segment? These are open questions as the tech world watches VMware’s next moves with a mixture of hope and skepticism.
VMware’s decision to restore the free ESXi tier confirms that even in a container-mad world, the humble hypervisor isn’t obsolete. It anchors hybrid clouds, powers on-prem labs, and forms the backbone of disaster recovery plans everywhere. By re-embracing its growing community, VMware may have bought itself crucial goodwill in a time of rapid change.
Key advice: read the licensing terms carefully. VMware is clear that the free ESXi is for community and individual use, not for running your buddy’s ecommerce startup on the sly. That said, for learning, experimentation, and non-commercial side projects, it’s everything you remember—and perhaps a little more.
There are countless getting-started guides online, many now updated to include notes on the new free tier. Even better, the community is energized anew; forums and Discords are pulsing with fresh ideas, scripts, and optimization tips.
But for now, the free ESXi is back, and that’s cause for cautious celebration. Just remember to keep those VM exports handy, and maybe don’t dismantle your test Proxmox cluster just yet.
By bringing it back (even quietly, sheepishly), VMware has acknowledged something every good IT pro intuitively knows: you can’t build the future on closed doors and silent hallways. Sometimes, the best way to maintain your place at the top is to open the gates and let the next generation of tinkerers in, license key and all.
So, dust off those home servers. Feed your VMs. Toast VMware’s change of heart, if only for now. The virtual world turns, but no one forgets who made it possible to spin up your first “hello world” on a decrepit desktop in a chilly spare room. In the world of technology, as in life, sometimes the community really does get the last word.
Source: inkl VMware has quietly brought back a popular free product over a year after killing it off
VMware’s Recent History: A Tale of Drama and Discontent
Let’s back up. When Broadcom acquired VMware, the sighs from IT admins and virtualization fans could have powered a medium-sized datacenter. Known for its reliability, feature richness, and – until recently – consumer-friendly approach, VMware’s ESXi hypervisor became the platform of choice for everything from lab enthusiasts to small business server closets. ESXi’s free tier was especially beloved, giving everyone a taste of virtualization magic without the cost.Then came the plot twist. In early 2024, VMware wielded the axe, discontinuing the free ESXi offering. The move sent shockwaves rippling across forums, blogs, and social media threads. Virtualization hobbyists, home lab aficionados, educators, and shoestring-budget startups felt the sting most acutely. Without a free ESXi, entry into the world of enterprise-class virtualization suddenly felt far more exclusive—and expensive.
A Community Uproar Turns the Tide
The news didn’t sit well. Outrage? Certainly. Confusion? Absolutely. A torrent of frustration poured in: Reddit threads lit up, Twitter (fine, “X”) users let the sarcasm flow, and virtualization podcasts featured segments with titles like, “VMware, Why?”But here’s where the underdog chorus crescendos. Rather than moving quietly into obscurity or shifting en masse to alternatives like Proxmox, XCP-ng, or even Microsoft’s Hyper-V (gasp!), the community kept the pressure on. Petitions circulated. Angry-yet-witty memes circulated. And, most importantly, a conversation began to (forcefully) make its way to VMware’s executive suite.
Quiet, Please: The Free ESXi Returns
Now, with little fanfare, VMware has rolled back its controversial decision. The free version of ESXi is back from the dead, appearing in the lineup for community use per the latest release notes and download pages. It’s the virtual equivalent of your favorite band announcing a surprise reunion – no press conference, just new tour dates quietly posted online. Industry insiders were tipped off by sleuths at TechRadar Pro, who noticed the reappearance less than a year after the product’s apparent demise.Is the timing coincidental? Hardly. There’s no mistaking that VMware’s about-face was motivated by a combination of mounting user backlash and a realization that goodwill in IT circles is tough to rebuild once lost. After all, what’s a virtualization titan without a legion of loyal fans tinkering after-hours and spreading the gospel of ESXi?
