One or more of the Fiber Channel HBA adapter is showing offline on ESXi host

Products

• VMware vSphere ESXi

Issue/Introduction

Symptoms:

• In the vSphere Client UI, Storage adapter or FC HBA card on the ESXi host appears to be in offline state as shown in the screenshot below:

 

• Running this command "esxcli storage san fc list" on the ESXi host displays the Port State of the affected HBAs  in down state as highlighted below:
  
     Adapter: vmhba4
   Port ID: 000000
   Node Name: 20:00:#:#:#:#:#:#:#:#:#
   Port Name: 21:00::#:#:#:#:#:#:#:#:#
   Speed: 0 Gbps
   Port Type: LPort
   Port State: LINK DOWN
   Model Description: QLE2692 Dual Port 16Gb FC to PCIe Gen3 x8 Adapter
   Hardware Version:
   OptionROM Version: 3.62
   Firmware Version: 9.10.11 (d0d5)
   Driver Name: qlnativefc
   DriverVersion: 5.3.80.0

Environment

VMware vSphere ESXi 7.x

VMware vSphere ESXi 8.x

Cause

The issue could be due to a hardware problem with the Fibre Channel (FC) Host Bus Adapter (HBA) or a connectivity issue between the FC HBA and the connected FC switch port.

• This entry from the /var/log/vmkernel.log file of the ESXi host points to FC HBA connectivity issue with the FC fabric:

2025-10-02T12:25:30.567Z In(182) vmkernel: cpu38:2097964)qlnativefc: vmhba1(13:0.0): qlnativefcTimer:10013:Cable is unplugged.
2025-10-02T12:25:32.567Z In(182) vmkernel: cpu46:2097964)qlnativefc: vmhba2(13:0.1): qlnativefcTimer:10013:Cable is unplugged.

Resolution

Engage the hardware vendor to perform a complete diagnostic of the FC HBA and verify link stability. If the issue still persists then involve the FC Fabric vendor to inspect the FC switch port, cable, and SFP for any physical or optical issues.

Additionally, verify the HBA compatibility with the ESXi version and ensure the HBA firmware and driver are up-to-date and supported.
To validate the driver and firmware version running on the Host Bus Adapters (HBA) refer to this article:  Determining Network/Storage firmware and driver version in ESXi