Windows 11 documentation covers information on how to install the operating system in a virtual machine. For additional information about the operating system, refer to the instructions included in the installation media.
Windows 11 documentation includes the following topics:
- Installation Instructions for Windows 11
- Installing VMware Tools in a Windows 11 Guest
- Knowledge Base Articles for Windows 11
- VMware Compatibility Guide
Installation Instructions for Windows 11
You can install Windows 11 in a virtual machine using the corresponding Windows 11 distribution CD.
Prerequisites
Before you begin, verify that the following tasks are complete:- Read General Installation Instructions for All VMware Products.
- Configure vSphere environment with a key provider, refer to VMware doc Create a Virtual Machine with a Virtual Trusted Platform Module.
- Read the Microsoft Minimum System Requirements for Windows 11 (https://www.microsoft.com/en-ie/windows/windows-11).
Note that the DirectX 12 and WDDM 2.0 graphics requirements do not apply to virtual machines. - Create and configure a new virtual machine with UEFI firmware, Secure Boot enabled, vTPM device and appropriate amount of virtual CPUs, virtual memory and virtual storage, to support the OS install and intended workload.
- The recommended choice for virtual storage controller is VMware Paravirtual SCSI (PVSCSI).
- Windows 11 version 22H2 includes a driver for PVSCSI for easy installation of the operating system. This driver should later be updated to a newer version using Windows Update or VMware Tools ISO.
- For Windows 11 version 21H2, refer to https://kb.vmware.com/s/article/84200 on how to add the latest PVSCSI driver to Windows ISO or provide driver to Windows during installation by following process mentioned in the section "To install PVSCSI drivers through CD/DVD drive (Recommended)" of KB https://kb.vmware.com/s/article/1010398.
- The recommended choice for virtual network adapter is vmxnet3.
- Windows 11 version 22H2 includes a driver for vmxnet3 for easy installation of the operating system. This driver should later be updated to a newer version using Windows Update or VMware Tools ISO.
- For Windows 11 version 21H2, install vmxnet3 driver through Windows Update or VMware Tools.
- During the VM configuration process, when selecting the Guest OS, on VMware vSphere 6.7U2/U3 or 7.0.x, if Windows 11 64-bit option is not available, select Windows 10 64-bit, see KB https://kb.vmware.com/s/article/85665.
Installation Steps
- Attach the Windows 11 ISO Image in the VM CD/DVD Drive.
- Power on the virtual machine. This begins the Windows installation.
- If Windows Setup reports this information:
"This PC does not meet the minimum system requirements to install this version of Windows."
Check the configuration of virtual machine to meet the Windows 11 minimum system requiremnts, - (Optional) If you are using VMware Paravirtual as the default SCSI
controller, install the pvscsi driver.
Refer to section "To install PVSCSI drivers through CD/DVD drive (Recommended)" in KB https://kb.vmware.com/s/article/1010398.
- Follow the prompts to complete the installation.
- Install VMware Tools.
Installing VMware Tools in a Windows 11 Guest
For information on VMware Tools, see Knowledge base article 1014294, General VMware Tools installation instructions, at http://kb.vmware.com/kb/1014294.
Knowledge Base Articles for Windows 11
The following links refer to knowledge base articles on operating system specific issues.
See the VMware knowledge base for a list of known issues about the operating system.
See Knowledge base article 85665, https://kb.vmware.com/s/article/85665.