Symptoms

ESXi hosts were showing an expired license alert even after adding new licenses

Cause

Cause 1: Hosts were not connected to vCenter ServerCause 2: Stale license entry in the VMware Directory Services database 

Resolution

Issue 1: If the hosts are still disconnected after adding the new licenses: Right click the host > Connection > and select Connect Issue 2: Stale licenses in the inventory may allow an expired and valid license to both be assigned to the host. If the expired license is not able to be un-assigned then view: Multiple Licenses Assigned to a Single ESXi Host & Expired License in inventory Warning in vCenter

Support Cases