vSAN license state change to “Unassigned” after vCenter upgrade from 7 to 8

Products

• VMware vCenter Server

Issue/Introduction

• Upgrade vCenter from 7 to 8.
• ESXi may or may not upgrade.
• Previous used vSAN license state change to “Unassigned”.
• vSAN clusters will be assigned an evaluation license.

 

Cause

vSAN licensing is tied to the version of the vCenter server. If you are running vCenter 8.0 you will need to use vSAN 8 licensing for all clusters under the vCenter. Because of this when you upgrade vCenter from 7 to 8 for example, by default the vSAN clusters will be assigned an evaluation license.

Resolution

1. Get the correct vSAN licenses from your entitlements in the Broadcom portal.
2. Install the license, and apply it to the impacted clusters.
3. Remove the unused old vSAN license.