The purpose of this blog post is to provide the guidance and the steps needed to create a VMware Template from a virtual machine in vSphere 7. A virtual machine template can be used to create a virtual machine from a golden image, which can be repurposed often to create as many virtual machines as you desire.
To begin, a new template must be created within your vSphere 7 environment. Please follow the steps outlined in this guide to begin the process.
- Log into your vSphere 7 environment, right-click the virtual machine you’d like to convert to a template, select Clone, and then Clone to Template.
- When prompted to do so at the Select a Name and Folder window, please provide a VM Template Name, then select the appropriate location for the template, following by Next to proceed.
- Select a Compute Resource, and then select Next to proceed.
- Select the Datastore, the Virtual Disk Format, and then Next to proceed.
- Review the settings at the Ready to Complete window and then Finish to confirm.
- The progress to convert the virtual machine to a template can be monitored under Recent Tasks.
- The new virtual template has been successfully created and can be used to deploy many virtual machines moving forward. Also, it’s recommended that you convert the template to a virtual machine periodically so that it can be updated (software and\or OS patches) and by doing so this eliminates the time required in the event you have a mass deployment of virtual machines because they’ll all be consistent when needed. Once the virtual machine is up-to-date, you should convert it back to a template.
I hope you found this blog post useful and if I have missed anything or if you have any suggestions, please let me know.
Al Rasheed - A personal Blog about IT related subjects. 
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