You must assign a license to an ESXi host before its evaluation period expires or its currently assigned license expires. If you upgrade, combine, or divide vSphere licenses in Customer Connect, you must assign the new licenses to ESXi hosts and remove the old licenses.

Prerequisites

  • To view and manage licenses in the vSphere environment, you must have the Global.Licenses privilege on the vCenter Server system, where the vSphere Client or the vSphere Web Client runs.

Procedure

  1. Navigate to the host in the inventory.
  2. Select the Configure tab.
  3. Under Settings, select Licensing.
  4. Click Assign License.
  5. In the Assign License dialog box, select the task that you want to perform.
    • In the vSphere Client, select an existing license or select a newly created license.
    Task Steps
    Select an existing license Select an existing license from the list and click OK.
    Select a newly created license
    1. Click the New License tab.
    2. In the Assign License dialog box, type or copy and paste a license key and click OK.
    3. Enter a name for the new license and click OK.

      Details about the product, product features, capacity, and expiration period appear on the page.

    4. Click OK.
    5. In the Assign License dialog box, select the newly created license, and click OK.
    • In the vSphere Web Client, select an existing license or select a newly created license.
    Task Steps
    Select an existing license Select an existing license from the list and click OK.
    Select a newly created license
    1. Click the Create New License (Create license icon) icon.
    2. In the New Licenses dialog box, type or copy and paste a license key and click Next.
    3. On the Edit license names page, enter a name for the new license and click Next.
    4. Click Finish.
    5. In the Assign License dialog box, select the newly created license, and click OK.

Results

The license is assigned to the host. Capacity from the license is allocated according to the license use of the host.