Unable to Connect from the VMware Host Client to an ESXi Host After Upgrading to ESXi 6.0 or Later

After you upgrade your host from ESXi 5.5 to ESXi 6.0 or later, your browser console might display an error message when you attempt to access your ESXi host by using the VMware Host Client, and your connection might fail.

Problem

After you upgrade your ESXi host from 5.5 to 6.0 or later, attempting to navigate to http://host-name/ui or http://host-IP-address/ui might result in the following error:

503 Service Unavailable (Failed to connect to endpoint: [N7Vmacore4Http16LocalServiceSpecE:0xffa014e8] _serverNamespace = /ui _isRedirect = false _port = 8308)

Cause

A change to /etc/vmware/rhttpproxy/endpoints.conf remains after an upgrade and causes the /ui endpoint to override the VMware Host Client.

When the /ticket is missing from the endpoint.conf file on your 6.0 or later ESXi host, your in-browser virtual machine console displays a Failed to connect error message but the VMware Remote Console continues to work.

Solution

1. Log in to your ESXi host either by using SSH or ESXi Shell.
   If you use SSH, you might need to enable SSH first. You can enable SSH by using DCUI.
2. Back up the endpoints.conf file.

   cp
   		/etc/vmware/rhttpproxy/endpoints.conf /tmp

3. Open the /etc/vmware/rhttpproxy/endpoints.conf file in an editor and remove the following line.

    /ui local 8308 redirect
   		allow

4. Restart the reverse Web proxy .

   		/etc/init.d/rhttpproxy restart

5. Try to access the VMware Host Client at http://host-name/ui or http://host-IP-address/ui.