Horizon 8 2506: Featuring improved control and productivity

The latest Horizon 8 2506 release brings a range of features designed to make virtual desktop and app environments more flexible, secure, and easier to manage. With expanded platform support, stronger authentication, smarter automation, and productivity-boosting updates, Horizon 8 continues to evolve to meet the needs of modern digital workspaces. Here are the top highlights from this release. 

Transition to Omnissa licensing for simpler, compliant upgrades 

As of Horizon 8 releases 2503.1 ESB and 2506, all VMware (Broadcom) license modules will be removed, and the platform will fully transition to the Omnissa License Module (OLM). Only Omnissa license keys will be recognized going forward. If you upgrade without applying a valid Omnissa key, the Horizon Console will enter a restricted mode until one is added. To avoid disruption and stay compliant, make sure to update your license key before upgrading. While this shift simplifies licensing long-term, it does require action ahead of time. For more information, refer to the KB on how to convert your VMware license keys to Omnissa license keys. 

Now supporting VMware Cloud Foundation 9.0 

Broadcom announced General Availability of VMware Cloud Foundation VCF/VVF 9.0 in June 2025. With the release of Horizon 8 version 2506, support has been added for both VCF 9.0 and the latest vSphere 9 infrastructure. If you're planning an upgrade to VCF/VVF 9.0 and have the necessary VCF or VVF entitlement, you can proceed confidently knowing Horizon 8 is now supported with VCF/VVF 9.0.  

Horizon 8 on Nutanix AHV limited availability  

Earlier this year, Omnissa announced the Beta for Horizon 8 on Nutanix AHV, offering a glimpse into the future of deploying Horizon on a non-vSphere hypervisor. With the 2506 release, we’re excited to introduce Limited Availability of Horizon 8 on Nutanix AHV, bringing advanced capabilities such as power management policies, vGPU support for high-performance use cases, App Volumes and DEM support, Cloud Pod Architecture, and hybrid flexibility with Horizon 8 on AHV in Nutanix NC2.    

Important to note, customers interested would need to work with Omnissa to have LA functionality enabled. While this is a production-ready release supported by Omnissa, it is important to receive guidance from Omnissa to ensure the LA meets customer’s use cases. More details can be found in the following KB article.   

Enhancing user productivity and client capabilities

Now, let’s take a closer look at the features focused on improving the end-user experience and client capabilities. These enhancements strengthen security, simplify device redirection, and bring new capabilities to popular collaboration tools like Microsoft Teams to help organizations keep users productive while simplifying management for IT. 

•  Strengthen security with both x.509 and SAML authentication  
  The Horizon Unified Access Gateway (UAG) now supports the use of both x.509 device certificate and SAML authentication together. Organizations can implement stronger multi-factor authentication policies for Horizon access, combining device-based verification with federated identity to improve security without complicating the end-user and admin experience. 
   
• Keep virtual desktops secure and up to date with Automated Agent Upgrade
  Building on the existing Horizon Automated Agent Upgrade (AAU) feature, Horizon 8 extends automated installs and updates to include in the Digital Experience Management and App Volumes agents. This enhancement keeps all persistent virtual desktops updated with the latest, most secure software to deliver optimal performance. Manual installation processes often lead to downtime and user disruption, but with automated updates, IT admins can lower operational overhead, gain administrative efficiency, and deliver a better user experience across their Horizon environments. 
   
• Enable multi-device scanning  
  Horizon 8 2506 improves the support for multiple scanners in RDSH desktop sessions, allowing all connected scanners to appear directly within scanning applications. Previously, users had to manually switch scanners through the Horizon scanner icon in the VDI taskbar and relaunch scanner application to use a different device. Now, the users get an option to choose the scanner device in the scan acquisition workflow. This enhancement improves productivity and delivers a better end-user experience during daily scanning tasks. 
   
• Improved Microsoft Teams Experience on Mac and Linux Clients  
  Horizon brings a more polished and professional Teams experience to Mac and Linux users. End-users on these platforms can set custom backgrounds during Teams video calls.  This feature allows IT admins to provide a pre-approved library of company-branded backgrounds, ensuring consistent branding across video calls while giving employees a professional set of options without needing to manage uploads themselves. 
  
  In addition, Mac users can now share individual applications instead of their entire desktop during Teams calls when using Horizon.  This update helps protect user privacy, reduces distractions, and delivers a more native, intuitive experience when presenting in meetings.  
   
