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June 22, 2026

Creating Linux Desktop Pools in Horizon 8

Horizon 8 uses desktop pools as its basis of centralized management. You create pools of virtual machines and select settings that give all the machines in a pool a common desktop definition. Horizon 8 can then deliver the desktops to end users through Horizon Clients.

Horizon 8 can deliver desktops from single-user virtual desktop machines that are managed by vCenter Server.

You can create a desktop pool from one of the following sources:

You can create the following types of desktop pools:

Desktop Pool TypeDescription
AutomatedAutomated desktop pools use a vCenter Server virtual machine template or snapshot to create a pool of identical virtual machines. You can create these automated desktop pools:
  • Instant-clone desktop pools.
  • Full-clone virtual machine desktop pools.
Manual Manual desktop pools are a collection of existing vCenter Server virtual machines. For manual pools, Horizon 8 does not create and manage the life cycle of the desktops in the pool. The desktops are created outside of Horizon 8 and then imported into Horizon Console.

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