vSphere Web Client Support beyond Adobe Flash EOL

vSphere Web Client in vSphere 7

In vSphere 7, the vSphere Client (HTML5) is the only client to manage all the vSphere workflows. Starting with vSphere 6.7 Update 1, vSphere Client (HTML5) has become feature complete to support vSphere management capabilities as that of the vSphere Web Client (Flash). VMware discussed the topic in this blog, in October of 2018:  https://blogs.vmware.com/vsphere/2018/10/fully-featured-vsphere-client-in-vsphere-6-7-update-1.html

VMware also bid farewell to the vSphere Web Client in August of 2017, in this blog post; https://blogs.vmware.com/vsphere/2017/08/goodbye-vsphere-web-client.html reminding customers that there would be no vSphere Web Client in the coming versions vSphere.

vSphere Web Client beyond Adobe Flash End-of-Life

As it is evident, vSphere Web Client uses Adobe Flash which is being sunset soon. By Dec 2020, Adobe is stopping the support for Flash and all the browser vendors are aligned with this timeline to disable running Flash on them. Due to this sunsetting, there is a window of about 11 months where the Flash client (vSphere Web Client) may not work in customer environments when browsers are upgraded to the latest version.

VMware’s recommendation is to upgrade vCenter Servers to vSphere 6.7 Update 3 and use HTML5 based vSphere Client to manage vSphere environments. Customers will not need to upgrade ESXi hosts to 6.7 version as a method of addressing Flash Client supportability. Note that a 6.7 vCenter Server can manage vSphere 6.5 ESXi hosts.

VMware will continue to support vSphere Web Client for vSphere 6.5 and 6.7 till the end of support for these versions on browsers where Adobe Flash can run. Additional information about VMware’s support for vSphere Web Client on vSphere 6.5 and 6.7 versions are covered in this KB article, vSphere Web (Flash) Client Supportability and End of Life (78589): https://kb.vmware.com/s/article/78589

Browser Support Statements:

• Microsoft: https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/help/4520411/adobe-flash-end-of-support
• Google: https://www.blog.google/products/chrome/saying-goodbye-flash-chrome/
• Mozilla: https://blog.mozilla.org/futurereleases/2017/07/25/firefox-roadmap-flash-end-life/

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