Free Isn't Free Anymore: Updating ESXi 8.0U3e to 8.0U3h Without Paying

**“Free” Isn’t Free Anymore: The Brutal Reality of Updating ESXi 8.0U3e to 8.0U3h Without Paying a Cent** There’s a special kind of optimism that comes with downloading something labeled “free.” It feels like you’ve beaten the system. You grabbed enterprise-grade virtualization software without pulling out a credit card. You’re running ESXi 8.0U3e, it boots, it works, your lab is humming. Life is good. And then the question hits: can you update it to 8.0U3h without buying anything? That’s when the optimism fades. Because what looks like a simple patch upgrade quickly turns into a maze of licensing terms, portal access restrictions, dead update servers, and a whole lot of “technically.” Welcome to the new reality of “free” ESXi. ## The Illusion of Free: What You Actually Downloaded Let’s get one thing straight: free ESXi has always been a limited experience. It’s not a secret. It’s a feature-restricted hypervisor meant for labs, testing, and small non-production environments. Historically, you’d grab the ISO, install it, apply a free license key, and call it a day. But updates? That’s where the story changes. The version you downloaded — 8.0U3e — is what you’re entitled to at the moment of download. And according to multiple voices in the discussion , that entitlement doesn’t automatically extend to future patch levels like 8.0U3h. One commenter put it bluntly: free ESXi is what it is. You get the version you get. That’s it. There’s no magical “but it’s just a minor update” loophole hiding in the fine print. And now that VMware lives under Broadcom, the landscape feels even more complicated. ## The Portal Problem: If You Can’t See It, You Can’t Touch It One of the most practical answers in the discussion was also the simplest: do you even have access to the update in the Broadcom portal? If 8.0U3h doesn’t appear in your account downloads, you don’t have entitlement. Period. That’s not gatekeeping. That’s how licensing enforcement works now. Access is the license. There’s no more public patch repository sitting out in the open. In fact, hostupdate.vmware.com was shut down in April 2025 . That old-school patching workflow? Gone. If you’re thinking about pointing your host to an update depot and calling it a day, that door’s closed. So the real question isn’t “is it legal?” It’s “can you even get the bits without a subscription?” And if you can’t get the ISO or depot file from the official portal tied to your account, then you’re not entitled to it. That’s how it’s structured now. ## “Technically Not Entitled” — The Gray Zone Nobody Likes One commenter summed it up with a phrase that stings: “Technically you are not entitled to download updates” . That word — technically — carries weight. Because from a pure functionality standpoint, ESXi doesn’t stop you from running `esxcli software profile update`. The command still works. The hypervisor doesn’t phone home mid-upgrade and throw you in license jail. If you somehow acquire the correct depot files and validate them with checksums, the system will update. But that doesn’t make it compliant. And that’s the line most homelabbers dance around. Functionality isn’t the same as entitlement. Just because the door opens doesn’t mean you’re allowed inside. Historically, even before the Broadcom era, patching beyond your SnS (Support and Subscription) contract wasn’t permitted under the VMware EULA. One commenter even pointed out that people had it backwards — some restrictions were loosened for critical CVE 9.0 security patches under Broadcom, not tightened . That nuance matters. But it doesn’t change the core truth: updates are tied to active subscriptions. ## Free Means Feature-Limited — And That’s Not New There’s another layer to this that often gets overlooked in the upgrade debate: the free edition is already heavily restricted. No vCenter management. No VADP-based backups. No storage API access. Someone asked whether free ESXi allows API access with Veeam. The short answer? No . VADP is a licensed feature. That means agent-based backups only. This isn’t new. Another commenter made it clear: ESXi FREE has always been like this . So when people frame the current situation as some sudden betrayal, that’s not entirely accurate. Free ESXi has never been a rolling entitlement to future patches and enterprise capabilities. It’s a snapshot in time. You install what you’re allowed to install. You run it as-is. That’s the deal. ## The Broadcom Factor: Stability or Whiplash? Let’s talk about the elephant in the room: Broadcom. There’s anxiety in the community. Some users argue that what’s legal today might not be tomorrow . Licensing language shifts. Portal structures change. Access policies tighten or relax. It’s not paranoia — it’s pattern recognition. Broadcom has already reshaped VMware’s licensing into subscription-centric models. Perpetual licensing is effectively sidelined. Entitlements live and die inside account portals. That unpredictability creates hesitation. If you’re trying to “stay legit,” as one commenter put it, the safest move is simple: if it doesn’t show in your portal, don’t touch it. That’s not fearmongering. It’s compliance hygiene. ## So… Can You Legally Update to 8.0U3h? If we strip away the noise, here’s the grounded answer based on what surfaced in the discussion : - If 8.0U3h is available in your Broadcom account portal under your entitlement, yes — you can update. - If it is not available to you via official channels tied to your account, you are not entitled to download or apply it. - Free ESXi does not grant blanket access to future patch levels. - Critical security patches may be treated differently in specific policy contexts, but that doesn’t automatically apply to every update. In other words: access equals license. No portal access? No legal upgrade. It’s that simple. And that frustrating. ## The Emotional Undercurrent: Why This Feels Worse Than It Is What makes this sting isn’t just the licensing model. It’s the expectation gap. For years, homelabbers built entire ecosystems around free ESXi. It became the default hypervisor for learning VMware. It powered certification labs. It was the sandbox for future enterprise architects. When the update path narrows, it feels personal. But from a vendor perspective, free editions are marketing funnels, not long-term entitlement programs. They’re designed to give you a taste, not a lifetime supply. That doesn’t make it less annoying. It just makes it predictable. ## The Hard Truth for Homelabbers If you want continuous updates, you need a subscription. If you want full API access and modern backup integration, you need a license. If you want zero ambiguity about what’s allowed, you need entitlement visibility in your account portal. Otherwise, you’re living in the frozen snapshot of whatever free ISO you downloaded. And maybe that’s okay. For a static lab, 8.0U3e might be perfectly fine. If there’s no critical CVE forcing your hand, you can run it as-is. Stability isn’t the enemy. But if you’re chasing every minor letter revision out of habit, you’ll run headfirst into licensing walls. ## The Bigger Picture: Compliance vs Capability Here’s the final lens to look through. This isn’t about whether the update command works. It does. It’s not about whether someone somewhere has a copy of 8.0U3h. They do. It’s about entitlement. Enterprise software licensing has shifted toward identity-bound access. What your account can download defines what you’re allowed to run. The days of loosely accessible public patch repositories are fading. Free ESXi isn’t broken. It’s constrained by design. So before you go hunting for 8.0U3h, log into your Broadcom portal. If it’s there, you’re good. If it’s not, that’s your answer. Sometimes the most frustrating answer is also the clearest one. And in this case, “free” doesn’t mean future-proof.