For a successful upgrade of your hosts, understand and prepare for the changes that are involved. Best Practices for ESXi UpgradesWhen you upgrade hosts, you must understand and follow the best practices process for a successful upgrade. Supported Upgrades to ESXi 6.0 You can upgrade an ESXi 5.0.x, ESXi 5.1.x, ESXi 5.5.0, or ESXi 5.5.х host directly to 6.0. Upgrade Options for ESXi 6.0VMware provides several ways to upgrade ESXi 5.x hosts to ESXi 6.0 hosts. Upgrading Hosts That Have Third-Party Custom VIBsA host can have custom vSphere installation bundles (VIBs) installed, for example, for third-party drivers or management agents. When you upgrade an ESXi 5.x host to ESXi 6.0, all supported custom VIBs are migrated, regardless of whether the VIBs are included in the installer ISO. Using Manually Assigned IP Addresses for Upgrades Performed with vSphere Update ManagerIf you are using vSphere Update Manager to upgrade a host from ESXi 5.x to ESXi 6.0, you must use manually assigned IP addresses for the hosts. Manually assigned IP addresses are also called static IP addresses. Media Options for Booting the ESXi InstallerThe ESXi installer must be accessible to the system on which you are installing ESXi. Using Remote Management Applications Remote management applications allow you to install ESXi on servers that are in remote locations. Download the ESXi InstallerDownload the installer for ESXi.
