--- title: "PowerCLI Tutorial: Boost Your VMware Management Skills" description: "Begin your journey with our PowerCLI tutorial and elevate your VMware infrastructure management to expert levels. Learn essential tips and tricks today!" canonical: "https://adamtheautomator.com/powercli-tutorial/" --- # PowerCLI Tutorial: Boost Your VMware Management Skills > Begin your journey with our PowerCLI tutorial and elevate your VMware infrastructure management to expert levels. Learn essential tips and tricks today! Source: https://adamtheautomator.com/powercli-tutorial/ --- ATA Learning Tap to hide [ ATA Learning ](/) * [Home](/) * [Tutorials](/tutorials/) * [Instructors](/author/) * [Advertising](/advertising/) * [Recommended Resources](/resources/) * [About Adam](/about-adam/) Search for: * [](https://twitter.com/adbertram) * [](https://github.com/Adam-the-Automator) * [](https://www.linkedin.com/company/adam-the-automator-llc) * [](/feed/) ![PowerCLI Tutorial: Boost Your VMware Management Skills](https://adamtheautomator.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/09/powercli-tutorial.jpg) # PowerCLI Tutorial: Boost Your VMware Management Skills [![](https://secure.gravatar.com/avatar/7323802b722e8034726c07745123b8c2fb1b513369c5b9e939f94ec1a83cf55f?s=192&d=mm&r=g)Dave Pinkawa](https://adamtheautomator.com/author/david-pinkawa/)28 December 202312 min. read Categories: [IT Ops](/category/it-ops/) Tags:[PowerCLI](/tag/powercli/)[PowerShell](/tag/powershell/)[VmWare](/tag/vmware/) Table of Contents * [What You Need to Have and Know](#what-you-need-to-have-and-know) * [Gather Information on ESXi Hosts with PowerCLI](#gather-information-on-esxi-hosts-with-powercli) * [Inspecting VMs with PowerCLI](#inspecting-vms-with-powercli) * [Inspecting Virtual Switches with PowerCLI](#inspecting-virtual-switches-with-powercli) * [Finding VMs Attached to a Virtual Network with PowerCLI](#finding-vms-attached-to-a-virtual-network-with-powercli) * [Getting OS Version Information on your VMs with PowerCLI](#getting-os-version-information-on-your-vms-with-powercli) * [Creating CSV Reports with PowerCLI](#creating-csv-reports-with-powercli) * [Inspecting Virtual Hard Disks with PowerCLI](#inspecting-virtual-hard-disks-with-powercli) * [Inspecting Virtual Network Adapters with PowerCLI](#inspecting-virtual-network-adapters-with-powercli) * [Running PowerShell Scripts in VMs with Invoke-VMScript](#running-powershell-scripts-in-vms-with-invoke-vmscript) * [Getting Advanced with Get-View](#getting-advanced-with-get-view) * [VMware Code Capture – Learn from your Clicks](#vmware-code-capture-learn-from-your-clicks) * [PowerCLI Tutorial Summary](#summary) * [Further Reading](#further-reading) PowerCLI by VMWare is becoming the ubiquitous interface for hypervisor virtualization administrators of ESXi supported hardware. Learning how to manage VMware via PowerShell and PowerCLI is a strong addition to your toolkit. In this PowerCLI tutorial, you’re going to learn how to do just that. Not a reader? Watch this related video tutorial! **_Not seeing the video? Make sure your ad blocker is disabled._** In this tutorial, you will learn: * the basics of connecting to VMware infrastructure with PowerCLI * familiarize yourself with cmdlets for working with VMware objects * empower yourself with the knowledge to explore * manage VMware further via PowerCLI Let’s get to it! ## What You Need to Have and Know Before you get too far in this PowerCLI tutorial, it’s always important to ensure you and I are both on the same page. For this article, I’m going to be assuming that: * **You have basic PowerShell experience.**  You don’t have to be a PowerShell expert, by any means, but any PowerShell familiarity you have will serve you well. * **You have a VMware ESXi host or vCenter appliance for connecting to and testing** * **You’re working on a Windows (Or Mac / Linux) workstation** * **You have PowerCLI already installed and are connected. If not, check out this [PowerCLI installation](https://adamtheautomator.com/vmware-powercli/) article.