Validated Platforms

This release family of NVIDIA vGPU software provides support for several NVIDIA GPUs on validated server hardware platforms, VMware vSphere hypervisor software versions, and guest operating systems. It also supports the version of NVIDIA CUDA Toolkit that is compatible with R595 drivers.

Supported NVIDIA GPUs and Validated Server Platforms

This release of NVIDIA vGPU software on VMware vSphere provides support for several NVIDIA GPUs running on validated server hardware platforms.

For a list of validated server platforms, refer to NVIDIA GRID Certified Servers.

The supported products for each type of NVIDIA vGPU software deployment depend on the GPU.

Note

NVIDIA vGPU software does not support vSGA.

GPUs Based on the NVIDIA Blackwell Architecture

Note

GPUs based on the NVIDIA Blackwell architecture support SR-IOV.

The manual placement of vGPUs on GPUs in equal-size mode is not supported on GPUs based on the NVIDIA Blackwell architecture.

GPU	Mixed vGPU Configuration - VCF or VMware vSphere Releases		Supported NVIDIA vGPU Software Products[1], [2], [3]
	Frame Buffer Size (Mixed-Size Mode)	Series	Time-Sliced NVIDIA vGPU on Single-Instance GPU[4]	1:1 MIG-Backed NVIDIA vGPU[5]	Time-Sliced, MIG-Backed NVIDIA vGPU[6]	GPU Pass Through
NVIDIA RTX PRO 6000 Blackwell Server Edition	9.0.1 and, unless explicitly stated otherwise, later maintenance releases 8.0 Update 3g and, unless explicitly stated otherwise, later update releases	9.0, 8.0	vWS vPC vApps	vWS vPC vApps	vWS vPC vApps	vWS vApps
NVIDIA RTX PRO 6000 Blackwell Server Edition liquid cooled	9.0.1 and, unless explicitly stated otherwise, later maintenance releases 8.0 Update 3g and, unless explicitly stated otherwise, later update releases	9.0, 8.0	vWS vPC vApps	vWS vPC vApps	vWS vPC vApps	vWS vApps
NVIDIA RTX PRO 4500 Blackwell Server Edition	9.0.1 and, unless explicitly stated otherwise, later maintenance releases 8.0 Update 3g and, unless explicitly stated otherwise, later update releases	9.0, 8.0	vWS vPC vApps	vWS vPC vApps	vWS vPC vApps	vWS vApps

GPUs Based on the NVIDIA Ada Lovelace Architecture

Note

GPUs based on the NVIDIA Ada Lovelace architecture support SR-IOV.

The manual placement of vGPUs on GPUs in equal-size mode is not supported on GPUs based on the NVIDIA Ada Lovelace architecture.

GPU	Mixed vGPU Configuration - VCF or VMware vSphere Releases		Supported NVIDIA vGPU Software Products[1], [2], [3]
	Frame Buffer Size (Mixed-Size Mode)	Series	NVIDIA vGPU	GPU Pass Through
NVIDIA L40S	9.0, 8.0 Update 3 and, unless explicitly stated otherwise, later update releases	9.0, 8.0	vWS vPC vApps	vWS vApps
NVIDIA L40	9.0, 8.0 Update 3 and, unless explicitly stated otherwise, later update releases	9.0, 8.0	vWS vPC vApps	vWS vApps
NVIDIA L20	9.0, 8.0 Update 3 and, unless explicitly stated otherwise, later update releases	9.0, 8.0	vWS vPC vApps	vWS vApps
NVIDIA L20 liquid cooled	9.0, 8.0 Update 3 and, unless explicitly stated otherwise, later update releases	9.0, 8.0	vWS vPC vApps	vWS vApps
NVIDIA L4	9.0, 8.0 Update 3 and, unless explicitly stated otherwise, later update releases	9.0, 8.0	vWS vPC vApps	vWS vApps
NVIDIA L2	9.0, 8.0 Update 3 and, unless explicitly stated otherwise, later update releases	9.0, 8.0	vWS vPC vApps	vWS vApps
NVIDIA RTX 6000 Ada	9.0, 8.0 Update 3 and, unless explicitly stated otherwise, later update releases	9.0, 8.0	vWS vPC vApps	vWS vApps
NVIDIA RTX 5880 Ada	9.0, 8.0 Update 3 and, unless explicitly stated otherwise, later update releases	9.0, 8.0	vWS vPC vApps	vWS vApps
NVIDIA RTX 5000 Ada	9.0, 8.0 Update 3 and, unless explicitly stated otherwise, later update releases	9.0, 8.0	vWS vPC vApps	vWS vApps

GPUs Based on the NVIDIA Ampere Architecture

Note

GPUs based on the NVIDIA Ampere architecture support SR-IOV.

The manual placement of vGPUs on GPUs in equal-size mode is not supported on GPUs based on the NVIDIA Ampere architecture.

GPU	Mixed vGPU Configuration - VCF or VMware vSphere Releases		Supported NVIDIA vGPU Software Products[1], [2], [3]
	Frame Buffer Size (Mixed-Size Mode)	Series	NVIDIA vGPU	GPU Pass Through
NVIDIA A40[7]	9.0, 8.0 Update 3 and, unless explicitly stated otherwise, later update releases	9.0, 8.0	vWS vPC vApps	vWS vApps
NVIDIA A16	9.0, 8.0 Update 3 and, unless explicitly stated otherwise, later update releases	9.0, 8.0	vWS vPC vApps	vWS vApps
NVIDIA A10	9.0, 8.0 Update 3 and, unless explicitly stated otherwise, later update releases	9.0, 8.0	vWS vPC vApps	vWS vApps
NVIDIA A2	9.0, 8.0 Update 3 and, unless explicitly stated otherwise, later update releases	9.0, 8.0	vWS vPC vApps	vWS vApps
NVIDIA RTX A6000[7]	9.0, 8.0 Update 3 and, unless explicitly stated otherwise, later update releases	9.0, 8.0	vWS vPC vApps	vWS vApps
NVIDIA RTX A5500[7]	9.0, 8.0 Update 3 and, unless explicitly stated otherwise, later update releases	9.0, 8.0	vWS vPC vApps	vWS vApps
NVIDIA RTX A5000[7]	9.0, 8.0 Update 3 and, unless explicitly stated otherwise, later update releases	9.0, 8.0	vWS vPC vApps	vWS vApps

GPUs Based on the NVIDIA Turing Architecture

Note

SR-IOV and the manual placement of vGPUs on GPUs in equal-size mode are not supported on GPUs based on the NVIDIA Turing™ architecture.

GPU	Mixed vGPU Configuration - VCF or VMware vSphere Releases		Supported NVIDIA vGPU Software Products[1], [2], [3]
	Frame Buffer Size (Mixed-Size Mode)	Series	NVIDIA vGPU	GPU Pass Through
Tesla T4	9.0, 8.0 Update 3 and, unless explicitly stated otherwise, later update releases	9.0, 8.0	vWS vPC vApps	vWS vApps

Support for a Mixture of Time-Sliced vGPU Types on the Same GPU

VMware vSphere Hypervisor (ESXi) support for a mixture of time-sliced vGPU types on the same GPU depends on the VMware vSphere Hypervisor (ESXi) release.

VMware vSphere Hypervisor (ESXi) Release	Mixture of Time-Sliced vGPU Support
9.0 and, unless explicitly stated otherwise, later releases 8 Update 3 and, unless explicitly stated otherwise, later update releases	VMware vSphere Hypervisor (ESXi) supports a mixture of different types of time-sliced vGPUs on the same physical GPU. Any combination of A-series, B-series, and Q-series vGPUs with any amount of frame buffer can reside on the same physical GPU simultaneously. The total amount of frame buffer allocated to the vGPUs on a physical GPU must not exceed the amount of frame buffer that the physical GPU has. For example, the following combinations of vGPUs can reside on the same physical GPU simultaneously: A40-2B and A40-2Q A40-2Q and A40-4Q A40-2B and A40-4Q By default, a GPU or GPU instance supports only vGPUs with the same amount of frame buffer and, therefore, is in equal-size mode. To support vGPUs with different amounts of frame buffer, the GPU or GPU instance must be put into mixed-size mode. In mixed-size mode, the maximum number of some types of vGPU allowed on a GPU or GPU instance is less than in equal-size mode. For more information, refer to Virtual GPU Software User Guide.
8.0 through 8 Update 2	VMware vSphere Hypervisor (ESXi) supports a mixture of time-sliced vGPUs with the same amount of frame buffer from different virtual GPU series on the same physical GPU. A-series, B-series, and Q-series vGPUs with the same amount of frame buffer, for example, A40-2B and A40-2Q, can reside on the same physical GPU simultaneously. However, vGPUs with different amounts of frame buffer are not supported on the same GPU. For example, the following combinations of vGPUs are not supported on the same GPU: A40-2Q and A40-4Q A40-2B and A40-4Q

Switching the Mode of a GPU that Supports Multiple Display Modes

Some GPUs support display-off and display-enabled modes but must be used in NVIDIA vGPU software deployments in display-off mode.

The GPUs listed in the following table support multiple display modes. As shown in the table, some GPUs are supplied from the factory in display-off mode, but other GPUs are supplied in a display-enabled mode.

GPU	Mode as Supplied from the Factory
NVIDIA A40	Display-off
NVIDIA L40	Display-off
NVIDIA L40S	Display-off
NVIDIA L20	Display-off
NVIDIA L20 liquid cooled	Display-off
NVIDIA RTX 5000 Ada	Display enabled
NVIDIA RTX 6000 Ada	Display enabled
NVIDIA RTX A5000	Display enabled
NVIDIA RTX A5500	Display enabled
NVIDIA RTX A6000	Display enabled
NVIDIA RTX PRO 6000 Blackwell Server Edition	Display-off
NVIDIA RTX PRO 6000 Blackwell Server Edition liquid cooled	Display-off

A GPU that is supplied from the factory in display-off mode, such as the NVIDIA A40 GPU, might be in a display-enabled mode if its mode has previously been changed.

To change the mode of a GPU that supports multiple display modes, use the displaymodeselector tool, which you can request from the NVIDIA Display Mode Selector Tool page on the NVIDIA Developer website.

Note

Only the GPUs listed in the table support the displaymodeselector tool. Other GPUs that support NVIDIA vGPU software do not support the displaymodeselector tool and, unless otherwise stated, do not require display mode switching.

Requirements for Using vGPU on GPUs Requiring 64 GB or More of MMIO Space with Large-Memory VMs

Some GPUs require 64 GB or more of MMIO space. When a vGPU on a GPU that requires 64 GB or more of MMIO space is assigned to a VM with 32 GB or more of memory on ESXi , the VM’s MMIO space must be increased to the amount of MMIO space that the GPU requires.

For more information, refer to Broadcom Knowledge Base Article: VMware vSphere VMDirectPath I/O: Requirements for Platforms and Devices.

No extra configuration is needed.

The following table lists the GPUs that require 64 GB or more of MMIO space and the amount of MMIO space that each GPU requires.

GPU	MMIO Space Required
NVIDIA A10	64 GB
NVIDIA A40	128 GB
NVIDIA RTX A5000	64 GB
NVIDIA RTX A5500	64 GB
NVIDIA RTX A6000	128 GB

Requirements for Using GPUs Requiring Large MMIO Space in Pass-Through Mode

• If a GPU that requires more than 32 GB of MMIO space is assigned to a VM, the VM’s MMIO space must be increased as explained in Broadcom Knowledge Base Article: VMware vSphere VMDirectPath I/O: Requirements for Platforms and Devices.

• Pass through of GPUs with large BAR memory settings has some restrictions on VMware ESXi:

  • The guest OS must be a 64-bit OS.

  • 64-bit MMIO must be enabled for the VM.

  • If the total BAR1 memory exceeds 256 Mbytes, EFI boot must be enabled for the VM.

    Note

    To determine the total BAR1 memory, run nvidia-smi -q on the host.

  • The guest OS must be able to be installed in EFI boot mode.

Requirements for Assigning Multiple GPUs in Pass-Through Mode to a Single VM

If you are assigning multiple GPUs in pass-through mode to a single VM, ensure that you allocate enough MMIO space to the VM for all the GPUs.

1. Calculate the amount of MMIO space that is required for all the GPUs that you want to assign in pass-through mode to the VM.

   1. On the hypervisor host, get the total BAR1 memory usage for each GPU.

      nvidia-smi -q
      ==============NVSMI LOG==============
      
      Timestamp                                 : Mon May 18 18:36:45 2026
      Driver Version                            : 595.91.04
      CUDA Version                              : 13.2
      
      Attached GPUs                             : 4
      GPU 00000000:01:00.0
      ...
         BAR1 Memory Usage
              Total                             : 128 GiB
      ...
      

      In this example, the total BAR1 memory usage for each GPU is 128 GiB.

   2. Multiply the total BAR1 memory usage for each GPU by the number of GPUs that you are assigning in pass-through mode to the VM.

      For example, if you are assigning four GPUs to a VM, the amount of MMIO space that is required for all the GPUs is 4⨯128 GiB, which equals 512 GiB.

2. Under the VM settings, choose VM Options > Advanced and set pciPassthru.use64bitMMIO="TRUE".

3. Allocate the required amount of MMIO space to the VM.

   pciPassthru.64bitMMIOSizeGB = "<mmio-space-in-gb>"
   

   <mmio-space-in-gb>

   The required amount of MMIO space in GiB that you calculated previously. For example, if you are assigning four GPUs to a VM that each use a total of 128 GiB of BAR1 memory, the amount of MMIO space that is required for all the GPUs is 512 GiB.

   pciPassthru.64bitMMIOSizeGB = "512"
   

Linux Only: Error Messages for Misconfigured GPUs Requiring Large MMIO Space

In a Linux VM, if the requirements for using GPUs requiring large MMIO space in pass-through mode are not met, the following error messages are written to the VM’s dmesg log during installation of the NVIDIA vGPU software graphics driver:

NVRM: BAR1 is 0M @ 0x0 (PCI:0000:02:02.0)
[  90.823015] NVRM: The system BIOS may have misconfigured your GPU.
[  90.823019] nvidia: probe of 0000:02:02.0 failed with error -1
[  90.823031] NVRM: The NVIDIA probe routine failed for 1 device(s).

Hypervisor Software Releases

Supported VMware vSphere Hypervisor (ESXi) and VCF Releases

Note

Broadcom has changed how VMware vSphere Hypervisor (ESXi) is distributed. Starting with release 9.0, ESXi is no longer available as a standalone product. Instead, ESXi 9.x is distributed only as part of VMware Cloud Foundation (VCF). In this documentation, references specifically to 9.x hypervisor releases use VCF. References specifically to 8.x releases and generic, release-independent references continue to use VMware vSphere.

This release is supported on the VMware vSphere Hypervisor (ESXi) and VCF releases listed in the table.

Note

Support for NVIDIA vGPU software requires the vSphere Foundation edition of VMware vSphere Hypervisor (ESXi) or a vSphere Enterprise Plus license. For details, see VMware vSphere Product Line Comparison (PDF).

Updates to a base release of VMware vSphere Hypervisor (ESXi) or VCF are compatible with the base release and can also be used with this version of NVIDIA vGPU software unless expressly stated otherwise.

Software	Release Supported	Notes
VMware Cloud Foundation (VCF) 9.1	9.1	This release supports all NVIDIA GPUs with vGPU and in pass-through mode that support NVIDIA vGPU software on VCF.
VMware Cloud Foundation (VCF) 9.0	9.0 and, unless explicitly stated otherwise, later maintenance releases for 9.0, such as 9.0.1	This release supports all NVIDIA GPUs with vGPU and in pass-through mode that support NVIDIA vGPU software on VCF. Support for the following GPUs requires VCF 9.0.1 or a later release: NVIDIA RTX PRO 4500 Blackwell Server Edition NVIDIA RTX PRO 6000 Blackwell Server Edition NVIDIA RTX PRO 6000 Blackwell Server Edition liquid cooled
VMware vSphere Hypervisor (ESXi) 8.0	8.0u3 P06 and later updates to release 8.0 unless explicitly stated otherwise. Earlier VMware vSphere Hypervisor (ESXi) 8.0 builds are not supported.	This release supports all NVIDIA GPUs with vGPU and in pass-through mode that support NVIDIA vGPU software on VMware vSphere. Support for the following GPUs requires VMware vSphere Hypervisor (ESXi) 8 Update 3g or a later update to release 8.0: NVIDIA RTX PRO 4500 Blackwell Server Edition NVIDIA RTX PRO 6000 Blackwell Server Edition NVIDIA RTX PRO 6000 Blackwell Server Edition liquid cooled

Supported Management Software and Virtual Desktop Software Releases

This release supports the management software and virtual desktop software releases listed in the table.

Note

Updates to a base release of Omnissa Horizon and VMware vCenter Server are compatible with the base release and can also be used with this version of NVIDIA vGPU software unless expressly stated otherwise.

Software	Releases Supported
Omnissa Horizon	Note All versions supported by earlier NVIDIA vGPU software 20 releases are also supported. Since 20.1: 8 2603 8 2512 8 2506 8 2503 2006 (8.0) through 2412 (8.14)
VMware Horizon	7.0 through 7.13
VMware vCenter Server	9.0 8.0

Guest OS Support

NVIDIA vGPU software supports several Windows releases and Linux distributions as a guest OS. The supported guest operating systems depend on the hypervisor software version.

Note

Use only a guest OS release that is listed as supported by NVIDIA vGPU software with your virtualization software. To be listed as supported, a guest OS release must be supported not only by NVIDIA vGPU software, but also by your virtualization software. NVIDIA cannot support guest OS releases that your virtualization software does not support.

NVIDIA vGPU software supports only 64-bit guest operating systems. No 32-bit guest operating systems are supported.

Windows Guest OS Support

NVIDIA vGPU software supports only the 64-bit Windows releases listed as a guest OS on VMware vSphere. The releases of VMware vSphere for which a Windows release is supported depend on whether NVIDIA vGPU or pass-through GPU is used.

Note

If a specific release, even an update release, is not listed, it’s not supported.

VMware vMotion with vGPU and suspend-resume with vGPU are supported on supported Windows guest OS releases.

Windows Guest OS Support in Release 20.2

• Windows Server 2025

• Windows Server 2022

• Windows 11 25H2 and all Windows 11 releases supported by Microsoft up to and including this release

• Windows 10 2022 Update (22H2) and all Windows 10 releases supported by Microsoft up to and including this release

  Note

  The hardware-accelerated GPU scheduling feature introduced in Windows 10 May 2020 Update (2004) is not supported on GPUs based on the Maxwell architecture and is supported only in pass-through mode on GPUs based on later architectures.

Windows Guest OS Support in Release 20.1

• Windows Server 2025

• Windows Server 2022

• Windows 11 25H2 and all Windows 11 releases supported by Microsoft up to and including this release

• Windows 10 2022 Update (22H2) and all Windows 10 releases supported by Microsoft up to and including this release

  Note

  The hardware-accelerated GPU scheduling feature introduced in Windows 10 May 2020 Update (2004) is not supported on GPUs based on the Maxwell architecture and is supported only in pass-through mode on GPUs based on later architectures.

Windows Guest OS Support in Release 20.0

• Windows Server 2025

• Windows Server 2022

• Windows 11 25H2 and all Windows 11 releases supported by Microsoft up to and including this release

• Windows 10 2022 Update (22H2) and all Windows 10 releases supported by Microsoft up to and including this release

  Note

  The hardware-accelerated GPU scheduling feature introduced in Windows 10 May 2020 Update (2004) is not supported on GPUs based on the Maxwell architecture and is supported only in pass-through mode on GPUs based on later architectures.

Linux Guest OS Support

NVIDIA vGPU software supports only the Linux distributions listed as a guest OS on VMware vSphere. The releases of VMware vSphere for which a Linux release is supported depend on whether NVIDIA vGPU or pass-through GPU is used.

Note

If a specific release, even an update release, is not listed, it’s not supported.

VMware vMotion with vGPU and suspend-resume with vGPU are supported on supported Linux guest OS releases.

Rocky Linux releases that are compatible with supported Red Hat Enterprise Linux releases are also supported as a guest OS.

Linux Guest OS Support in Release 20.2

Guest OS	Wayland Support	X11 Support
Deprecated: CentOS Linux 8 (2105)	××	✓✓
Debian 12	××	✓✓
Red Hat CoreOS 4.11	××	✓✓
Red Hat Enterprise Linux 10.2 Not supported on VCF releases before VCF 9.1	✓✓	××
Red Hat Enterprise Linux 10.1 Not supported on VCF releases before VCF 9.1	✓✓	××
Red Hat Enterprise Linux 10.0 Not supported on VCF releases before VCF 9.1	✓✓	××
Red Hat Enterprise Linux 9.8	×!	✓!
Red Hat Enterprise Linux 9.7	×!	✓!
Red Hat Enterprise Linux 9.6	×!	✓!
Red Hat Enterprise Linux 9.4	×!	✓!
Red Hat Enterprise Linux 8.10	×!	✓!
SUSE Linux Enterprise Server 16.0	✓✓	××
SUSE Linux Enterprise Server 15 SP7	××	✓✓
SUSE Linux Enterprise Server 15 SP6	××	✓✓
Ubuntu 24.04 LTS	✓×	✓✓
Ubuntu 22.04 LTS	××	✓✓
Ubuntu 20.04 LTS	××	✓✓

✓✓ Supported by NVIDIA vGPU software and enabled by default in the OS.

✓× Supported by NVIDIA vGPU software but disabled by default in the OS and must be enabled.

✓! Supported by NVIDIA vGPU software but requires the alternative display server protocol to be disabled in the OS.

×× Not supported by NVIDIA vGPU software or the OS.

×! Not supported by NVIDIA vGPU software and must be disabled in the OS.

Linux Guest OS Support in Release 20.1

Guest OS	Wayland Support	X11 Support
Deprecated: CentOS Linux 8 (2105)	××	✓✓
Debian 12	××	✓✓
Red Hat CoreOS 4.11	××	✓✓
Red Hat Enterprise Linux 10.1 Not supported on VCF releases before VCF 9.1	✓✓	××
Red Hat Enterprise Linux 10.0 Not supported on VCF releases before VCF 9.1	✓✓	××
Red Hat Enterprise Linux 9.7	×!	✓!
Red Hat Enterprise Linux 9.6	×!	✓!
Red Hat Enterprise Linux 9.4	×!	✓!
Red Hat Enterprise Linux 8.10	×!	✓!
SUSE Linux Enterprise Server 16.0	✓✓	××
SUSE Linux Enterprise Server 15 SP7	××	✓✓
SUSE Linux Enterprise Server 15 SP6	××	✓✓
Ubuntu 24.04 LTS	✓×	✓✓
Ubuntu 22.04 LTS	××	✓✓
Ubuntu 20.04 LTS	××	✓✓

✓✓ Supported by NVIDIA vGPU software and enabled by default in the OS.

✓× Supported by NVIDIA vGPU software but disabled by default in the OS and must be enabled.

✓! Supported by NVIDIA vGPU software but requires the alternative display server protocol to be disabled in the OS.

×× Not supported by NVIDIA vGPU software or the OS.

×! Not supported by NVIDIA vGPU software and must be disabled in the OS.

Linux Guest OS Support in Release 20.0

Guest OS	Wayland Support	X11 Support
Deprecated: CentOS Linux 8 (2105)	××	✓✓
Debian 12	××	✓✓
Red Hat CoreOS 4.11	××	✓✓
Red Hat Enterprise Linux 10.1 Not supported on VCF releases before VCF 9.1	✓✓	××
Red Hat Enterprise Linux 10.0 Not supported on VCF releases before VCF 9.1	✓✓	××
Red Hat Enterprise Linux 9.7	×!	✓!
Red Hat Enterprise Linux 9.6	×!	✓!
Red Hat Enterprise Linux 9.4	×!	✓!
Red Hat Enterprise Linux 8.10	×!	✓!
SUSE Linux Enterprise Server 15 SP2	××	✓✓
Ubuntu 24.04 LTS	✓×	✓✓
Ubuntu 22.04 LTS	××	✓✓
Ubuntu 20.04 LTS	××	✓✓

✓✓ Supported by NVIDIA vGPU software and enabled by default in the OS.

✓× Supported by NVIDIA vGPU software but disabled by default in the OS and must be enabled.

✓! Supported by NVIDIA vGPU software but requires the alternative display server protocol to be disabled in the OS.

×× Not supported by NVIDIA vGPU software or the OS.

×! Not supported by NVIDIA vGPU software and must be disabled in the OS.

NVIDIA CUDA Toolkit Version Support

The releases in this release family of NVIDIA vGPU software support NVIDIA CUDA Toolkit 13.2.

To build a CUDA application, the system must have the NVIDIA CUDA Toolkit and the libraries required for linking. For details of the components of NVIDIA CUDA Toolkit, refer to NVIDIA CUDA Toolkit 13.2 Release Notes.

To run a CUDA application, the system must have a CUDA-enabled GPU and an NVIDIA display driver that is compatible with the NVIDIA CUDA Toolkit release that was used to build the application. If the application relies on dynamic linking for libraries, the system must also have the correct version of these libraries.

For more information about NVIDIA CUDA Toolkit, refer to CUDA Toolkit Documentation 13.2.

Note

If you are using NVIDIA vGPU software with CUDA on Linux, avoid conflicting installation methods by installing CUDA from a distribution-independent runfile package. Do not install CUDA from a distribution-specific RPM or Deb package.

To ensure that the NVIDIA vGPU software graphics driver is not overwritten when CUDA is installed, deselect the CUDA driver when selecting the CUDA components to install.

For more information, see NVIDIA CUDA Installation Guide for Linux.

Wayland Display Server Protocol Support

The Wayland display server protocol is supported with only a subset of supported GPUs, guest OS releases, and display resolutions.

Supported GPUs

All GPUs supported by NVIDIA vGPU software, except GPUs based on the NVIDIA Turing™ architecture.

Supported Guest OS Releases

Only Red Hat Enterprise Linux 10 guest OS releases supported by NVIDIA vGPU software.

• Ubuntu 26.04 LTS

• Ubuntu 24.04 LTS

Supported Display Resolutions

• 2560×1600

• 3840×2160

• 4096×2160

• 5120×2880

• 7680×4320

Limitations with Wayland Display Server Protocol Support

The following use cases are not supported:

• VDPAU

• Vulkan video playback

• Console VNC

• Frame-rate limiting (FRL)

Known Issues with Wayland Display Server Protocol Support

• Wayland with Ubuntu 24.04 does not work with multi-vGPU VMs

• Display resolutions can’t be changed in GNOME Settings with Wayland

• Remote desktop connections fail for vGPUs with 1 GB of frame buffer when used with Wayland

vGPU Migration Support

vGPU Migration, which includes vMotion and suspend-resume, is supported on all supported GPUs, but only on a subset of supported VMware vSphere Hypervisor (ESXi) releases and guest operating systems.

Limitations with vGPU Migration Support

vGPU migration is disabled for a VM for which any of the following NVIDIA CUDA Toolkit features is enabled:

• Unified memory

• Debuggers

• Profilers

Supported Hypervisor Software Releases

All supported releases of VMware vSphere

Supported Guest OS Releases

Windows and Linux.

Known Issues with vGPU Migration Support

Use Case	Affected GPUs	Issue
Migration of a VM configured with NVIDIA vGPU software release 20.1 to a host running release 20.0	All GPUs that support vGPU Migration	Migrating a VM configured with NVIDIA vGPU software release 20.1 to a host running release 20.0 fails
Migration between hosts with different ECC memory configuration	All GPUs that support vGPU Migration	Migration of VMs configured with vGPU stops before the migration is complete

Fast Suspend-Resume Support

NVIDIA vGPU software supports VMware Fast Suspend-Resume with the NVIDIA Virtual GPU Manager. Fast Suspend-Resume enables changes to a VM, such as adding a network adapter, with minimal disruption to the VM. Fast Suspend-Resume is supported on all supported guest operating systems, but on only a subset of supported GPUs and VMware vSphere Hypervisor (ESXi) releases.

Supported GPUs

Fast Suspend-Resume is supported on all supported GPUs, except the Tesla M10 GPU.

Supported Hypervisor Software Releases

Since VCF 9.0

Supported Guest OS Releases

Windows and Linux.

Limitations with Fast Suspend-Resume Support

Unified memory is not supported. If unified memory is enabled for a vGPU, VMware vSphere Hypervisor (ESXi) operations that involve Fast Suspend-Resume fail, reporting a hot plug operation failure.

Multiple vGPU Support

To support applications and workloads that are compute or graphics intensive, multiple vGPUs can be added to a single VM. The assignment of more than one vGPU to a VM is supported only on a subset of vGPUs and hypervisor software releases.

vGPUs that Support Multiple vGPUs Assigned to a VM

The supported vGPUs depend on the architecture of the GPU on which the vGPUs reside:

• For GPUs based on the NVIDIA Volta architecture and later GPU architectures, all Q-series vGPUs are supported.

  On GPUs that support the Multi-Instance GPU (MIG) feature, the supported vGPUs depend on the NVIDIA vGPU software release:

  • Since 20.2: Both time-sliced and MIG-backed vGPUs are supported. Support for MIG-backed vGPUs requires VCF 9.1 or a later release.

  • 20.0, 20.1 only: Only time-sliced vGPUs on a single-instance GPU are supported.

• For GPUs based on the NVIDIA Maxwell™ graphics architecture, only Q-series vGPUs that are allocated all of the physical GPU’s frame buffer are supported.

You can assign multiple vGPUs with differing amounts of frame buffer to a single VM, provided the board type and the series of all the vGPUs is the same. For example, you can assign an A40-48Q vGPU and an A40-16Q vGPU to the same VM. However, you cannot assign an A30-8Q vGPU and an A16-8Q vGPU to the same VM.

Multiple vGPU Support on the NVIDIA Blackwell Architecture

Board	vGPU
NVIDIA RTX PRO 6000 Blackwell Server Edition NVIDIA RTX PRO 6000 Blackwell Server Edition liquid cooled	Since 20.2: All Q-series vGPUs. Support for MIG-backed vGPUs requires VCF 9.1 or a later release. 20.0, 20.1 only: All time-sliced Q-series vGPUs on a single-instance GPU. MIG-backed vGPUs and time-sliced, MIG-backed vGPUs are not supported.
NVIDIA RTX PRO 4500 Blackwell Server Edition	Since 20.2: All Q-series vGPUs. Support for MIG-backed vGPUs requires VCF 9.1 or a later release. 20.0, 20.1 only: All time-sliced Q-series vGPUs on a single-instance GPU. MIG-backed vGPUs and time-sliced, MIG-backed vGPUs are not supported.

Multiple vGPU Support on the NVIDIA Ada Lovelace Architecture

Board	vGPU
NVIDIA L40S	All Q-series vGPUs
NVIDIA L40	All Q-series vGPUs
NVIDIA L20 NVIDIA L20 liquid cooled	All Q-series vGPUs
NVIDIA L4	All Q-series vGPUs
NVIDIA L2	All Q-series vGPUs
NVIDIA RTX 6000 Ada	All Q-series vGPUs
NVIDIA RTX 5880 Ada	All Q-series vGPUs
NVIDIA RTX 5000 Ada	All Q-series vGPUs

Multiple vGPU Support on the NVIDIA Ampere GPU Architecture

Board	vGPU
NVIDIA A40	All Q-series vGPUs [8]
NVIDIA A16	All Q-series vGPUs [8]
NVIDIA A10	All Q-series vGPUs [8]
NVIDIA A2	All Q-series vGPUs [8]
NVIDIA RTX A6000	All Q-series vGPUs [8]
NVIDIA RTX A5500	All Q-series vGPUs [8]
NVIDIA RTX A5000	All Q-series vGPUs [8]

Multiple vGPU Support on the NVIDIA Turing GPU Architecture

Board	vGPU
Tesla T4	All Q-series vGPUs

Maximum Number of vGPUs Supported per VM

For VMware vSphere, the maximum number of vGPUs per VM supported depends on the hypervisor release:

Hypervisor Release	Maximum Number of vGPUs per VM
Since VMware vSphere 8.0 Update 2	16
VMware vSphere 8.0 and 8.0 Update 1	8

Hypervisor Releases that Support Multiple vGPUs Assigned to a VM

All hypervisor releases that support NVIDIA vGPU software are supported.

Peer-to-Peer CUDA Transfers over NVLink Support

Peer-to-peer CUDA transfers enable device memory between vGPUs on different GPUs that are assigned to the same VM to be accessed from within the CUDA kernels. NVLink is a high-bandwidth interconnect that enables fast communication between such vGPUs. Peer-to-Peer CUDA transfers over NVLink are supported only on a subset of vGPUs, VMware vSphere Hypervisor (ESXi) releases, and guest OS releases.

vGPUs that Support Peer-to-Peer CUDA Transfers

Only Q-series time-sliced vGPUs that are allocated all of the physical GPU’s frame buffer on physical GPUs that support NVLink are supported.

Peer-to-Peer CUDA Transfer Support on the NVIDIA Ampere GPU Architecture

Board	vGPU
NVIDIA A40	A40-48Q
NVIDIA RTX A6000	A6000-48Q
NVIDIA RTX A5500	A5500-24Q
NVIDIA RTX A5000	A5000-24Q

Peer-to-Peer CUDA Transfer Support on the NVIDIA Turing GPU Architecture

Board	vGPU
Quadro RTX 6000	RTX6000-24Q
Quadro RTX 6000 passive	RTX6000P-24Q
Quadro RTX 8000	RTX8000-48Q
Quadro RTX 8000 passive	RTX8000P-48Q

Peer-to-Peer CUDA Transfer Support on the NVIDIA Volta GPU Architecture

Board	vGPU
Tesla V100 SXM2 32GB	V100DX-32Q
Tesla V100 SXM2	V100X-16Q

Hypervisor Releases that Support Peer-to-Peer CUDA Transfers

Peer-to-Peer CUDA transfers over NVLink are supported on all hypervisor releases that support the assignment of more than one vGPU to a VM. For details, see Multiple vGPU Support.

Guest OS Releases that Support Peer-to-Peer CUDA Transfers

Linux only. Peer-to-Peer CUDA transfers over NVLink are not supported on Windows.

Limitations on Support for Peer-to-Peer CUDA Transfers

• NVSwitch is not supported. Only direct connections are supported.

• Only time-sliced vGPUs are supported. MIG-backed vGPUs are not supported.

• PCIe is not supported.

• SLI is not supported.

Unified Memory Support

Unified memory is a single memory address space that is accessible from any CPU or GPU in a system. It creates a pool of managed memory that is shared between the CPU and GPU to provide a simple way to allocate and access data that can be used by code running on any CPU or GPU in the system. Unified memory is supported only on a subset of vGPUs and guest OS releases.

Note

Unified memory is disabled by default. If used, you must enable unified memory individually for each vGPU that requires it by setting a vGPU plugin parameter. NVIDIA CUDA Toolkit profilers are supported and can be enabled on a VM for which unified memory is enabled.

vGPUs that Support Unified Memory

On GPUs that support the MIG feature and on which this feature is enabled, only Q-series MIG-backed vGPUs that occupy an entire GPU instance are supported. All other MIG-backed vGPUs are not supported.

On single-instance GPUs, only Q-series vGPUs that are allocated all of the physical GPU’s frame buffer on physical GPUs that support unified memory are supported.

Unified Memory Support on the NVIDIA Blackwell GPU Architecture

Board	vGPU
NVIDIA RTX PRO 6000 Blackwell Server Edition NVIDIA RTX PRO 6000 Blackwell Server Edition liquid cooled	NVIDIA RTX PRO 6000 Blackwell DC-96Q All Q-series MIG-backed vGPUs that occupy an entire GPU instance
NVIDIA RTX PRO 4500 Blackwell Server Edition	NVIDIA RTX PRO 4500 Blackwell DC-32Q All Q-series MIG-backed vGPUs that occupy an entire GPU instance

Unified Memory Support on the NVIDIA Ada Lovelace GPU Architecture

Board	vGPU
NVIDIA L40	L40-48Q
NVIDIA L40S	L40S-48Q
NVIDIA L20 NVIDIA L20 liquid cooled	L20-48Q
NVIDIA L4	L4-24Q
NVIDIA L2	L2-24Q
NVIDIA RTX 6000 Ada	RTX 6000 Ada-48Q
NVIDIA RTX 5880 Ada	RTX 5880 Ada-48Q
NVIDIA RTX 5000 Ada	RTX 5000 Ada-32Q

Unified Memory Support on the NVIDIA Ampere GPU Architecture

Board	vGPU
NVIDIA A40	A40-48Q
NVIDIA A16	A16-16Q
NVIDIA A10	A10-24Q
NVIDIA A2	A2-16Q
NVIDIA RTX A6000	A6000-48Q
NVIDIA RTX A5500	A5500-24Q
NVIDIA RTX A5000	A5000-24Q

Guest OS Releases that Support Unified Memory

Linux only. Unified memory is not supported on Windows.

Limitations on Support for Unified Memory

• Only time-sliced Q-series and C-series vGPUs that are allocated all of the physical GPU’s frame buffer on physical GPUs that support unified memory are supported. Fractional time-sliced vGPUs are not supported.

• When unified memory is enabled for a VM, vGPU migration is disabled for the VM.

NVIDIA GPU Operator Support

NVIDIA GPU Operator simplifies the deployment of NVIDIA vGPU software with software container platforms on immutable operating systems. An immutable operating system does not allow the installation of the NVIDIA vGPU software graphics driver directly on the operating system. NVIDIA GPU Operator is supported only on specific combinations of hypervisor software release, container platform, and guest OS release.

For more information, refer to Using NVIDIA vGPU in the NVIDIA GPU Operator documentation.

NVIDIA Deep Learning Super Sampling (DLSS) Support

NVIDIA vGPU software supports NVIDIA DLSS on NVIDIA RTX Virtual Workstation.

Supported DLSS versions: 2.0. Version 1.0 is not supported.

Supported GPUs:

• NVIDIA L40

• NVIDIA L40S

• NVIDIA L20

• NVIDIA L20 liquid cooled

• NVIDIA L4

• NVIDIA L2

• NVIDIA RTX 6000 Ada

• NVIDIA RTX 5880 Ada

• NVIDIA RTX 5000 Ada

• NVIDIA A40

• NVIDIA A16

• NVIDIA A2

• NVIDIA A10

• NVIDIA RTX A6000

• NVIDIA RTX A5500

• NVIDIA RTX A5000

• NVIDIA RTX PRO 6000 Blackwell Server Edition

• NVIDIA RTX PRO 6000 Blackwell Server Edition liquid cooled

• NVIDIA RTX PRO 4500 Blackwell Server Edition

• Tesla T4

Note

NVIDIA graphics driver components that DLSS requires are installed only if a supported GPU is detected during installation of the driver. Therefore, if the creation of VM templates includes driver installation, the template should be created from a VM that is configured with a supported GPU while the driver is being installed.

Supported applications: only applications that use nvngx_dlss.dll version 2.0.18 or newer

vSphere Lifecycle Management (vLCM) Support

NVIDIA vGPU software supports updating the Virtual GPU Manager for VMware vSphere Hypervisor (ESXi) by using vLCM.

Supported VMware vSphere Hypervisor (ESXi) releases: All releases supported by NVIDIA vGPU software

Supported VMware vCenter Server releases: All releases supported by NVIDIA vGPU software

Note

Updating the Virtual GPU Manager for VMware vSphere Hypervisor (ESXi) by using vLCM might fail with the following error:

Host not compatible with the image. The bootbank partition on the host has a capacity of <size>, the image requires <size>. Remove unnecessary components from the image.

For information about how to work around this issue, refer to Broadcom Knowledge Base Article: ESXi upgrade or installation failure: Host not compatible with the image. The bootbank partition on the host has a capacity of ＜size＞, the image requires ＜size＞.

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[1] (1,2,3,4)

The supported products are as follows:

• vWS: NVIDIA RTX Virtual Workstation

• vPC: NVIDIA Virtual PC

• vApps: NVIDIA Virtual Applications

[2] (1,2,3,4)

N/A indicates that the deployment is not supported.

[3] (1,2,3,4)

vApps is supported only on Windows operating systems.

[4]

A single-instance GPU is a GPU that is not partitioned into multiple GPU instances.

[5]

A 1:1 MIG-backed NVIDIA vGPU is a MIG-backed vGPU that occupies an entire GPU instance.

[6]

Time-sliced, MIG-backed NVIDIA vGPU support requires VCF 9.1 or a later release. Earlier VCF 9.0 builds and all VMware vSphere Hypervisor (ESXi) 8 releases are not supported.

[7] (1,2,3,4)

This GPU is supported only in displayless mode. In displayless mode, local physical display connectors are disabled.

[8] (1,2,3,4,5,6,7)

This type of vGPU cannot be assigned with other types of vGPU to the same VM.