VMware has (somewhat) seen the light with regard to vRAM entitlements and made a number of changes based on customer feedback.
Here are the changes (all values are per socket/license):
Essentials: 32 GB vRAM entitlement (was 24 GB)
Essentials Plus: 32 GB vRAM entitlement (was 24 GB)
Enterprise: 64 GB (was 32 GB)
Enterprise Plus: 96 GB (was 48 GB)
Further, VMware will cap at 96GB of RAM on a single VM the amount of RAM that counts against the vRAM pool. So, if you have a VM that has 128GB of RAM assigned to it, only 96GB will count in vRAM calculations used for licensing purposes. With the original scheme, a massive VM was no longer financially feasible but this change brings thing back to reality a bit. VMware indicated that no single virtual machine will ever cost more than one Enterprise Plus license.
If I happened to be a conspiracy theorist, I’d say that VMware intentionally deployed insanely low vRAM entitlements knowing full well that there would be major push back. From there, the company could capitulate to “customer feedback” and implement somewhat more reasonable entitlements this earning accolades for introducing a brand new licensing charge.
I guess it’s a good thing I’m not a conspiracy theorist! 🙂