** I’ll be using PowerCLI v 11.4.0. I will be working from a Windows 10 workstation with Windows PowerShell 5.1, but you’re welcome to use PowerShell 6 instead as there’s feature parity for this tutorial. ## Gather Information on ESXi Hosts with PowerCLI Before you dive into the virtual layer of our vSphere environment, it is a good idea to review the physical hardware layer. VMware PowerCLI provides a cmdlet directly for this purpose, to gather detailed information called `Get-VMHost`. While you’re connected to your vCenter server or ESXi host, run the following cmdlet. ```powershell PS51> Get-VMHost ``` ![Get-VMHost](https://adamtheautomator.com/content/images/2019/08/get-vmhost.png) Get-VMHost Since I am connected to a vCenter Server Appliance which is managing two separate ESXi hosts, I am provided with some basic information about the hosts being managed. The `Get-VMHost` allows you to review the hardware capabilities of your virtualization hosts. But, by default, `Get-VMHost` doesn’t return all the information it can. If you pipe the `Get-VMHost` cmdlet to `Format-List`, you will get console output for all information about the given hosts. ![Get-VMHost | Format-List](https://adamtheautomator.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/06/Since-I-am-connected-to-a-vCenter-S-1024x131.png "image_tooltip") `Get-VMHost | Format-List` Alternatively, you can be pickier and only select individual properties on the VMHost object you’re working with like: ```powershell PS51> Get-VMHost | format-list -Property State,LicenseKey,Version ``` Leveraging this more verbose output will provide an even greater view of the underlying hardware running your virtualized workloads. Some of the information, in particular, would be: * License validation info * CPU/Memory totals * Hardware vendor model * DNS hostname After review, this can be compiled into a CSV file perhaps using the [`Export-CSV` cmdlet](https://adamtheautomator.com/export-csv/). ## Inspecting VMs with PowerCLI Let’s now dive into another topic in this PowerCLI tutorial by reviewing virtual hosts is reviewing which virtual machines are currently present on a given ESXi host. The `Get-VM` command is a handy command you can use to review VM information. ```powershell PS51> Get-VMHost -Name | Get-VM ``` The output of this cmdlet will look something like below: ![PS51> Get-VMHost -Name | Get-VM](https://adamtheautomator.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/06/The-output-above-provides-a-full-status-list-of-cur-1024x365.png "image_tooltip") PS51> Get-VMHost -Name | Get-VM The output above provides a full status list of currently running VMs on a given host. If you were to choose to not specify an individual host, as I have done above, you’ll receive a table of information for each subsequent host and the VMs on each. If you are ever troubleshooting an issue and need to know the number of virtual machines on a given host or have a need to use VMware PowerCLI to gather ESXi host information, you can use these cmdlets going forward. The reporting functionality you have at your fingertips is starting to expand! ## Inspecting Virtual Switches with PowerCLI For those of us charged with configuring or administering the virtual networks of a vCenter cluster, there is a full range of networking cmdlets for any use case. If you wish to see the virtual switches configured in your vSphere environment, you will use the following: ```powershell PS51> Get-VirtualSwitch ``` Depending on the number of virtual networks and virtual switches you have, your resulting list may be quite large. In my case, as you see below, I have a single _DSwitch_ which is a _Distributed Virtual Switch_. In an Enterprise vSphere implementation where there are many ESXi hosts in a cluster, _DSwitches_ simplify the deployment of virtual switches and port groups across a multitude of hosts with the same configuration. This saves on the manual labor of creating identical network configurations on each host manually, and is a great way to scale your cluster! ![Get-VirtualSwitch](https://adamtheautomator.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/06/Finding-VMs.png "image_tooltip") Get-VirtualSwitch ## Finding VMs Attached to a Virtual Network with PowerCLI While attempting to narrow down the scope of an issue, you may wonder which VMs are connected to which networks. To figure that out, you can use the `Get-VirtualPortGroup` command. Let’s learn about this cmdlet in this PowerCLI tutorial. A port group is essentially a virtual network. To display all port groups, run `Get-VirtualPortGroup` without any parameters. You should then see a listing of all virtual port groups present in your vSphere environment. ![Get-VirtualPortGroup](https://adamtheautomator.