Broadcom didn't just kill a free license; they killed the on-ramp for a generation of VMware engineers. The homelab has a new default OS, and its name isn't ESXi. Have you managed to get a valid free key for ESXi 8 recently? Let me know in the comments—things change fast in the Broadcom era.
Suddenly, the rumors started swirling. Is the free license dead? Did Broadcom just torch the homelab community? vmware esxi 8 free license
If you have an existing free license key from the vSphere 7 era, it might work on ESXi 8.0 Update 3. If you don't have one, you are currently out of luck for the official "Free Hypervisor" product. Broadcom didn't just kill a free license; they
Broadcom has signaled that the free hypervisor is a legacy headache they don't want to support. Their focus is on large subscription customers. Let me know in the comments—things change fast