Control an ESXi server with vSphere client over the internet?

[JudahTheobald]

I work for a company that manage a number of servers, most of which run ESXi. There are times when the VM's that run on them are unresponsive, or crash. When this happens we often have no choice but to visit and access the console from a client within the network. I was wondering if it was possible for me to open up a port like 12345 and have it forward to the  ESXi host, giving me access to it's inventory and the VM power states and all the usual stuff, only remote rather than within the network. I want to know if it is possible, and what ports are required for me to do this. I am aware that you can install the client as a VM and remote into that, but I would rather keep things the way they are. I simply want to access servers ESXi host's by opening the vSphere Client on my own machine remotely, and feeding it the customers external IP and managing it that way. Thanks for your time.

[Rubeck · Accepted solution]

Hi..

Yes, this is indeed possible... All requried ports for doing this are listed in the KB below:

TCP and UDP Ports required to access vCenter Server, ESX hosts, and other network components

/Rubeck

[Tsjo]

But that is alot of ports to open in the firewalls.

I would recommend a jumpbox, accessible from a very limited amount of addresses and available by Secure RDS or similar.