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/06/in-your-vSphere-environment..png "image_tooltip") Get-VirtualPortGroup To find all of the VMs inside of that port group (_DPortGroup_ in my case), you can run the below script. Be sure to replace the value _DPortGroup_ with the name of your Virtual Port Group. ```powershell PS51> Get-VM | Where-Object { ($PSItem | Get-NetworkAdapter | where {$_.networkname -match "DPortgroup"})} ``` In this one-liner, we are getting a list of all virtual machines that exist in this vCenter appliance, and then filtering with the `Where-Object` cmdlet to get only those VMs with a network name that matches our Port Group. ![Getting VMs with only a specific port group](https://adamtheautomator.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/06/VMs-with-a-network-name-that-matches-our-Port-Group.-1024x346.png "image_tooltip") Getting VMs with only a specific port group With this output, you’ll be able to define what machines are connected and configured for each network. When asked to locate and analyze which VMs are connected to a particular network in VMware you will now be empowered to provide a PowerCLI reporting solution to this question. ## Getting OS Version Information on your VMs with PowerCLI The bulk of administrative work inside of VMware is done at the virtual machine level. You’re likely to receive countless requests for tasks like retrieving a list of all hard drive sizes on VMs or getting guest OS versions for all your servers among others. These tasks are cumbersome at scale. PowerCLI is able to streamline these with a few important cmdlets to add to your arsenal so let’s cover them in this PowerCLI tutorial. You may have been asked at some point in time, “How many Ubuntu servers do we have in our VMware cluster?”. You might have then spent way too much time clicking around in vCenter looking for an answer. PowerCLI can streamline this process by looking at the VM objects in vCenter and applying some PowerShell magic on the output. Take a look at the following script that pulls together VM information. This snippet uses the `Get-View` command which we will go into a bit later but for now, you should know that it is an advanced way to retrieve VMware object properties. In this case, we’re gathering nested properties that are most easily retrieved in this method. ```powershell PS51> Get-VM | Sort-Object -Property Name | Get-View -Property @("Name", "Config.GuestFullName", "Guest.GuestFullName") | Select-Object -Property Name, @{N="Configured OS";E={$_.Config.GuestFullName}}, @{N="Running OS";E={$_.Guest.GuestFullName}} ``` The above code is retrieving a  list of virtual machines via the PowerCLI `Get-VM` cmdlet, sorting said list with the PowerShell `Sort-Object` cmdlet, and then retrieving some of the object properties using the PowerCLI `Get-View` cmdlet. Running this in my environment yields the result below. You can see the name of the VM in vCenter, the `Configured OS` which is how VMware’s virtual hardware is set to interpret the guest operating system, and the actual `Running OS` that represents the actual OS. ![Finding VMs based on various criteria](https://adamtheautomator.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/06/actual-Running-OS-that-represents-the-actual-OS..png "image_tooltip") Finding VMs based on various criteria With the VMs _replicant_ and _Scriptrunner_ are powered off in the cluster, you will not be able to see the `Running OS` value for them. The OS is gathered by the VMware Tools service. If it’s not available, PowerCLI cannot pull the operating system information. ## Creating CSV Reports with PowerCLI VMware Tools is an in-guest service for both Windows and Linux VMs that provides the hypervisor additional information and administrative capabilities. Most commonly this will provide clean-shutdown, operating system information, and higher resolution console viewing of the VMs. A convenient way to report on and provide this information would be to pipe the above script into the `Export-CSV`  cmdlet. `Export-Csv` will create a CSV file with the same information you see in the console. ```powershell PS51> Get-VM | Sort-Object -Property Name | Get-View -Property @("Name", "Config.GuestFullName", "Guest.GuestFullName") | Select -Property Name, @{N="Configured OS";E={$_.Config.GuestFullName}}, @{N="Running OS";E={$_.Guest.GuestFullName}} | Export-CSV C:\report.csv -NoTypeInformation ``` After running the above code, you should then be able to open the CSV file with Excel to review the report. ![CSV file of VM information](https://adamtheautomator.