Getting a list of patches for your ESX hosts through update manager PowerCLI

So you have alot of VMware hosts in your environment, and want to get an actual list of all the patches and upgrades needed?

Well, I know you can get that in the compliance view in the update manager plugin in vCenter, however there is no way to print it from there.

So you can easily do it from PowerCLI, however you need to also install the VUM - VMware Update Manager PowerCLI,, this is on top of your regular VMware PowerCLI:

You can find the version you need here:

https://communities.vmware.com/community/vmtn/automationtools/powercli/updatemanager 

For me, it was version 6, so install that, and then connect to your vCenter and you can run this PowerCLI script:

ForEach ($HostToCheck in Get-VMHost){
$Details = Get-Compliance $HostToCheck -Detailed| Select -ExpandPropertyNotCompliantPatches| Select @{N="Hostname";E={$HostToCheck}}, Severity,IdByVendor, ReleaseDate, Description, Name
$ComplianceResult += $Details
}
$ComplianceResult | Export-CSV -Path c:\temp\NeededPatches.CSV -NoType


That will create a CSV file in c:\temp that will have information like this:

That's about it, you now have a detailed list of hosts/patches needed with a URL to the VMware KB for a description of the patch.