How to confirm when ESX host was placed into or exited Maintenance Mode

Products

• VMware vSphere ESXi

Issue/Introduction

It is believed that an ESX host was placed into Maintenance Mode but is not currently in Maintenance mode, allowing VMs to run on it unexpectedly.

• Want to confirm if host truly was placed into MM and if it exited MM.

Resolution

For each ESX host you want to confirm this for do the following.

• Connect to ESX host via SSH as root user.
• Change to log directory:
  
  cd /var/run/log
  
  
• Search for “entering maintenance mode” and “exit maintenance mode”, as well as “exitmaintenancemode” and “entermaintenancemode” using the "grep" command.
  
  Example command:
  
  grep -i "entering maintenance mode" hostd.*
  
  Example log events:
  
  

  2026-02-05T12:56:18.986Z In(166) Hostd[2099245]: [Originator@6876 sub=Vimsvc.ha-eventmgr] Event 2870 : The host has begun entering maintenance mode.

  2026-02-05T12:56:19.012Z In(166) Hostd[2099261]: [Originator@6876 sub=Vimsvc.ha-eventmgr opID=ml2mes9m-121961-auto-2m3u-h5:70021559-5b-35-47f1 sid=5216cb6c user=vpxuser:VSPHERE.LOCAL\Administrator] Event 2871 : Host ###### in ha-datacenter has started to enter maintenance mode

  2026-02-05T12:56:19.013Z Wa(164) Hostd[2099251]: [Originator@6876 sub=Vslmsvc.HostModeListener] Received Host in maintenance mode change

  2026-02-05T12:56:19.025Z In(166) Hostd[2099253]: [Originator@6876 sub=Vimsvc.ha-eventmgr] Event 2872 : The host has entered maintenance mode.

• Take note of the timestamp of first occurrence for Entering Maintenance Mode and when it Exited MM.
  • If either Entering or Exiting MM is not listed in the logs, it is likely it did not happen.