Each VMware Live Site Recovery server can support a certain number of protected VMs, protection groups, recovery plans, and concurrent recoveries.

Protection and Recovery Maximums for VMware Live Site Recovery with enhanced replication

Important: Enhanced replications require minimum versions vSphere Replication 9.0.x, vCenter Server 8.0u2 or later, and ESXi host 8.0u2 or later.
Table 1. Protection and Recovery Maximums for VMware Site Recovery with enhanced replication
Item Maximum
Total number of virtual machines configured for protection using vSphere Replication enhanced replication 4000
Note: VMware Live Site Recovery with enhanced replication capability including 1 minute RPO, auto-scaling, and load balancing, scales to a limit of 4000 protected VMs by provisioning additional ESXi hosts to accomodate the workload requirements. The number of replicated VMs per host on the target site depends on, but is not limited to the virtual machines disks size, number of disks, change rate, and RPO.
Total number of virtual machines configured for protection using enhanced vSphere Replication with version 9.0.1 and later 5000
Total number of virtual machines per protection group 1500
Total number of recovery plans 250
Total number of protection groups per recovery plan 250
Maximum number of protected disks per virtual machine on ESXi 8.0 or earlier version. 64
Maximum number of protected disks per virtual machine on ESXi 8.0 Update 1 or later version. 256
Maximum number of protected disks per host. 8192
RPO 1 min, 5 min, 30 min, 60 min, 90 min, 120 min

Protection Maximums for VMware Live Site Recovery

Table 2. Protection Maximums for VMware Live Site Recovery
Item Maximum
Total number of virtual machines configured for protection (array-based replication, vSphere Replication, and Virtual Volumes Replication combined) 5000
Total number of virtual machines configured for protection using array-based replication 5000
Total number of virtual machines configured for protection using vSphere Replication 4000
Total number of virtual machines configured for protection using Virtual Volumes Replication 500
Note: Contact your storage vendor for exact number of supported virtual machines, replicated with Virtual Volumes Replication.
Total number of virtual machines configured for protection using vSphere Replication on vSAN Express Storage datastores 1500
Note: If you are using vSAN Express Storage datastores, the vCenter Server and ESXi must be version 8.0 Update 2b or later.
Total number of virtual machines configured for protection using array-based replication with stretched storage 1000
Total number of virtual machines per protection group 1500
Total number of array-based replication protection groups and vSphere Replication protection groups 500
Total number of recovery plans 250
Total number of protection groups per recovery plan 250
Total number of replicated datastores (using array-based replication) 255
Total number of replicated datastores (using array-based replication) per VMware Live Site Recovery 9.0.1 pair 500
Total number of replicated devices (using array-based replication) 255
Total number of replicated datastores and replicated devices (using array-based replication) 255
Total number of replicated datastores and replicated devices (using array-based replication) per VMware Live Site Recovery 9.0.1 pair 500

You can run array-based protection groups alongside vSphere Replication protection groups and storage policy protection groups in the same VMware Live Site Recovery server instance. The total number of protection groups cannot exceed 500 for all protection types combined. For example, you cannot create 250 array-based replication protection groups and then create 350 vSphere Replication protection groups, as this creates 600 protection groups in total.

If you have 250 array-based protection groups, you can create additional 250 vSphere Replication protection groups, to make a total of 500 protection groups. Similarly, in a setup that combines an array-based replication and vSphere Replication, you can protect a maximum of 5,000 virtual machines, even if you combine replication types. The protection limit for array-based replication is 5,000 virtual machines. The protection limit for vSphere Replication is 4,000 virtual machines. However, the maximum number of virtual machines that you can protect by using a combination of array-based and vSphere Replication is still 5,000 virtual machines, and not 9,000.

If you protect 3,000 virtual machines with vSphere Replication, you can protect a maximum of another 2,000 virtual machines with array-based replication.

If you protect 1,000 virtual machines with array-based replication, you can protect a maximum of another 4,000 virtual machines with vSphere Replication.

Bidirectional Protection

If you establish bidirectional protection, in which site B serves as the recovery site for site A and at the same time site A serves as the recovery site for site B, limits apply across both sites, and not per site. In a bidirectional implementation, you can protect a different number of virtual machines on each site, but the total number of protected virtual machines across both sites cannot exceed the limits.

If you protect 3,000 virtual machines using array-based replication from site A to site B, you can use array-based replication to protect a maximum of 2,000 virtual machines from site B to site A. If you are using array-based replication for bidirectional protection, you can protect a total of 5,000 virtual machines across both sites.

If you protect 155 replicated datastores using array-based replication from site A to site B, you can use array-based replication to protect a maximum of 100 replicated datastores from site B to site A. If you are using array-based replication for bidirectional protection, you can protect a total of 255 replicated datastores across both sites.

If you protect 2000 virtual machines using vSphere Replication from site A to site B, you can use vSphere Replication to protect a maximum of 2000 virtual machines from site B to site A. If you are using vSphere Replication for bidirectional protection, you can protect a maximum of 4000 virtual machines across both sites.

If you protect 3,000 virtual machines using array-based replication from site A to site B and 1,000 virtual machines using vSphere Replication from site A to site B, you can protect a maximum of 1,000 virtual machines from site B to site A. If you are using a combination of array-based replication and vSphere Replication for bidirectional protection, you can protect a maximum of 5,000 virtual machines across both sites, of which you can protect a maximum of 4,000 by using vSphere Replication.

Recovery Maximums for VMware Live Site Recovery

Item Maximum
Total number of concurrently running recovery plans. 10

IP Customization Maximums for VMware Live Site Recovery

If you implement IP customization for recovered virtual machines, you can configure a maximum of one IP address for each NIC, using DHCP, static IPv4, or static IPv6. For static IPv4 or IPv6 addresses, you provide the following information per NIC:
  • 1 IP address
  • Subnet information
  • 1 gateway server address
  • 2 DNS servers (primary and secondary)

You also set 2 WINS addresses for DHCP or IPv4, on Windows virtual machines only.

Deployment Maximums for VMware Live Site Recovery in a Shared Recovery Site Configuration

In a shared recovery site configuration, you can deploy a maximum of 10 VMware Live Site Recovery server instances for each vCenter Server instance. The limits apply to each VMware Live Site Recovery pair in a shared recovery site configuration.