• Can my OS run without VMware Tools?

    Although a guest operating system can run without VMware Tools, always run the latest version of VMware Tools in your guest operating systems to access the latest features and updates. You can configure your virtual machine to automatically check for and apply VMware Tools upgrades each time you power on your virtual machines.

  • How is VMware Tools released?

    ISOs (containing installers): These are packaged with the product and are installed in a number of ways, depending upon the VMware product and the guest operating system installed in the virtual machine. For more information, see the Installing VMware Tools section. VMware Tools provides a different ISO file for each type of supported guest operating system: Mac OS X, Windows, Linux, NetWare, Solaris, and FreeBSD.

    Operating System Specific Packages (OSPs): Downloadable binary packages that are built and provided by VMware for particular versions of Linux distributions. OSPs are typically available for older releases, such as RHEL 6. Most current versions of Linux include Open VM Tools, eliminating the need to separately install OSPs. To download OSPs and to find important information and instructions, see VMware Tools Operating System Specific Packages (OSPs). For a list of supported guest operating systems, see VMware Compatibility Guide.

    open-vm-tools (OVT): This is the open source implementation of VMware Tools intended for Linux distribution maintainors and virtual appliance vendors. OVTs are generally included in the current versions of popular Linux distributions, allowing administrators to effortlessly install and update VMware Tools alongside other Linux packages. For more information, see KB VMware support for Open VM Tools (2073803)

  • Which operating systems are supported by open-vm-tools?
    • Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7.0 and later releases
    • SUSE Linux Enterprise 12 and later releases
    • Ubuntu 14.04 and later releases
    • CentOS 7 and later releases
    • FreeBSD 10.3, 10.4 & 11.1
    • Debian 7.x and later releases
    • Oracle Linux 7 and later
    • Fedora 19 and later releases
    • openSUSE 11.x and later releases
  • Are there VMware Tools VIB available?

    Offline bundles with VMware Tools VIB can be installed on vSphere 5.5.x, 6.0.x and 6.5.x versions using vSphere Update Manager. Offline bundles are supported from 10.2.0 and later.