Why Free ESXi Mattered in the First Place
To grasp the ripple effect of VMware’s course reversal, you have to understand the role of free ESXi in the tech ecosystem. While the company’s paid offerings have long been industry standards for enterprises, the no-cost ESXi gave professionals and enthusiasts a way to experiment, prototype, and learn without budget approvals and procurement headaches. Universities used it to train the next generation of IT staff. SMBs ran mission-critical servers on it. Power users built sophisticated home labs replicating real-world infrastructure.Cutting off free ESXi wasn’t just a question of dollars and cents; it was a blow to education, innovation, and community engagement. Sure, large enterprises pay the bills, but the grassroots crowd are the tastemakers and troubleshooters who make VMware technology look good.
Broadcom and VMware: Corporate Moves, Customer Blues
When Broadcom took the driver’s seat, it wasted little time in reorganizing VMware’s product offerings and subscription models. Investors applauded—it’s what investors do when companies trim costs and tweak revenue streams. Customers? Not so much. The discontinuation of free ESXi was symbolic of the new, less cuddly VMware.Under Broadcom, there were whispers of aggressive license enforcement, leaner product portfolios, and a laser focus on enterprise revenues. Many speculated this spelled the end of VMware’s long-standing courtship of the independent IT crowd. The free ESXi’s sudden disappearance seemed to confirm that suspicion.
Now, with its surprise return, some are wondering aloud: Is this a genuine reversal, or a shrewd PR move? The answer probably lies somewhere in the virtual appliance that powers VMware’s own risk calculations.
How Did the Community React?
The short answer: with cautious optimism. Forums that once hosted rants about betrayal now feature tentatively hopeful updates: “It’s back! But for how long?” Skepticism runs deep; after all, trust isn’t rebuilt with a single download link.Plenty of users have already moved onto alternative platforms, burned by the rug-pull of early 2024. Proxmox, in particular, saw a surge in tutorials and migration guides. Some die-hards, though, never fully abandoned ESXi—they kept their home labs on life support, holding out for a comeback. Their faith, it seems, was partially rewarded.
A Closer Look at the New Free ESXi
So, what’s changed? The high-level summary: the new free ESXi appears to restore most, if not all, of the previous personal-use features. Licensing terms now specifically reference “community” use, which suggests some tweaks in eligibility and perhaps functionality. VMware has retained the core features that made ESXi attractive for home and learning environments—support for a small set of VM instances, robust management tools, and that wonderful synergy with vSphere Client (at least, as far as the fine print allows).Enterprise features, naturally, remain locked behind paywalls, as they always have. But for most non-commercial users, the essential experience remains: deploy, experiment, snapshot, break things, fix them, repeat. This, in the end, is the heartbeat of technical progress.
Virtualization Wars: Why This Move Matters
The stakes might sound niche, but virtualization touches every aspect of modern computing. Cloud platforms, enterprise operations, disaster recovery strategies, hobby projects—ESXi fits into all of it. When VMware sours its relationship with entry-level users, it indirectly encourages a migration toward alternatives. And competitors are always waiting.Proxmox VE, for instance, is open-source, community-driven, and rapidly maturing. The same goes for XCP-ng, with its Xen-based underpinnings and solid community support. Even Microsoft, whose Hyper-V technology rides atop every Pro and Enterprise install of Windows, found favor with spurned VMware devotees.
In other words, pulling ESXi back from the market wasn’t just a misguided business move—it was potentially a strategic blunder that could have cost VMware its core influencer network. The return of free ESXi signals a recognition of this risk. It’s difficult to build industry dominance on lock-ins and license fees alone; you need evangelists, tinkerers, and, yes, the occasional grumpy Redditor.
Lessons Learned: What This Saga Tells Us
VMware’s free ESXi resurrection offers several timely lessons for the tech industry at large.First: never underestimate the power of your enthusiast base. Professional IT buyers arguably make the final purchasing decisions for big-ticket infrastructure, but it’s the hands-on techies, the after-hours homelabbers, who set the trends and unearth the bugs. Ignore them at your peril.