• Improve density and performance with IDD as the default display driver 
  Horizon is making the Indirect Display Driver (IDD) the default display driver to deliver better session density and performance across environments. IDD is hypervisor-agnostic and works with both hardware GPUs and software rasterizers, enabling optimal rendering at high frame rates, even for demanding 3D and design applications. It also reduces memory, CPU, and GPU consumption in many cases, helping organizations support more users per host while maintaining a high-quality experience in Horizon virtual desktops.
   
• Enable high-performance AMD hardware encoding on physical PCs 
  Horizon enables hardware encoding for physical machines with AMD GPUs. By leveraging AMD hardware encoding, the graphics processing is all done by the GPU thereby freeing up the PC’s CPU. Also users benefit from enhanced graphics performance and a smoother, more responsive experience when accessing their physical PCs through Horizon. 
   
• Eliminate downtime with automatic TLS certificate renewal  
  Blast now automatically replaces its self-signed TLS certificates before they expire, eliminating the manual effort required to update certificates on each agent. This enhancement prevents unexpected connection failures due to expired certificates, improves security compliance, and reduces administrative overhead for large Horizon deployments. 

Improve management efficiency and security controls

This section covers updates that simplify management, boost automation, and enhance privacy and control in Horizon environments that make it easier for IT teams to securely and efficiently manage Horizon environments. 

• Deliver published desktops and apps on Amazon WorkSpaces Core with automated RDS farms  
  Horizon 8 on Amazon WorkSpaces Core now supports automated RDS farms using multi-session Windows Server 2019 and 2022 hosts. This enables customers to deliver published desktops and applications through Remote Desktop Session Hosts (RDSH), expanding deployment flexibility beyond traditional VDI. Admins can use AWS Public Bring Your Own Protocol (BYOP) server bundles to create custom gold images and streamline provisioning through the Horizon console. With the Apps on Demand feature of App Volumes, applications are delivered upon request without the need to pre-install apps on the farm hosts, reducing image management complexity and storage requirements. 
   
• Protect application privacy during Helpdesk sessions 
  Horizon 8 now includes a new privacy setting to protect sensitive application information during helpdesk sessions. When enabled, this feature hides application names in the Helpdesk API, preventing helpdesk admins from seeing specific application file names while assisting users through Horizon Console. By default, application names remain visible, but admins can choose to turn on this setting to align with organizational privacy policies. This enhancement empowers organizations to maintain user and application confidentiality without compromising helpdesk support. 
   

• Simplify Connection Server lifecycle management with expanded automation options  
  Expanding on previous SMB file share support introduced in Horizon 8 2503, this release adds support for NFS file shares, giving admins another option for hosting Connection Server installer files. This eliminates the need for a dedicated web server with certificates which reduces overhead and makes it easier to automate deployments and updates.  In addition, we’ve expanded automation capabilities with support for Ansible playbooks—similar to how we added Terraform support in the Horizon 8 2406 release. These playbooks use Horizon’s LCM APIs to automate deployment and configuration workflows.  Sample scripts are available for download and can be customized to fit your deployment needs.  

  With these enhancements, Horizon now offers a complete set of tools for automating lifecycle management. Admins can use LCM REST APIs to script installation, upgrade, and configuration tasks; leverage our Terraform provider to automate deployments; or adopt newly introduced Ansible playbooks to streamline both deployment and configuration workflows. These options give IT teams the flexibility to integrate Horizon into their preferred automation frameworks while reducing manual effort and accelerating time to value. 

• Gain control with GUI-based CPA entitlement management  
  Building on existing API capabilities, Horizon adds the ability to enable or disable Cloud Pod Architecture (CPA) global entitlements directly from the Horizon Admin Console. Previously, admins could only perform these actions via API, limiting accessibility for those who rely on the GUI for day-to-day management. This enhancement introduces a user-friendly interface with toggle controls and confirmation prompts to prevent accidental changes, giving admins clearer visibility and greater control when performing maintenance or managing entitlements across their Horizon environments. 
   
• Helpdesk Tool added to more Horizon editions 
  The Helpdesk Tool is now available in more Horizon Term subscriptions, giving admins greater visibility into end-user sessions and enabling faster troubleshooting. Previously limited to Horizon Enterprise and Horizon Apps Enterprise, the feature has now been added to Horizon for Linux, Horizon Standard, Horizon Advanced, Horizon Apps Standard, and Horizon Apps Enterprise. Review the updated feature comparison sheet to see what’s included in your edition. 

Learn more about the updates in Horizon 8 2506 

This release delivers updates across security, management, and end-user experience that gives  IT teams more control and flexibility in their Horizon environments. To see the complete list of features and updates check out the Horizon 8 2506 release notes.