Time synchronisation not working in NAT networking mode

[antonwas1991]

Good afternoon,

I encountered that you cannot synchronize time from a Windows 11 guest when the networking mode is NAT. When you switch to bridge mode it is working like expected.

I mean the built in time synchronization feature which can be found at the settings; Time & Language -> Date & time. There you can find the feature under the Extra settings header. It has a button to the right of the screen calling Synchronize now.

Is this normal behaviour or a bug in VMware Workstation 17.5.1

[RDPetruska]

If you have VMware Tools installed, the time sync should happen through there, no need for network connection.

[antonwas1991]

Ok you are right. So it looks like VMWare had time synchronization made part of VMWare Tools. If you wan to use it in a VM you need to install VMWare Tools.  Is that right?

[RDPetruska]

If you want to use ANY of the features/drivers included in the VMware Tools package, then yes, you need to install it.

You can always use a network connection and standard NTP time services.  I was just pointing out that if you have VMware Tools installed (always recommended, at the very least for the drivers for the emulated cards), then you can just enable the time sync with host in the VM settings.