How To Import OVF Virtual Machine On VMware Workstation Player

How To Import OVF Virtual Machine On VMware Workstation Player

It provides the steps required to import an Open Virtualization Format (OVF) Virtual Machine to VMware Workstation Player

March 29, 2020

Sometimes, we might be required to import an existing virtual machine to the VMware Workstation Player installed on Windows. This tutorial provides the steps required to import an Ubuntu 18.04 Open Virtualization Format (OVF) 1.0 virtual machine to VMware Workstation Player 15 installed on the Windows 10 operating system. The steps should be the same for other versions of the VMware Player and other guest operating systems including Ubuntu.

You might also be interested in How To Install VMware Workstation Player On Windows 10, How To Export Virtual Machine On VirtualBox To OVF, How To Install VirtualBox On Windows, How To Install Ubuntu On Windows Using VirtualBox, and How To Install Ubuntu On Windows Using VMware Workstation Player With Easy Install.

The default screen of the VMware Workstation Player should be the same as shown in Fig 1. I have removed other virtual machines for demonstration purposes.

VMware Workstation Player - Home

Fig 1

Import Virtual Machine

Click Player -> File -> Open menu options as shown in Fig 2. You can also press the shortcut keys Ctrl + O.

VMware Workstation Player - Import - Open

Fig 2

It will show the File Chooser Dialog to select the virtual machine. After selecting the appropriate virtual machine, it shows the options to configure the name and path to store the imported virtual machine as shown in Fig 3.

VMware Workstation Player - Import - Config

Fig 3

Now click the Import Button to start importing the virtual machine. It might also ask to Retry OVF Import to relax the OVF specifications as shown in Fig 4.

VMware Workstation Player - Import - Progress

Fig 4

Click the Retry Button. It will show the import progress as shown in Fig 5.

VMware Workstation Player - Import - Progress

Fig 5

After successfully importing the OVF, VMware Player will add the Virtual Machine to its library as shown in Fig 6.

VMware Workstation Player - Import - Library

Fig 6

Install VMware Tools

In this step, we will install VMware Tools on the Ubuntu 18.04 virtual machine imported by us in the previous step. You can also follow How To Install Windows On Mac Using VMware Fusion - Part 2 to install VMware Tools on Windows 10.

Now click the Play virtual machine option to boot Ubuntu as shown in Fig 6. It will show the boot progress and the Login Screen as shown in Fig 7 and Fig 8.

VMware Workstation Player - Import - Boot Progress

Fig 7

VMware Workstation Player - Import - Login

Fig 8

We can also view the settings of the imported virtual machine as shown in Fig 9 and Fig 10. We can change these settings after suspending or shutting down the guest operating system.

VMware Workstation Player - Import - Settings

Fig 9

VMware Workstation Player - Import - Settings

Fig 10

Click the OK Button to close the Settings Panel and login to Ubuntu. Now open the terminal and use the below-mentioned commands to install VMware Tools on Ubuntu as shown in Fig 11 and Fing 12.

# Refresh Packages
sudo apt-get update

# Install VMware Tools
sudo apt-get install open-vm-tools

# Install VMware Tools for Desktop
sudo apt-get install open-vm-tools-desktop

The sample output of the above commands is shown in Fig 11.

VMware Workstation Player - Import - VMware Tools

Fig 11

Now close the terminal. Power Off the virtual machine and again start it. The blurry screen should be clear and it will occupy the entire screen of the virtual machine as shown in Fig 12.

VMware Workstation Player - Import - Max

Fig 12

We can even go to full-screen mode and the guest operating system should cover the entire screen. Apart from the UI, VMware tools also add several other utilities including networking for optimal performance.

Summary

This tutorial provided all the steps required to import an existing virtual machine in Open Virtualization Format (OVF) to the VMware Workstation Player. It also provided the steps to install the VMware Tools in the last section.

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