What’s new
Our goal is to deliver new features and product updates to XenServer 9 preview customers as soon as they are ready. New releases provide more value, so there’s no reason to delay updates. Through the XenServer 9 release stream, we deliver updates incrementally in waves to help ensure product quality and maximize availability.
Note:
If you are using a Citrix License Server that hosts license files to license your hosts and pools, you must change to using licenses held within the License Activation Service in Citrix Cloud. For more information, see Licensing.
For more information about getting a XenServer license, see the XenServer website. XenServer is now an entitlement of the Citrix for Private Cloud, Citrix Universal Hybrid Multi-Cloud, Citrix Universal MSP, and Citrix Platform License subscriptions for running your Citrix workloads. Read more.
Licensing changes
File based licensing system EOL notification
License Activation Service (LAS) is the next generation technology for product activations across the suite of Citrix products.
Note:
File based licensing system, traditionally used for activating various on-premises components, will be End of Life (EOL) on April 15, 2026.
LAS will be the only way to activate and license Citrix on-premises components after April 15, 2026. To remain supported, your XenServer deployment must be on a LAS compatible version.
Requirement
Should you have questions or concerns, contact Customer Care. Citrix may limit or suspend your Citrix Maintenance for non-compliance with these requirements without liability in addition to any other remedies Citrix may have at law or equity. These requirements don’t apply where prohibited by law or regulation.
License Activation Service
Register your Citrix License Server with Citrix Cloud to use the licenses and entitlements that your License Activation Service holds. For more information, see Licensing.
Currently, you can still use the previous licensing mechanism to host license files on your Citrix License Server. However, in future, XenServer can only be licensed through the License Activation Service.
Citrix Virtual Apps and Desktops™ and Citrix DaaS
For more information about getting a XenServer license, see the XenServer website.
XenServer is now an entitlement of the Citrix for Private Cloud, Citrix Universal Hybrid Multi-Cloud, Citrix Universal MSP, and Citrix Platform License subscriptions for running your Citrix workloads. Read more.
To learn which versions of Citrix Virtual Apps and Desktops (MCS) and Citrix Provisioning (PVS) are supported with XenServer 9, see Supported Hypervisors for Citrix Virtual Apps and Desktops (MCS) and Citrix Provisioning (PVS).
Trial Edition
You can try XenServer 9 for free with Trial Edition. The Trial Edition lets you try Premium Edition features for up to 90 days, but in a restricted size pool of up to 3 hosts. After the 90-day trial period expires, you cannot start any VMs on your Trial Edition host or pool. For more information about the different editions of XenServer, see XenServer editions.
Core Enhancements
- NUMA Optimizations
- In Preview Host Secure Boot
- Driver Multi-Versioning
- Improved Host Network Name Handling
- Updated Xen Hypervisor (v4.20)
- Dom0 Kernel Upgraded to 6.x
- New base Operating System for the Control Domain
- GFS2 SRs Now Use Corosync3
Note:
GFS2 SRs on XenServer 8.4 must be converted from Corosync2 to Corosync3 before upgrading to XenServer 9. Refer to the Corosync feature documentation.
NUMA optimization
XenServer® 9 introduces NUMA optimization to improve VM performance on NUMA hosts. NUMA optimization co-locates VM vCPUs and memory on the same NUMA node to reduce memory-access latency. This feature is enabled by default, persists across VM lifecycle operations and reboots, and adds per-VM RRD metrics for visibility and troubleshooting. Performance gains vary by workload and CPU architecture.
Secure Boot for hosts
XenServer® 9 adds support for Secure Boot in firmware for host installation and runtime, including boot from SAN. Secure Boot enforces signature verification for each boot component to prevent untrusted code from running and to improve platform integrity. Mixed pools (hosts with Secure Boot enabled and disabled) are supported. You can enable Secure Boot after an upgrade from XenServer 8.4 or on fresh installs. When finalised, you will be able to use the Microsoft UEFI CA; currently a feature preview is available that uses a XenServer development certificate, for more information see Secure Boot for XenServer 9.
Predictable dom0 network interface naming
XenServer® 9 adopts systemd predictable network interface names in the control domain (dom0) and consolidates interface management in Toolstack networkd. Interfaces are no longer forcibly renamed to the legacy ethN pattern (for example, eth0, eth1). This change improves stability and maintainability, reduces ambiguity across reboots and hardware changes, and aligns naming with industry standards. Update scripts and automation that assume ethN device names to discover interfaces dynamically (for example, by MAC address or by using xe pif-list).
Changes to guest operating system support
For the full list of supported guest operating systems in XenServer 9, see Guest operating system support.
Removed
Support for the following guests has been removed in XenServer 9:
- SUSE Linux Enterprise Desktop 12 SP4 (64-bit)
Restrict use of port 80
For new installations, XenServer 9 disables HTTP (port 80) on the management interface and requires TLS (HTTPS) for secure connections. Upgrades retain existing port settings.
For more information about how to open port 80, see Restrict use of port 80.
Removed features
The following features are no longer supported in XenServer 9:
- Host BIOS Boot Support
- Legacy NVIDIA GPU Support (Maxwell & Pascal)
- Software FCoE
- Linux Bridge Network Stack
Compatibility notes
XenServer 9 is compatible with the following components:
- The latest version of the XenServer VM Tools for Windows
- The latest version of the XenServer VM Tools for Linux
- The latest version of the Workload Balancing virtual appliance
- The latest version of the Conversion Manager virtual appliance
These components are available on the XenServer Downloads page.