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/06/xcel.png "image_tooltip") CSV file of VM information ## Inspecting Virtual Hard Disks with PowerCLI The `Get-Harddisk` command is another useful command to know. The `Get-HardDisk` cmdlet allows you to inspect information about virtual hard disks attached to VMs. For example, to query information about the virtual hard disk attached to the _exchange1_ VMs, you could run the following: ```powershell PS51> Get-VM -Name exchange1 | Get-HardDisk | Format-List ``` ![query information about the virtual hard disk attached to the exchange1 VMs](https://adamtheautomator.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/06/Some-of-this-information-may-be-redundant-such-as-the-capacity-in-KB-vs.-GB-1024x217.png "image_tooltip") Querying information about the virtual hard disk attached to the _exchange1_ VMs Some of this information may be redundant, such as the capacity in KB vs. GB. But there is value in knowing the `StorageFormat` (thin/thick provisioning types). And knowing the VMDK file name. For example, ff you see a common issue and all VM hard disks reside on the same datastore volume, this knowledge may expedite troubleshooting. ## Inspecting Virtual Network Adapters with PowerCLI In addition to reviewing hard disk information of your virtual machines, you may also want to check on the virtual network adapters. To check on these properties for a single VM, you can use the `Get-NetworkAdpter` cmdlet. ```powershell PS51> Get-NetworkAdapter -VM myVM ``` While you had hunted earlier in this port for all VMs residing in the same network, this time you only want to see the adapters connected to a particular VM. ![Get-NetworkAdapter](https://adamtheautomator.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/06/network-this-time-you-only-want-to-see-the-adapters-connected-to-a-particular-VM..png "image_tooltip") Get-NetworkAdapter This is useful if troubleshooting VMs that have multiple network adapters connected. You can quickly and at a glance determine if those adapters are connected to the proper networks. ## Running PowerShell Scripts in VMs with Invoke-VMScript Using the `Invoke-VMScript`, you can also run PowerShell code directly inside of the VM; no network connectivity necessary. If you have ever used [PowerShell Direct](https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/virtualization/hyper-v-on-windows/user-guide/powershell-direct) within a Hyper-V environment, this will be a similar experience. Instead of creating a PowerShell Remoting session or using the [`Invoke-Command`](https://adamtheautomator.com/invoke-command/) cmdlet over the network, the `Invoke-VMScript` cmdlet can send commands directly to the VM without normal WinRM or SSH connectivity. As an example, perhaps you’d like to perform a simple directory listing on a VM called _exchange1_. To do so, you would pass `dir C:\` as the value for the `ScriptText` parameter as shown below. ```powershell PS51> Invoke-VMScript -VM exchange1 -ScriptText "dir C:\" ``` The results are as if you had run the commands from the VM console itself. `Invoke-VMScript` then relays all of the output the command that was run on the VM returns. ![Invoke-VMScript](https://adamtheautomator.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/06/While-this-is-a-basic-example-you-1024x347.png "image_tooltip") Invoke-VMScript While this is a basic example, you can get as complicated as you would like. This PowerCLI cmdlet allows you to specify batch, PowerShell, or Bash types within the `ScriptText` parameter. You can get more advanced as well. Below you can see how to use `Invoke-VMScript` to run PowerShell code using a separate `$script` variable for the `ScriptText` parameter input. This allows us to create more customized script input for the VM to process. ```powershell PS51> $script = 'Get-Disk' $guestCredential = Get-Credential Invoke-VMScript -ScriptText $script -VM VM -GuestCredential $guestCredential -ScriptType Powershell ``` The `ScriptText` parameter value needs to a string. This is why the `$script` variable has the single-outer-quotes as a necessity. You may have also noticed the use of the `GuestCredential` parameter. This parameter is used to authenticate into the VM operating system. This parameter is especially useful if you want to run the script as a different account. Your script in action should result in output similar to below. ![Running a script on a VM with Invoke-VMScript](https://adamtheautomator.