vCenter Server requirements
VMware Horizon supports multiple versions of vSphere. The purchase of Horizon licenses entitles users to use the latest supported version of both vSphere and vCenter Servers, although support is maintained for some older versions due to restrictions that some organizations may be under.
The following versions of vSphere are supported by VMware Horizon:
- vSphere 6.7.0
- vSphere 6.5.0, 6.5 U1, or 6.5 U2
- vSphere 6.0 (Update 1 or newer is required to support the latest Horizon features; Update 2 or newer is required to support VSAN 6.2)
- vSphere 5.5 (Update 3b or newer recommended; SSLv3 must be re-enabled as described in VMware KB article 2139396) (https://kb.vmware.com/s/article/2139396)
Consult the VMware Product Interoperability Matrices for an updated list of the supported versions of vSphere and vCenter Servers. Supporting earlier versions of vSphere and vCenter Servers is important for customers who are already running earlier versions of either software platform, and cannot, or will not, upgrade for some reason. Even with this support, the use of dedicated ESXi servers and vCenter Servers for your Horizon environment is recommended to ensure that all the latest Horizon features are supported.
There are multiple Horizon features that are supported only if certain other prerequisites are met. Examples of these vSphere version-dependent features include the following:
- vSphere 6 is required to use VMware vSAN, or Windows 10 as a desktop OS
- Prior to vSphere 6, the vCenter Server Appliance could not support the maximum number of desktops that can be deployed in a single Horizon Pod
- Some virtual desktop graphics acceleration technologies, such as NVDIA GRID Tesla processor-based server cards (https://www.nvidia.com/en-us/design-visualization/technologies/virtual-gpu/), require vSphere 6 or newer.
A complete list of Horizon features that require specific versions of vSphere or vCenter Server may be found in VMware document Horizon 7 Installation (https://docs.vmware.com/en/VMware-Horizon-7/index.html) or the Horizon 7 Release Notes (https://docs.vmware.com/en/VMware-Horizon-7/7.6/rn/horizon-76-view-release-notes.html) that accompany each release of the Horizon platform.