With the release of VMware Cloud Foundation 9, Broadcom has reverted the name of the hypervisor back to ESX removing the ESXi name that was introduced with ESXi 4.1, when the old service console was removed.
I don’t know why the change was made back to the original ESX naming, but the i was supposed to indicate that it was the “integrated” version without the service console. The service console has not been added back in ESX 9, but the name has been changed back to the original.
Goodbye ESXi, it was a good 15 year run!
Version naming and initial release year#
| Version | Release Date |
|---|---|
| ESX 1.0 | 2001 |
| ESX 2.0 | 2003 |
| ESX 2.1 | 2004 |
| ESX 2.5 | 2005 |
| ESX 3.0 | 2006 |
| ESX 3.5 | 2007 |
| ESX 4.0 | 2009 |
| ESXi 4.1 | 2010 |
| ESXi 5.0 | 2011 |
| ESXi 5.1 | 2012 |
| ESXi 5.5 | 2014 |
| ESXi 6.0 | 2015 |
| ESXi 6.5 | 2016 |
| ESXi 6.7 | 2018 |
| ESXi 7.0 | 2020 |
| ESXi 8.0 | 2022 |
| ESX 9.0 | 2025 |
Note: Version 3.5 and 4.0 was also available as ESXi editions, but 4.1 was the first release that only had ESXi as an option
All the documentation for VCF 9 references ESX, even for older versions which was named ESXi at the time of release.
For more detailed information about all the releases and versions, check virten.net: