VCF 9 Fleet Planning Sizer (ESA)

Fleet License Summary

1 TiB per licensed core (planner model) · vmtechie.blog

Mgmt Cores

--

WLD Cores

--

Entitlement (TiB)

--

Add-on Required (TiB)

--

Required Raw (TiB)--

Planning aid only — validate all designs with official Broadcom docs

1 TB decimal = 1000 GB. All TiB figures use ×0.9095 conversion. DRR > 2.0 is optimistic unless validated against actual workloads.

⚠ External Storage — Entitlement Impact

VCF licenses include 1 TiB vSAN raw storage per licensed core. Domains using external storage do not consume this entitlement — those cores still cost the same but the bundled storage value is forfeited. Budget for external array acquisition, licensing and support costs separately.

Total forfeited entitlement -- TiB

🗄 Storage Model Reference ✦ VCF 9 · KB 416270

Supporting all Principal Storage Options in VMware Cloud Foundation 9 · click to expand

✦ VCF 9 — All Principal Storage Options Supported

VCF 9 supports a variety of storage types as principal storage across management and workload domains. Standard greenfield VCF workflows cover vSAN ESA, vSAN OSA, Fibre Channel and NFS v3. Additional types — iSCSI, NFS v4.1, FCoE and NVMe over Fabrics (FC, TCP, RDMA) — can also be used as principal storage via the Converge workflow, where an existing vSphere environment with pre-configured storage is imported into VCF 9. This sizer models the external storage path (host count driven by compute & memory) and surfaces the vSAN entitlement forfeited per domain.

🟢 Greenfield VCF Workflows

Configured during domain/cluster creation. Fully automated by VCF Operations — deploy, scale, LCM, patch, upgrade.

✓ vSAN ESA — NVMe only, single-tier
✓ vSAN OSA — SATA, SAS, NVMe
✓ Fibre Channel (FC)
✓ NFS v3

🔄 Via Converge Workflow (KB 416270)

Pre-configure storage on ESXi 9 hosts, deploy vCenter, then import into VCF 9 using Converge or Import vCenter workflow.

✓ iSCSI
✓ NFS v4.1
✓ FCoE
✓ NVMe over Fabrics (FC, TCP, RDMA)

Converge Deployment Method — Step by Step

⚙ Management Domain

Deploy ESXi 9 on selected hosts
Configure target datastore (iSCSI / NFS v4.1 / FCoE / NVMe-oF) on one host
Deploy vCenter 9 appliance on that host
Create a vSphere cluster with all hosts using the pre-configured datastore
Deploy VCF Installer → run Converge workflow to convert to VCF 9

Pre-configured datastore becomes principal storage for the management domain.

💾 Workload Domain

Repeat management steps 1–4 on new hosts
In VCF Operations → Add Workload Domain → Import a vCenter
Select the newly created vCenter
Repeat as needed for additional workload domains

Pre-configured datastore becomes principal storage for the workload domain.

⚠ Day 2 Operations — Important Constraint

Hosts and clusters provisioned via Converge are fully lifecycle managed by VCF Operations (LCM, patching, upgrades).

For other Day 2 operations (host commissioning, adding/removing hosts or clusters) — perform the operation in vCenter first, then run Sync Inventory in VCF Operations.

🚫 If Sync Inventory is skipped:

Lifecycle management in VCF Operations will be blocked for those hosts and clusters until inventory is synchronised.

See: Managing Configuration Drift — Broadcom docs

Principal & Supplemental Storage — Domain Support Matrix

Storage Model	Mgmt — Default Cluster	Mgmt — Additional Clusters	VI Workload Domain	Method
vSAN ESA	Principal	Principal	Principal	🟢 Greenfield
vSAN OSA	Principal	Principal	Principal	🟢 Greenfield
Storage Cluster (disaggregated vSAN)	—	Principal	Principal	🟢 Greenfield
Compute-Only Cluster	—	Principal	Principal	🟢 Greenfield
Fibre Channel (FC)	Principal	Principal + Supp	Principal + Supp	🟢 Greenfield
NFS v3	Principal	Principal + Supp	Principal + Supp	🟢 Greenfield
iSCSI	Principal*	Principal*	Principal*	🔄 Converge
NFS v4.1	Principal*	Principal*	Principal*	🔄 Converge
FCoE	Principal*	Principal*	Principal*	🔄 Converge
NVMe/FC · NVMe/TCP · NVMe/RDMA	Principal*	Principal*	Principal*	🔄 Converge

* Via Converge workflow — pre-configure datastore on ESXi 9, deploy vCenter, then import into VCF 9. Day 2 non-LCM operations must be performed in vCenter first, followed by Sync Inventory in VCF Operations.

Source: Broadcom KB Article 416270 — Supporting all Principal Storage Options in VMware Cloud Foundation 9 · knowledge.broadcom.com/external/article/416270 · Validate all storage model decisions against the current Broadcom VCF design guide before procurement.

Fleet Topology

Live architecture overview — click a domain to scroll to it

⚙ Management Domain

Host Profile · VM Stack · Cluster Analysis · WLD clusters can override spec individually

Host Specification

Storage

CPUs/Host

Cores/CPU

RAM (GB)

NVMe Qty

NVMe Size (TB)

Min Hosts

Policy + Planning

CPU Sub

Mem Sub

Compute Reserve %

RAID Type

FTTi

RAID-5 Stripei

vSAN Free %

Dedup Ratio

Compression

VM Swap Used %

Storage Growth %

Host Failures

VMware Management VM Stack

Full VCF 9 stack · Custom slots included

Inc	Component	Inst.	Size	vCPU	RAM (GB)	Disk (GB)

Cluster Analysis

Limiter: --

Compute

Demand-- vCPU

Host Cap--

Hosts needed--

Memory

Demand-- GB

Host Cap--

Hosts needed--

Mgmt Hosts: --

Storage: -- | PF: --

Core Licenses: --

Raw TiB: --

ESA Storage Breakdown

VM

Swap

PF

Free

Growth

VM Capacity	-- GB	Total VM disk demand ÷ DRR (dedup × compression ratio)
+ Swap	-- GB	VM RAM × swap % — reserved for vMotion safety net
Interim Total	-- GB	VM + Swap before RAID overhead
× PF --	-- GB	vSAN RAID tax — the cost of your redundancy policy
+ Free Reserve	-- GB	Headroom for resync, rebuilds & spike absorption
+ Growth	-- GB	Forward capacity buffer for data growth over time
Eff. Hosts	--	N − failed hosts (usable for storage)
Per Host Req.	-- GB	Total ÷ effective hosts — drives storage host count
Raw/Host	-- GB	Actual raw NVMe capacity per host from spec above

4. Workload Domains

Per-WLD host spec · NVMe tiering · vSAN ESA policy · vmtechie.blog

Disclaimer

⚠ Independent Planning Aid — Not an Official Broadcom Tool
This tool is created and maintained by vmtechie.blog as a free community resource. It is not affiliated with, endorsed by, or supported by Broadcom Inc. or VMware by Broadcom.

All sizing figures are estimates only, based on inputs you provide and simplified models of VCF 9 behaviour. Real-world deployments involve variables this tool cannot fully account for — including actual workload profiles, vSAN overhead variance, network topology, hardware-specific performance, and customer-specific licensing agreements.

Always validate every design against official Broadcom TechDocs, the VMware HCL, and qualified field engineering guidance before any procurement or deployment decision.

📖 How this sizer works — full methodology explained →

VCF 9 Fleet Sizer