How to download VMware Player / VMware Workstation (and VMware Fusion)

Since VMware, LLC, was acquired by Broadcom Inc., there has been a great amount of confusion of how to download VMware Workstation virtualization software, but especially Workstation Player.

VMware, now under the umbrella of Broadcom, has taken down (or at least broke) download links to download VMware Workstation Player, the free version of VMware Workstation. And if you were to search online, regardless of which search engine you use, you would have a difficult time figuring out how to download the latest versions of Workstation Player. There seems to be a lack of quality results, dictating how to acquire it. I spent a couple of weeks, off and on, trying to find out how to get Workstation Player, I even called up VMware to find some answers. For those who don’t know, I am investor in Broadcom, Inc., but I don’t have a license for Workstation, I am a free user of Workstation Player, not Workstation Pro.

During my off and on research of how to find the download page for Workstation Player, I found out that VMware Workstation Pro is now free! Though, the product is only free for non-commercial use, so if you use Workstation for professional use, you still will need to pay up. This is a major departure on how licensing for Workstation has always worked. As Workstation Pro, was a fully-featured virtualization software program, that has support for creating checkpoints, support for changing levels of hardware compatibility with previous versions of Workstation, useful for running old or obscure operating systems, and more. While on the other hand, VMware Workstation Player, formally known simply as VMware Player, was the simple and basic virtualization program, that will satisfy your nostalgic need to see and use Windows XP, just fine.

As a consequence for having Workstation Pro be made free, VMware intends to discontinue Workstation Player and Fusion Player will be discontinued, according to the official announcement of Workstation (and Fusion) being made free for commercial use.

According to Broadcom’s article, here is how you can download VMware Workstation. As with the change of how Workstation is distributed, you have to make a Broadcom account and fill in some personal information, to acquire Workstation now. So, if you use Windows Package Manager (winget) or Chocolatey (choco) package managers, you are now unable to download using either package managers. The only official way to download from Broadcom’s website.

1. Sign up for a Broadcom Customer account, here
2. Once you are signed up, visit the official link to download Workstation or Fusion:
   • Workstation (Windows and Linux)
   • Fusion (macOS only)
3. Be sure to select the versions that have for Personal Use in the name
   You may be prompted to fill out some personal information for your profile, if you aren’t comfortable, I’ll be making an post about alternatives to Workstation, so stay tuned!
4. Download and install VMware Workstation or Fusion, as per usual

For more information about downloading VMware Workstation or VMware Fusion, visit Broadcom’s article: https://knowledge.broadcom.com/external/article?articleNumber=368734

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