By — Paul Turner, VP Product Management, Cloud Platform Business Unit, VMware
VMware is committed to bringing great products to market that meet our customers’ short and long term needs. This means listening to our customers when designing compelling new products and when we provide world class support throughout the product lifecycle.
In these challenging times, many customers have reached out to share how their businesses have been impacted by Covid-19. The current business environment has created a climate of uncertainty leading to challenges for IT operations and strategic planning. While these customers look to resume regular business at some point in the near future, they need stable, non-disruptive operations now to help with that transition to a desired future state.
To help customers with that transition, we are extending the general support period for vSphere 6.7. Originally, vSphere 6.7 was scheduled to reach EoGS (End of General Support) on November 15, 2021. We are extending this date by 11 months, to October 15, 2022.
The original EoTG (End of Technical Guidance) date of November 15, 2023 still applies for vSphere 6.7. There is no change in supportability dates for any other vSphere release.
vSphere 7, released earlier this year, is the biggest enhancement to ESX in over a decade. It includes major new capabilities such as running modern containerized applications natively on vSphere, improved operations capabilities such as workload-oriented DRS, and enhanced intrinsic security. However, we know it takes time to plan and execute upgrades for vSphere, given how fundamental it is to our customers’ entire IT infrastructure footprint. This is especially true in the current environment.
Our intent for this added period of supportability for vSphere 6.7 is to offer customers worry-free stability and an added buffer period for planning future upgrades as they resume regular operations moving forward.
If you have any questions about this announcement, please reach out to your VMware Representative, your VMware Reseller Partner, or contact VMware Support.
You can learn about the latest innovations and benefits of vSphere 7 on the product website.
