vCenter Server Upgrade Compatibility

The upgrade to vCenter Server 7.0 affects other software components of the data center.

Upgrading vCenter Server and Related VMware Products and Components summarizes how upgrading vCenter Server can affect your data center components.

vCenter Server 7.0 can manage ESXi version 6.5 hosts in the same cluster with ESXi 7.0 hosts. vCenter Server 7.0 cannot manage ESXi 6.0 or earlier hosts.

vSphere supports upgrades from vCenter Server 6.5 and later to vCenter Server 7.0. To upgrade from vCenter Server 5.0, 5.1, 5.5, or 6.0 you must first upgrade the vCenter Server instance to version 6.5 or later releases, and then upgrade to vCenter Server 7.0. For information about upgrading vCenter Server 5.0, 5.1, 5.5, or 6.0 to version 6.5 or 6.7, see the VMware vSphere 6.5 Documentation or VMware vSphere 6.7 Documentation

Table 1. Upgrading vCenter Server and Related VMware Products and Components

Product or Component	Compatibility
vCenter Server	Verify support for the upgrade path from your current version of vCenter Server to your planned upgrade version. See the VMware Product Interoperability Matrix at http://www.vmware.com/resources/compatibility/sim/interop_matrix.php.
vCenter Server database	Verify that your database is supported for the vCenter Server version that you are upgrading to. Upgrade the database if necessary. See the VMware Product Interoperability Matrix at http://www.vmware.com/resources/compatibility/sim/interop_matrix.php. Note: vCenter Server 7.0 uses PostgreSQL for the embedded database. vCenter Server 7.0 does not support external databases.
ESX and ESXi hosts	Verify that your ESX or ESXi host works with the vCenter Server version that you are upgrading to. vCenter Server 7.0 requires ESXi host version 6.5 or later. Upgrade if necessary. See the VMware Product Interoperability Matrix at http://www.vmware.com/resources/compatibility/sim/interop_matrix.php.
VMware Host Profiles	Host Profiles is a vCenter Server tool for designing and deploying ESX and ESXi hosts. Ensure that you are using Host Profiles version 6.0 or later. See Knowledge Base article KB 52932. For more information on upgrade problems related to Host Profiles, see Upgrade Issues with vCenter Server Containing Host Profiles and the sections on Host Profiles upgrade workflows in the vSphere Host Profiles documentation.
VMFS volumes	ESXi no longer supports VMFS3 datastores. The ESXi host automatically upgrades VMFS3 to VMFS5 when mounting existing datastores. You cannot upgrade a VMFS5 datastore to VMFS6. If you have a VMFS5 datastore in your environment, create a VMFS6 datastore and migrate virtual machines from the VMFS5 datastore to VMFS6. For more information on VMFS datastores, see the vSphere Storage documentation.
Virtual machines	Upgrade options depend on your current version. See the information about upgrading virtual machines in the ESXi Upgrade documentation.
VMware Tools	Upgrade options depend on your current version. See the information about upgrading VMware Tools in the ESXi Upgrade documentation.
Auto Deploy	To ensure compatibility and best performance, when you upgrade to vCenter Server 7.0, use Auto Deploy to upgrade ESXi hosts to the same version.
vSphere Distributed Virtual Switch (DVS)	You must upgrade to DVS version 6.5 or later before you upgrade to vCenter Server 7.0. See Knowledge Base article KB 52826.
vSphere Network I/O Control	DVS version 6.0 or later supports only Network I/O Control version 3. If you are using an earlier version of Network I/O Control you must upgrade to Network I/O Control version 3. For more information, see the vSphere Networking documentation.
vSAN	To avoid potential faults because of differences in the vSAN support in vCenter Server and ESXi, synchronize versions of vCenter Server and ESXi. For the best integration between vSAN components on vCenter Server and ESXi, deploy the latest version of these two vSphere components. For more information, see the ESXi Installation and Setup, vCenter Server Installation and Setup, ESXi Upgrade, and vCenter Server Upgrade documentation.
vSAN disk version	vSAN has several different on-disk format versions available depending on the version and upgrade history of the cluster. Some on-disk format versions are transient while others are intended for long-term production. As certain vSAN features are tied to the on-disk format version, the format version must be accounted for when determining interoperability. See Knowledge Base article KB 2148493.
Legacy Fault Tolerance	If the vCenter Server inventory contains a VM on which legacy VMware Fault Tolerance (FT) is in use, upgrade or migration will be blocked until you turn off this feature. For information about legacy FT, see Knowledge Base article KB 2143127. For information on disabling or turning off FT, see Knowledge Base article KB 1008026.