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VMware configuration maximums from 1.0 to 5.1

VMware has really grown in scalability from the early days of ESX 1.0 with each new release of vSphere. I put together this table on how the configuration maximums have increased over the years so you can see just how much it scales over the years. VMware has published there Configuration Maximums documentation with each release starting with VI3 which you should be familiar with especially if you are trying to get a certification. I pieced together the earlier versions from the installation documentation for each release, there isn’t much info available on ESX 1.0 so if you know anything please fill in the blanks for me. Notice how the VM virtual disk size of 2TB has never changed, this is to due file system limitations that VMware has not yet been able to overcome. With their new Virtual Volumes architecture that limit may finally be gone. Also note on the earlier versions the documentation did not state a 2TB virtual disk limit although I’m almost positive it existed, the documentation stated “9TB per virtual disk”, not sure why though.

Configuration Maximums for VMware ESX/vSphere

VMware release:1.01.52.02.53.03.54.04.15.05.15.56.0
vCPUs per VM112244883264128
RAM per VM2GB3.6GB3.6GB3.6GB16GB64GB255GB255GB1TB1TB4TB
NICs per VM?4444410101010
VM Virtual Disk????2TB2TB2TB2TB2TB2TB62TB
VMFS Volume?64TB64TB64TB64TB64TB64TB64TB64TB64TB
pCPU per host?81616323264160160160320
vCPU per host?648080128128512512204820484096
RAM per host?64GB64GB64GB64GB256GB1TB1TB2TB2TB4TB
pNICs per host?161616323232323232

In addition hears a diagram from VMware that depicts the configuration maximums in a slightly different manner:

VMware Configuration Maximum Published Documents:

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