VMUG Advantage members who have recently earned their VCP-VCF certification are entitled to non-commercial VMware Cloud Foundation (VCF) licenses for personal use. When logging into the Broadcom Certification Portal, you may have noticed that only perpetual licenses for VCF 5.x are available, with no listings for VCF 9.0.
VCF 9.0 introduces a new keyless entitlement model, which requires some additional work on Broadcom's backend systems. While the delay in availability is not ideal, it is actively being worked on, and we hope to share an update in the very near future.
With that said that, I recently came up with a proposal that would at least allow existing VMUG Advantage members who have passed their VCP-VCF certification to start deploying VCF 9.0 and leverage the in-product 90 day evaluation period while the backend licensing is being sorted out.
The missing link that prevented users from deploying VCF is the fact that the VCF Installer also requires several metadata files, which is automatically retrieved when you have a Broadcom Support Entitlement, allowing you to generate a Broadcom Download Token.
Since VMUG Advantage members do not have a support entitlement, the quick workaround was to simply publish the the required VCF 9.0 metadata files. In addition, I have also included the folder structure within the download to further simplify the setup of a VCF Offline Depot, allowing users to deploy either a VVF or VCF 9.0 deployment.
Big thanks to the VCF Product, Engineering and Release Management for supporting this idea and rolling this out to our community while the longer term solution is being worked on.
UPDATE (12/08/25) - The new VMUG Advantage + VCP-VCF certification licensing is now available. You will need to authenticate into Broadcom Support Portal (BSP) and then open the following URL: https://support.broadcom.com/group/ecx/alpine-certificate which is where you will access both VCF 5.x and 9.x licensing and download tokens.
UPDATE (10/23/25) - It was shared on the VMware Community Podcast that the VCF 9.0 licensing for VMUG Advantage members w/their VCF Certification is planned to go live on Dec 8th! In addition, users will have the ability to generate download tokens and be able to go through the same experience as a user with support entitlements. The workaround posted here will no longer be required once the VCF 9.0 licensing has officially launched.
Step 1 - Login to the Broadcom Certification Portal and you should see a SKU labeled VCF-CLD-FND, click on the Request License button to initiate a license request which will allow you to download both VCF 5.x and 9.0 software binaries.
The request may take 1-2 days to get approved and you will then see a download icon as shown in the screenshot above which will take you directly to the Broadcom Support Portal (BSP) or you can login directly to support.broadcom.com using the email address that is associated with your VCP-VCF certification.
Step 2 - Navigate to My Downloads on the left hand navigation and you can then filter by the keyword Foundation which will then allow you to select vSphere Cloud Foundation product version 9.0.0.0
For your convenience, here is the direct URL to VCF 9.0 Product Download page.
Step 3 - Download the following binaries and files from each section, which is the minimal to deploy VCF 9:
- VMware Cloud Foundation Installer (Direct URL)
- VCF-SDDC-Manager-Appliance-9.0.0.0.24703748.ova
- vcf-9.0.0.0-offline-depot-metadata.zip
- VMware Cloud Foundation Automation (Direct URL)
- vmsp-vcfa-combined-9.0.0.0.24701403.tar
- VMware Cloud Foundation Operations (Direct URL)
- Operations-Appliance-9.0.0.0.24695812.ova
- VMware Cloud Foundation Operations Collector (Direct URL)
- Operations-Cloud-Proxy-9.0.0.0.24695833.ova
- VMware Cloud Foundation Operations Fleet Manager (Direct URL)
- VCF-OPS-Lifecycle-Manager-Appliance-9.0.0.0.24695816.ova
- ESX Server (Direct URL)
- VMware-VMvisor-Installer-9.0.0.0.24755229.x86_64.iso
- NSX Manager (Direct URL)
- nsx-unified-appliance-9.0.0.0.24733065.ova
- VMware-NSX-T-9.0.0.0.24733065.vlcp
- vCenter Server (Direct URL)
- VMware-VCSA-all-9.0.0.0.24755230.iso
Note: To download ESX 9.0 GA ISO, you need to toggle the version in the upper right hand corner 9.0.0.0100 to 9.0.0.0.
Step 4 - Extract the vcf-9.0.0.0-offline-depot-metadata.zip file which will contain the folder structure for setting up VCF Offline Depot along with the required metadata files for GA release of VCF 9.0
Step 5 - Once you have downloaded all files from Step 3, place them into their respective folders which should look like the following:
At this point, you now have a VCF Offline Depot that can be used to deploy both VVF/VCF 9.0!
Step 6 - Install the new VCF 9.0 Installer by deploying VCF-SDDC-Manager-Appliance-9.0.0.0.24703748.ova which act as both the VVF/VCF Installer as well as the SDDC Manager function.
You can serve the VCF Offline Depot directory locally from your desktop by using simple Python script or you can setup a web server with TLS certificates including basic authentication to serve the content. I much prefer the former option, especially when combining with the fact that you can serve this over HTTP instead of HTTPS to further simplify the setup.
