NSX-T Edge VM Hardware Version upgrade

VMware NSX VMware NSX-T Data Center

This article has been created to describe all the steps and conditions for upgrading the hardware version for Edge VMs

Prior to NSX-T 4.0.1, Edge VM hardware version was 13.
Starting from NSX 4.0.1, there is additional feature support which requires upgrade of the Edge HW version.
Upgraded HW version is a requirement for running SmartNIC-enabled Edge.
SmartNIC requires a minimum version combination of vSphere 8.0, NSX-T 4.0.1 and Edge Hardware Version 20.

VMware NSX-T Data Center

VMware NSX

There are now a number of possible Edge VM HW versions and they are determined by the ESXi Host version where the Edge VM is running.

NSX-T 4.0.1 is supported only with vSphere 7.x and vSphere 8.x environments.

Greenfield Deployments

NSX-T Edge node auto-deployed, from NSX-T Manager API/UI, will automatically deploy the Edge VM with a HW version according to the version of ESXi above.
NSX-T Edge node manually deployed, through OVA, will require the administrator to set the HW version at deployment time.

Upgraded Environments

It is recommended to upgrade the vSphere ESXi environment first before upgrading NSX to 4.0.1. However, before upgrading vSphere environment check if the version of ESXi and vCenter are compatible with the current version of NSX ( refer this link - https://interopmatrix.broadcom.com/Interoperability?col=912,&row=1, ).
Since Edge HW version is determined from the ESXi version, it is important to ensure that all versions of ESXi in a vSphere cluster are the same version. Heterogenous vSphere clusters may cause problems during DRS/vMotion since vMotion may fail due to HW version incompatibility. VMware does not recommend running NSX Edge VMs in a heterogeneous vSphere clusters.
Existing auto-deployed Edges, from UI/API, will continue to have the same HW version. If an Edge VM is redeployed, it will automatically be deployed with an upgraded HW version matching the vSphere version.
Reference: Redeploy an NSX Edge VM Appliance
Edge VMs which were originally manually deployed from ovf will remain at HW version 13. New Edges will need to be deployed, specifying the higher HW version at deployment time.
The replace option can then be used to replace the older harder version Edges
Reference: Replace an NSX Edge Transport Node