How to Configure NTP Time Synchronization for your ESX Server

Enable the NTP client in the service console’s firewall. To do this, type the following command at the command line:

esxcfg-firewall –e ntpClient

Set the service console’s date and time using an NTP server. To do this, type the following command at the command line:

ntpdate IP_address_of_NTP_Server

The ntpdate output should look similar to this:

4 May 20:56:13 ntpdate[29453]: step time server 192.168.xx.yy offset 2462.594 sec

Force the hardware clock to match the current ESX Server time. To do this, type the following command at the command line:

hwclock --systohc --utc