Unable to remove expired evaluation license.

Products

• VMware vCenter Server

Issue/Introduction

1. You see alert on vCenter once logged in

          There are expired or expiring licenses in your inventory.
          
          

     2. When clicked on Manage your licenses, see that Evaluation license is expired.

     3.  Remove license option is greyed out:
         

 

Environment

• VMware vCenter server 7.x
• VMware vCenter server 8.x

Cause

If the license is though expired but if assigned to any asset in inventory, remove option will be greyed out.

Resolution

1. Go to Menu > Administration > licenses tab

2. Expand evaluation license, check in tabs if this license is assigned to any vCenter\hosts\vSAN cluster\supervisors or solutions.

3. If it is assigned, replace it with valid license and then remove expired license from inventory.

Note: If the hosts that have the license applied to are to be decommissioned, remove them from inventory from the vCenter and then the remove option should be available again.

Additional Information

How to use the vSAN License on the vSAN cluster

Managing licenses on ESXi hosts using the vSphere Web Client