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/06/The-result-of-this-script-p-1024x196.png "image_tooltip") Running a script on a VM with Invoke-VMScript The result of this script provides us with the VM’s disk information. Based on that, you should know it’s a remote VM because of the `VMware Virtual Disk` as the friendly name of the drive. ## Getting Advanced with Get-View You may have seen some of the basic cmdlets return a property called `ExtensionData`. You can find this property by piping many PowerCLI cmdlets to the PowerShell `Get-Member` cmdlet.  If you were wondering what that was, now’s your chance to find out. The next step in this venture is understanding the `Get-View` cmdlet. VMware PowerCLI leverages many different queries to the VM to provide the pretty and simple output of `Get-VM`. But there is a lot under the hood that is only accessible by using the `Get-View` cmdlet. You’re likely to see a lot of scripts using this cmdlet. It would behoove you to spend some time getting used to seeing this cmdlet in action. To familiarize yourself, use the `Get-View` cmdlet to get some virtual machine information (_exchange1_ in this example). You can see the `Filter` options of this cmdlet require the use of a PowerShell hashtable and not individual string values. Be aware when building your own unique scripts! ```powershell PS51> Get-View -ViewType VirtualMachine -Filter @{"Name" = "myVMName"} ``` The result of the command above is a lot of nested configuration information and method options for taking actions against the VM or getting object properties. ![Get-View](https://adamtheautomator.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/06/If-you-use-the-same-script-above-and-s.png "image_tooltip") Get-View If you use the same script above and send the output to a variable, you can inspect those nested options with dot notation. Here you can see and retrieve all of that additional information of the guest operating system, that you may want to report on via PowerCLI. ```powershell PS51> $VM = Get-View -ViewType VirtualMachine -Filter @{"Name" = "myVMName"} PS51> $VM.Guest ``` ![Using Get-View with the Filter Parameter](https://adamtheautomator.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/06/Perhaps-youd-like-to-select-a-single-property.-If-so-you-could-run-the-following-to-narrow-down-an-in.png "image_tooltip") Using Get-View with the Filter Parameter Perhaps you’d like to select a single property. If so, you could run the following to narrow down an individual value. ```powershell PS51> $VM.Guest.GuestFullName ``` There are many `Get-View` options for all types of VMware objects. Feel free to explore all of these options and review this [informative article from VMware](https://blogs.vmware.com/PowerCLI/2015/02/get-view-part-1-introduction.html) that goes in-depth on this powerful cmdlet! ## VMware Code Capture – Learn from your Clicks If you’d like to take advantage of PowerCLI but would rather not build code by typing, [Code Capture](https://blogs.vmware.com/PowerCLI/2018/08/introducing-code-capture.html) in vCenter is here for you. Code Capture is a new developer tool that acts similarly to the Active Directory Administrative Center. Let’s cover Code Capture in this PowerCLI tutorial. This tool records all actions you take within the GUI. It then transforms all of those actions and provides you with PowerCLI scripts. By default, Code Capture is not turned on. To turn it on, open up your vCenter appliance and navigate to  _Menu_ –> _Developer Center_ as shown below. ![Navigating to the Developer Center menu item in vSphere](https://adamtheautomator.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/06/vcenter-developer-center.png "image_tooltip") Navigating to the Developer Center menu item in vSphere Once at the _Developer Center_ tab, toggle the _Enable Code Capture_ option. ![Enabling code capture](https://adamtheautomator.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/06/codecapture.png "image_tooltip") Enabling code capture When you enable Code Capture, you will then see a red _Record_ button within your vCenter header. Once enabled, whenever you wish to have an action recorded and turned into PowerCLI output you must _record_ the GUI activity by hitting the _record_ button. ![Code capture enabled indicator](https://adamtheautomator.