Best news I could have received before this weekend 🙂 Thanks William Lam!
Thanks William, I have a few VMUG Advantage user reach out for this... it will really help them.
I had the same workaround idea earlier this month on a vExpert Discord chat server channel, i'm glad VMware by Broadcom is always prompt at solving !
Thanks again to the team !
I wonder if VCF 5.x offline depot could have the same treatment as 9.0
VMUG Advantage has largely become OBE for those of us that have paid for a multiyear subscription, unless we plan on tacking current VCP exam. Basically, the only thing that was keeping me on staying up to date with VMware's (nee Broadcom) products was the ability to easier deploy a licensed product in the home lab. Having previously worked for VMware, and having all of the old VCP type certifications, there is ZERO incentive to update those certifications. It's a true shame that Broadcom wants to kill off the interest in the products, and especially is driving smaller customers away. Given that I can even access the bits that I've paid for.... -shrug-
Totally agree
Do you have a workaround for uploading the binaries to VCF Operations?
Many thanks William for you efforts on out behalf!
When I log on to the support portal, I don't see any SKUs - only a generic certification page. I think this may be due to my profile status - I am registered with a non-corporate account, and so can't build my profile to include software support options. Not absolutely sure if this is the case, but I seem to be at a standstill in terms of getting to the SKU to enable this entitlement.
- Richard
You need to access your entitlements by first logging into the Alpine portal https://support.broadcom.com/group/ecx/alpine-certificate, clicking on the download link there will take you to the support portal with the correct entitlement.
Hi Chris,
I too am in the same boat as Richard is. I went to the link above and I do see my entitlements, but again, the download section is "off limits" to download for me. I contact William by email (with screenshots) of the entire process to see if either I am doing something wrong, but I suspect BROADCOM changed the way we get software (as non-corporate domain email accounts are no longer allowed to download software per BROADCOM tech support.)
Hello William,
Thanks for a workaround to get at least installed the VCF9 in trial mode.
"With that said that, I recently came up with a proposal that would at least allow existing VMUG Advantage members who have passed their VCP-VCF certification to start deploying VCF 9.0 and leverage the in-product 90 day evaluation period while the backend licensing is being sorted out."
There will be an external organization within https://vcf.broadcom.com/ portal where all VMUG active subscription users will be invited to make an registration of VCF Operations appliances?
Hi William,
thanks for the great article, will there be any way to "restart" the evaluation period for VCF-9? It could take until December this year for the new license type, if I start the 90-day eval today it would expire in November.
Hi William,
thanks for your article. Helped me a lot. But VMUG/Broadcom is responsible to solve this as soon as possible in a more convenient way. Ideally before november (my eval has ended)
Could you please add informations about additional components (like VIDB or VCFOPS4LOGS) according to this: https://techdocs.broadcom.com/us/en/vmware-cis/vcf/vcf-9-0-and-later/9-0/lifecycle-management/what-is-the-vcf-download-tool-/vcf-download-tool-binaries-commands.html
Just got my vmug advantage! But where do I download my token? I want to test out the new vcf bundle transfer tool and make sure it works.
Nevermind I see it is still being worked on and to use the metadata file.
Please read the blog post, there’s no download tokens as that requires an entitlement
Hi William. I'm confused. Your links direct me to the same download section I am having issues with downloads. I created a support account using my own domain email, but I am unable to download anything (without an entitlement.) Where you aware that BROADCOM does NOT support profile configurations (in order to download anything) if using a non-corporate domain email account?
Does this situation have anything to do with this?
https://support.broadcom.com/web/ecx/support-content-notification/-/external/content/CriticalAlerts/0/36073
The Certification Portal _LOOKS_ simliar to BSP, but they're not. Make sure to use the link provided and you'll get the behavior I described. Furthermore, this workaround is only required up until the new VCF 9.0 licensing has launched for VMUG Advantage members, which is planned for 11/15 (as noted in the updated article).
Hi William. I sent an email to you with screenshots of the whole process for me. Will you take a look to see if I am doing anything wrong? Thank you so much.
Thank you William
Hi all - Is anyone else having trouble downloading their VMUG entitlement currently? I’m no longer able to download either the VCF 9.0.0 or 9.0.1 files using this method (attempted 28/11/25). I notice there is a new link on the top left of the download page that mentions ‘VCF 9 licences can be found here’, which redirects via SSO to vcf.broadcom.com where my license entitlement is shown. However even though I can generate a download token now it doesn’t appear to work when I add it into the SDDC Manager online depot or use the VCF download tool.
Hi all, Steve everyone with VMUG entitlement have the download not working, it was announced in video that the finishing updates of the sites/products will be done by the 8th of december. Everyone can rewatch the video youtube dot com/watch?v=dXz37mqJHwo