After you upgrade VMware Cloud Director and NSX Manager, you must upgrade the vCenter Server systems and ESXi hosts that are registered to VMware Cloud Director. After you upgrade all attached vCenter Server systems and ESXi hosts, you can upgrade the NSX Edges.

Prerequisites

Verify that you have already upgraded each NSX Manager that is associated with the vCenter Server systems that are attached to your cloud. See Upgrade Each NSX Manager That Is Associated with an Attached vCenter Server System.

Procedure

  1. Deactivate the vCenter Server instance.
    1. From the top navigation bar of the VMware Cloud Director Service Provider Admin Portal, under Resources, select vSphere Resources.
    2. In the left panel, click vCenter Server Instances.
    3. Select the radio button next to the vCenter Server instance you want to deactivate and click Disable.
    4. Click OK.
  2. Upgrade the vCenter Server system.

    For information, see vCenter Server Upgrade.

  3. Verify all VMware Cloud Director public URLs and certificate chains.
    1. From the top navigation bar, select Administration.
    2. In the left panel, under Settings, click Public Addresses.
    3. Verify all public addresses.
  4. Refresh the vCenter Server registration with VMware Cloud Director.
    1. From the top navigation bar of the VMware Cloud Director Service Provider Admin Portal, under Resources, select vSphere Resources.
    2. In the left panel, click vCenter Server Instances.
    3. Select the radio button next to the target vCenter Server and click Reconnect.
    4. Click OK.
  5. Upgrade each ESXi host that the upgraded vCenter Server system supports.

    See the VMware ESXi Upgrade.

    Important:

    To ensure that you have enough upgraded host capacity to support the virtual machines in your cloud, upgrade hosts in small batches. When you do this, host agent upgrades can complete in time to allow virtual machines to migrate back to the upgraded host.

    1. Use the vCenter Server system to put the host into maintenance mode and allow all the virtual machines on that host to migrate to another host.
    2. Upgrade the host.
    3. Use the vCenter Server system to reconnect the host.
    4. Use the vCenter Server system to take the host out of maintenance mode.
  6. (Optional) Upgrade NSX Edges managed by the NSX Manager associated with the upgraded vCenter Server system.

    Upgraded NSX Edges deliver improvements in performance and integration. You can use either NSX Manager or VMware Cloud Director upgrade NSX Edges.

    • For information about using NSX Manager to upgrade NSX Edges, see the NSX for vSphere documentation at https://docs.vmware.com.

    • To use VMware Cloud Director to upgrade an NSX Edge Gateway, you must operate on the VMware Cloud Director network object that the Edge supports:

      • An appropriate upgrade of an Edge Gateway occurs automatically when you use either the VMware Cloud Director or VMware Cloud Director API to reset a network that the Edge Gateway serves.

      • Redeploying an Edge Gateway upgrades the associated NSX Edge appliance.

        Note:

        Redeploying is supported only for NSX Data Center for vSphere Edge Gateways.

      • Resetting a vApp network from within the context of the vApp upgrades the NSX Edge appliance associated with that network. To reset a vApp network from within the context of a vApp, navigate to the Networks tab for the vApp, display its networking details, click the radio button next to the name of the vApp network, and click Reset.

      For more information on how to redeploy Edge Gateways and reset vApp networks, see the VMware Cloud Director API Programming Guide.

What to do next

Repeat this procedure for the other vCenter Server systems registered to your VMware Cloud Director installation.