Turn an RVTools export into a presales-ready briefing.
Drop your .xlsx export and get cluster breakdowns, per-core licensing impact, storage totals, and optimization findings — written in plain English an SE can walk into a customer meeting with.
Add your RVTools export
In RVTools: connect to vCenter, then File → Export all to Excel (.xlsx). Drop that file below.
.xlsx hereGet the briefing
📋 Executive summary
Environment totals and auto-written findings in plain English — the slide-one story for your customer readout.
🧮 Licensing impact
Per-cluster socket & core counts run through Broadcom's per-core model (16-core minimum per CPU). Phantom cores, consolidation math, done for you.
💾 Storage & optimization
Datastore totals, thin-vs-thick splits, snapshot hygiene, powered-off VMs, and right-sizing candidates an SE can act on.
How it works
1️⃣ Export
In RVTools, connect to vCenter and choose File → Export all to Excel. That spreadsheet is the only thing that ever touches the customer environment.
2️⃣ Parse locally
Your browser reads the file into memory and parses it with SheetJS — a spreadsheet engine running entirely inside this page. No upload, no server, no network request carrying your data. It works offline.
3️⃣ Brief
The analyzer normalizes the tabs, rolls up clusters, runs the per-core licensing math, and writes the findings in plain English. Download the HTML report and walk into the meeting.
What it reads
| RVTools tab | What it unlocks |
|---|---|
vInfo | VM inventory, power state, clusters, provisioned/used storage — the only required tab |
vHost | Host inventory, sockets, cores, licensing math, utilization |
vCluster | Cluster membership and datacenter rollup |
vDatastore | Storage health, free-space alerts, overprovisioning |
vDisk | Thin vs thick analysis |
vSnapshot | Snapshot hygiene — sizes and ages |
vCPU / vMemory | Per-cluster totals and consolidation ratios |
vTools | VMware Tools status findings |
It tolerates both modern and legacy RVTools column names across versions. Missing a tab? That section simply degrades gracefully.
Honest limitations
- RVTools exports are point-in-time inventory — no performance history. Right-sizing flags are review candidates, not verdicts; pair with vROps / Aria Operations.
- Host utilization % is live at the moment of export, not an average.
- Licensing covers compute cores only — vSAN capacity entitlements, NSX, and Aria aren't modeled.
- It trusts what RVTools reports — stale vCenter data in, stale analysis out.
Licensing math, explained
Broadcom licenses vSphere as a per-physical-core subscription, with a minimum of 16 cores per CPU socket. Per host:
license cores = sockets × max(cores per socket, 16)
A socket with fewer than 16 physical cores is still billed at 16. The gap is phantom cores — licenses you pay for every year but can never use, because the silicon doesn't exist. Worked examples:
| Host config | Sockets | Cores/socket | Physical cores | License cores | Phantom |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2× 16-core — no waste | 2 | 16 | 32 | 32 | 0 |
| 2× 10-core — typical older host | 2 | 10 | 20 | 32 | 12 |
| 2× 8-core | 2 | 8 | 16 | 32 | 16 |
| 2× 32-core — dense refresh host | 2 | 32 | 64 | 64 | 0 |
The analyzer applies this to every host, rolls it up per cluster, and shows exactly where the waste lives. The refresh scenario modeler on the Licensing tab lets you drag replacement-host specs (sockets, cores/socket, host count) and watch the license-core delta update live — the classic presales motion: consolidating low-core hosts onto dense ones deletes phantom cores without losing compute.
Frequently asked questions
Is my RVTools data uploaded anywhere?
No. The file is read with the browser's FileReader API and parsed in memory by a vendored copy of SheetJS running in this page. There is no server, no analytics on file contents, and no network request carrying your data — you can open devtools' network tab and verify, or disconnect from the internet after the page loads.
Is anything stored in my browser?
Only if you use Projects: named saves and the automatic session restore keep a copy in your browser's localStorage — still 100% on your machine, never uploaded anywhere. "Clear session data" wipes it. Export gives you a portable JSON file instead, with nothing retained in the browser at all.
What RVTools versions are supported?
Any version that exports the standard Excel tabs. The parser matches both modern column names (e.g. Provisioned MiB) and legacy ones (e.g. Provisioned MB), so old and new exports both work.
Can I share the results with my team or the customer?
Yes — the Report tab generates a standalone HTML briefing you can download and email. It's fully self-contained (no external dependencies), and contains only the analysis, which you control.
Does it replace a real capacity assessment?
No — it's a first-pass briefing from a point-in-time inventory export. It can't see performance history, so right-sizing flags are "review candidates," not verdicts. Pair it with vROps / Aria Operations data for the full picture.
Which RVTools export option do I use?
In RVTools: connect to vCenter, then File → Export all to Excel. The .xlsx format is preferred; legacy .xls works too.
Which tabs are required?
Only vInfo. Every extra tab unlocks more sections — see the tab table in "How it works" above for what each one adds.
Can I use it on a customer site with no internet?
Yes. Once the page has loaded, everything — including the spreadsheet parser — runs locally. Save the page and it works fully offline.
Does it model vSAN, NSX, or Aria licensing?
No — compute core licensing only. vSAN capacity entitlements and NSX/Aria aren't modeled. The full list of limitations is in "How it works".
How is this different from just reading the RVTools spreadsheet?
Rollups you can't eyeball: per-cluster licensing with phantom-core waste, consolidation ratios, thin-vs-thick storage, auto-written findings in plain English, and a shareable briefing report.
Can I adjust the finding thresholds?
Not in this version — thresholds are fixed (datastore under 10% free is critical, snapshots older than 30 days get flagged). Configurable thresholds are on the roadmap.