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 vSphere 8.0 U3 – Official persistent VM identifier for tracking and safe API operations after MoRef change

nima jahan's profile image
nima jahan posted Nov 30, 2025 01:27 AM

Hello VMware Staff / Product Management,

We are developing a production-grade provisioning integration (WHMCS + custom backend) against vSphere 8.0 U3 and we need to store a VM identifier that survives the following scenarios with 100 % reliability:

  • Cross vCenter vMotion (xVC-vMotion)
  • HCX migrations (Bulk, vMotion, RAV)
  • Unregister / re-register of the same VM
  • SRM failover / failback
  • vCenter upgrade (7 → 8) and vCenter migration (with Migration Assistant)
  • Multi-vCenter / Enhanced Linked Mode environments

We store a vSphere VM identifier in our database so that, even if the MoRef (vm-XXXX) changes (unregister/re-register, xVC-vMotion, HCX migration, etc.), we can still reliably find the same logical VM again and never accidentally send PowerOn/Reconfig/Delete or any other operation to the wrong VM.

we have this in the api documents

VcenterVmIdentityInfo {
    bios_uuid:  (string, required)
    128-bit SMBIOS UUID of a virtual machine represented as a hexadecimal string in "12345678-abcd-1234-cdef-123456789abc" format.
    instance_uuid:  (string, required)
    VirtualCenter-specific 128-bit UUID of a virtual machine, represented as a hexademical string. This identifier is used by VirtualCenter to uniquely identify all virtual machine instances, including those that may share the same SMBIOS UUID.
    name:  (string, required)
    Virtual machine name.
}
  • Is config.instanceUuid + vCenter Instance UUID still the officially supported, guaranteed-persistent, and recommended method in vSphere 8.0 U3 for safely re-identifying a VM after its MoRef has changed?
  • Is config.uuid (BIOS UUID) still officially NOT recommended for VM tracking / asset management / orchestration purposes in vSphere 8.0 U3?
  • Has anything changed in vSphere 8.0 U2/U3 (or is planned for future releases) that would make instanceUuid unreliable or deprecated for this use-case?
  • Is there any newer identifier that Broadcom/VMware now officially recommends instead of instanceUuid for this exact scenario (tracking + safe API operations after MoRef change)?

    We need an authoritative answer because this identifier is used for destructive and billing-critical operations.

    Thank you in advance.


    #vsphere-8 vsphere-api

    # vm-identification

    # instance-uuid

    # bios-uuid