If you haven't looked at the vSphere Client UI in the last six months, open it up. Check out the "Developer Center" tab or the new "Compliance" views. It keeps getting better, even if Broadcom is shaking things up behind the scenes.
Thankfully, that era is over. Today, the vSphere Client (HTML5) is not just a "replacement"—it is the definitive control plane for the modern data center. But is it perfect? Let's look at where it excels, where it still stumbles, and how it fits into the age of Kubernetes. Let’s give credit where it is due. With vSphere 6.7 Update 1, VMware finally achieved feature parity . The old C# client and the Flash client were put out to pasture. For the first time in a decade, we had one client to rule them all. vsphere client
Is it the slow load time for large environments? The plugin crashes? Or do you actually miss the old fat client? Let me know in the comments. If you haven't looked at the vSphere Client
A single pane of glass. You don't leave the vSphere Client to check vSAN health or storage replication. The Con: Plugin conflicts. I have watched the vSphere Client crash (or hang on a white screen) because a third-party plugin was 0.0.1 versions out of date. When the client freezes, disabling plugins via the URL query string ( ?ignoreExtensions=1 ) is a lifesaver—memorize that trick. The CLI Shadow Here is the truth: The vSphere Client is fantastic for inspection and incident response . But for automation and repetition , you should be living in PowerCLI or govc . Thankfully, that era is over
If you have been a vSphere administrator for more than a few years, you remember the dark times. The "hybrid war." You kept one tab open with the modern HTML5 client for basic tasks, and another tab open with the dreaded Flex (Flash) client for "advanced" settings like EVC, complex permissions, or legacy DVSwitch edits.