Enabling SSH In VMware vSphere 4.1 (ESXi)

Once upon a time enabling SSH in ESXi involved logging into the console directly and working some command line mojo.

I didn’t look at this with the 4.0 release of vSphere but can confirm that using the console is no longer required to enable SSH in vSphere 4.1. Here are the steps to follow using the vSphere Client:

• Click the Configuration tab
• Click Security Profile in the Software box on the left hand side
• Click Properties at the top right
• In the Service Properties window select Remote Tech Support (SSH)
• Click the Options button
• In the Remote Tech Support SSH window click the Start automatically radio button
• Click the Start button
• Click OK

No reboot should be necessary – that wasn’t so painful now was it?