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/06/recording-code-capture.png "image_tooltip") Code capture enabled indicator The red _record_ button will appear next to your logged on user section of vCenter so that you can now record at any time. To demonstrate Code Capture, go through the _New Virtual Machine_ creation wizard. 1. Click on the _Record_ button to begin recording. This will cause the red _Record_ button to begin pulsing. 2. Right-click your VMware host, and _Create a New Virtual Machine_. Run through the resulting wizard creating a new virtual machine with all default values. 3. Once the virtual machine is created, click on the record button and stop your recording. The resulting output may be slightly more verbose than anticipated. The output even includes all actions of browsing the GUI before creating the VM. But you should see a section denoted in the comments starting with `CreateVM_Task`. This is where the code begins to create a VM. Below is a portion of the _CreateVM\_Task_ output of the _New VM Wizard_ process in the GUI via Code Capture: ![Developer Center generated code](https://adamtheautomator.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/06/code-capture-example.png) Developer Center generated code This output can be a little overwhelming, but it exposes you directly to the number of configuration options available to your virtual machines. Depending on your own needs, you’re now empowered to make adjustments in your own scripts and customize to your heart’s content. The Code Capture utility isn’t limited just to VM creation. It can also build code for networking changes, small VM modifications, or host configuration changes. By being able to review the PowerCLI output of GUI actions you can take a shortcut on your journey to infrastructure deployed as code. ## PowerCLI Tutorial Summary In this article, you covered a lot of ground. Nice job! I hope that you’ve realized the power that PowerCLI brings to managing VMware infrastructure. There are a lot of cmdlets in PowerCLI for a wide range of product bases but we only covered a few here. Be sure to stay tuned to this blog for more articles on this awesome tool! ## Further Reading * **_[How to Download and Install PowerCLI \[Tutorial\]](https://adamtheautomator.com/vmware-powercli/)_** * **_[Official VMware PowerCLI docs](https://www.vmware.com/support/developer/PowerCLI/)_** Share this article [Share on X](https://twitter.com/intent/tweet?url=https%3A%2F%2Fadamtheautomator.com%2Fpowercli-tutorial%2F&text=PowerCLI%20Tutorial%3A%20Boost%20Your%20VMware%20Management%20Skills)[Share on Facebook](https://www.facebook.com/sharer/sharer.php?u=https%3A%2F%2Fadamtheautomator.com%2Fpowercli-tutorial%2F)[Share on LinkedIn](https://www.linkedin.com/sharing/share-offsite/?url=https%3A%2F%2Fadamtheautomator.com%2Fpowercli-tutorial%2F) ## Related Posts ![](https://adamtheautomator.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/08/install-vmware-powercli.png) ### [VMware PowerCLI: Installation and Scripting Guide](/vmware-powercli/) Download, install, and script VMware PowerCLI for efficient configuration deployments and VM reports. ![](https://adamtheautomator.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/07/VMware_logo.svg_.png) ### [Import & Export OVF Files: Move VMs Between Hosts](/ovf-file/) Learn how to import and export OVF files to move virtual machines between hosts in this informative tutorial. ![](https://adamtheautomator.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/06/26995-troubleshoot-dns-issues-powershell-codex.webp) ### [Troubleshoot DNS Issues with PowerShell](/troubleshoot-dns-issues-powershell/) Troubleshoot DNS issues with PowerShell by testing name resolution, DNS client settings, cache entries, and network connectivity in a repeatable workflow. ## Categories * [IT Ops](/category/it-ops/) * [Cloud](/category/cloud/) * [DevOps](/category/devops/) * [Home Ops](/category/home-ops/) * [Information Security](/category/infosec/) * [Software Development](/category/software-development/) ## Site * [Home](/) * [Tutorials](/tutorials/) * [Instructors](/author/) * [Advertising](/advertising/) * [Recommended Resources](/resources/) * [About Adam](/about-adam/) Copyright 2026© ATA Learning | [Privacy Policy](/privacy/)