Second: transparency and communication matter. VMware’s low-key about-face may have prevented another round of drama, but clearer messaging about why the free tier was killed – and what factors led to its revival – would go a long way to rebuilding trust.
Third: in a world brimming with open-source alternatives, brand loyalty is fragile. Remove the perks that fostered your early fans, and you’ll quickly discover how readily they’ll evangelize your competitors.
VMware’s Challenge: Rebuilding Goodwill (Again)
With ESXi free once more, VMware faces a familiar challenge: winning back the hearts and minds of the very users it spurned. Some will return, eager to dust off their old VMs. Others have moved on, happy with alternate platforms. Most, it’s safe to say, will proceed warily, always keeping a backup export handy.What VMware does next will be telling. Will there be new community initiatives or beta programs? Will there be robust support channels for individual users? Or will the strategic focus remain on squeezing maximum value from the enterprise segment? These are open questions as the tech world watches VMware’s next moves with a mixture of hope and skepticism.
What’s Next for Virtualization?
The broader virtualization market is undergoing its own transformation. Kubernetes, containerization, serverless computing—each represents a new challenge to traditional hypervisor models. But virtualization isn’t going anywhere; if anything, it’s becoming more essential as IT environments grow more dynamic and distributed.VMware’s decision to restore the free ESXi tier confirms that even in a container-mad world, the humble hypervisor isn’t obsolete. It anchors hybrid clouds, powers on-prem labs, and forms the backbone of disaster recovery plans everywhere. By re-embracing its growing community, VMware may have bought itself crucial goodwill in a time of rapid change.
How to Get Started with the New Free ESXi
If you’re a home lab enthusiast or an IT newcomer, there’s never been a better moment to jump into the world of ESXi. The reissued free version is available for download directly from VMware’s official site. Registration is required—expect to hand over an email address in exchange for your shiny new license key.Key advice: read the licensing terms carefully. VMware is clear that the free ESXi is for community and individual use, not for running your buddy’s ecommerce startup on the sly. That said, for learning, experimentation, and non-commercial side projects, it’s everything you remember—and perhaps a little more.
There are countless getting-started guides online, many now updated to include notes on the new free tier. Even better, the community is energized anew; forums and Discords are pulsing with fresh ideas, scripts, and optimization tips.
A Reality Check: Proceed with Eyes Wide Open
Before anyone throws a ticker-tape parade, it’s prudent to note: the virtualization landscape is forever fluid, and VMware’s roadmap is not immune to sharp bends and abrupt detours. The company, and its new masters at Broadcom, could shift gears again. They could tweak the free license, restrict features, or even kill it off with the next quarterly report.But for now, the free ESXi is back, and that’s cause for cautious celebration. Just remember to keep those VM exports handy, and maybe don’t dismantle your test Proxmox cluster just yet.
Final Thoughts: Community Voices Triumph... For Now
This episode will go down as a potent reminder of what happens when a tech giant loses touch with its roots. The ESXi free tier isn’t just a product. It’s a symbol—a handshake with the thousands of professionals, educators, and hobbyists who keep the digital world turning.By bringing it back (even quietly, sheepishly), VMware has acknowledged something every good IT pro intuitively knows: you can’t build the future on closed doors and silent hallways. Sometimes, the best way to maintain your place at the top is to open the gates and let the next generation of tinkerers in, license key and all.
So, dust off those home servers. Feed your VMs. Toast VMware’s change of heart, if only for now. The virtual world turns, but no one forgets who made it possible to spin up your first “hello world” on a decrepit desktop in a chilly spare room. In the world of technology, as in life, sometimes the community really does get the last word.
Source: inkl VMware has quietly brought back a popular free product over a year after killing it off
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