When Broadcom took over VMware it did not simply raise a price list — it rebuilt the pricing model from the ground up. Perpetual licences disappeared, thousands of SKUs collapsed into two subscription bundles, and billing moved to a per-core basis with hard minimums. This page breaks down exactly what changed and why so many renewal quotes arrived far higher than expected.
| VMs | Hosts | VMware VCF / yr | Proxmox VE / yr | 3-yr saving |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 50 | 3× | £50,304 | £2,820 | £142,452 |
| 100 | 4× | £67,072 | £3,760 | £189,936 |
| 250 | 8× | £134,144 | £7,520 | £379,872 |
| 500 | 15× | £251,520 | £14,100 | £712,260 |
All figures are indicative estimates for planning only and subject to change; licence prices vary by reseller and deal size, and any monthly finance figure is subject to credit approval — not a quotation.
From perpetual licences to per-core subscription
The single biggest change is structural. Where you once bought a VMware licence outright and paid a modest annual support fee, everything is now a recurring subscription charged per physical CPU core. Ownership is gone: stop paying and entitlement lapses. Because the meter is now cores rather than sockets or perpetual seats, a densely populated dual-socket host that felt cheap under the old model can carry a very different annual cost once every core is counted and billed each year.
Two bundles, per-core rates and hard minimums
Broadcom collapsed thousands of SKUs into two editions: vSphere Foundation (VVF) for compute-centric virtualisation, and Cloud Foundation (VCF), which folds in vSAN, NSX and Aria at a much higher per-core rate. Two minimums then inflate almost every quote. Each CPU is licensed at no fewer than sixteen cores, so lower-core processors are billed as sixteen; and orders carry a seventy-two-core floor no small cluster can dip below — you pay for cores, and bundles, you may never use.
Why 2026 renewal bills jumped so sharply
For most organisations the shock lands at renewal. A single quote can stack several changes at once: the move to subscription, forced bundling into VVF or VCF, per-core counting with the sixteen-core floor, and the loss of previously discounted perpetual pricing. Layer on annual uplift and late-renewal penalties and the year-one figure can dwarf what the same estate cost before. The calculator on this page turns those mechanics into your own numbers so nothing arrives as a surprise.
FAQs
Why did my VMware renewal cost so much more than last time?
Several changes compound in one renewal: the switch from perpetual licences to per-core subscription, forced bundling into VVF or VCF, the sixteen-core-per-CPU billing floor, and the loss of legacy perpetual discounts. Each alone raises the figure; stacked together, plus annual uplift, they explain renewal quotes that land far above the previous term's cost.
What is the difference between VVF and VCF pricing?
vSphere Foundation (VVF) is the compute-focused edition at the lower per-core rate. Cloud Foundation (VCF) sits at a significantly higher per-core price because it bundles vSAN storage, NSX networking and the Aria suite into one package. If you do not use those add-ons, VCF means paying for software your estate may never touch — a common driver of over-spend.
How does the 16-core-per-CPU minimum affect my bill?
Every physical CPU is licensed at a minimum of sixteen cores, even if the processor has fewer. A host running eight- or twelve-core CPUs is still billed as though each had sixteen, so you pay for cores that do not physically exist. On low-core hardware this inflates the licensed core count well beyond what you actually run.