Broadcom Puts Free Edition of VMware ESXi Back on Offer
Techstrong.IT, Tuesday, April 22nd, 2025
VMware ESXi free edition is back. In a hushed release last week, Broadcom dropped ESXi 8.0 Update 3e, an entry-level hypervisor for non-production use.
'Broadcom makes available the VMware vSphere Hypervisor version 8, an entry-level hypervisor. No Broadcom support is available for this offering and it is for non-production use,' the release note on Broadcom's support portal read.
The free version is currently available to download on the same portal for all registered users.
This was unexpected considering that the company culled the free version of the bare-metal hypervisor back in February 2024. The former free version which was available to users for many years had been a favorite of home users, students and professionals alike. The offer allowed small business owners and home lab operators to tinker with the hypervisor and run small production workloads at no cost.