Stop, Start or Restart Services on vCenter Server 7.x/8.x

Products

• VMware vCenter Server 7.0
• VMware vCenter Server 8.0

Issue/Introduction

This article provides steps to stop, start, or restart vCenter Server services.

 

For troubleshooting and maintenance purposes, it is necessary to change the status of VMware vCenter Server services such as VMware Virtual Center Server, VMware vSphere Web Client, or VMware Directory Service.

Environment

• VMware vCenter Server 7.x 
• VMware vCenter Server 8.x

Resolution

In VMware vCenter Server 7.x and higher, VMware recommends to use the vSphere Web Client or Service Control command-line tool to stop, start, or restart vCenter Server services.

• For more information about previous version of vCenter Server, see Stop, Start or Restart Services on vCenter Server 6.x or Higher
• For more information about VCSA see, Stopping, Starting or Restarting VMware vCenter Server Appliance 6.x & above services (344633)

 

Starting/Stopping/Restarting vCenter Server and/or Platform Services Controller Services:

To start/stop/restart a vCenter Server and/or Platform Services Controller service if it is has stopped using the vSphere Web Client:

1. Log in to the vSphere Web Client with a vCenter Single Sign-on administrator account.
2. Navigate to Administration > Deployment > System Configuration.
3. Click on Services to view the list of all services within the vCenter Server system.
4. To view a list of services for a specific node, click Nodes, select the node in question and click the Related Objects tab.
5. Right-click on the service you would like to start and select Start/stop/restart.

Note:

• If you restart Inventory Service in the preceding method, the Inventory Service starts but the services depending on the Inventory Service fail to start.
  • This issue will not be fixed as Inventory Service will be removed in the future release of vCenter Server.
  • To work around this issue, log in to Windows Machine and restart Inventory Service.
  • This issue does not occur in vCenter Server Appliance.

 

Start/Stop/Restart Services on a vCenter Server Appliance Using the CLI:

1. Run this command to list the vCenter Server and/or Platform Services Controller services and their statuses:
   
   service-control –-status --all
   
2. Run this command to:

5. • Start a specific service: service-control --start <service_name>
   • Start all services: service-control --start --all

To perform a dry run of the command, this displays the actions that command run without executing the actions: service-control --start --all --dry-run

• • Stop a specific service: service-control --stop <service_name>
  • Stop all services: service-control --stop --all

To perform a dry run of the command, this displays the actions that command run, without executing the actions: service-control --stop --all --dry-run

• • Restart all services at once: service-control --stop --all && service-control --start --all