The enhanced virtual keyboard feature provides better handling of international keyboards and keyboards that have extra keys. This feature is available only on Windows host systems.

Note: The enhanced keyboard driver has been removed from VMware Workstation 17.6 and later.

Because it processes raw keyboard input as soon as possible, the enhanced virtual keyboard feature also offers security improvements by bypassing Windows keystroke processing and any malware that is not already at a lower layer. When you use the enhanced virtual keyboard feature, only the guest operating system acts when you press Ctrl+Alt+Delete.

Note: You cannot configure the enhanced virtual keyboard setting for a remote virtual machine.

Prerequisites

  • Power off the virtual machine.
  • If you did not install the Enhanced Keyboard Utility feature when you initially installed or upgraded Workstation Pro, install it by running the Workstation Pro installer in program maintenance mode. See Install the Enhanced Keyboard Driver on a Windows Host.

Procedure

  1. Select the virtual machine and select VM > Settings.
  2. On the Options tab, select General.
  3. Select an option from the Enhanced virtual keyboard drop-down menu.
    Option Description
    Off The virtual machine does not use the enhanced virtual keyboard feature. This is the default value.
    Use if available (recommended) The virtual machine uses the enhanced virtual keyboard feature, but only if the enhanced virtual keyboard driver is installed on the host system.
    Required The virtual machine must use the enhanced the virtual keyboard feature. If you select this option and the enhanced keyboard driver is not installed on the host system, Workstation Pro returns an error message.
  4. Click OK to save your changes.