Widely considered the "gold standard" for VMware. It features Easy Install support, where VMware Workstation automatically detects the ISO and handles the entire installation process, including pre-installing Open-VM-Tools for shared clipboards and folder.
If you are running VMware on a laptop with limited RAM, consider these "thin" ISOs that require as little as 512MB to 2GB of memory: linux iso for vmware
| Setting | Recommended value | |---------|------------------| | Guest OS Family | Linux | | Guest OS Version | Choose the closest match (e.g., “Ubuntu 64-bit”, “Debian 12 64-bit”, “Other Linux 5.x/6.x kernel 64-bit”) | | Virtual disk | 20–40 GB (thin provisioned) | | Memory | 2–4 GB for desktop, 1–2 GB for server | | CPU | 2 vCPUs minimum | | Network | NAT or Bridged (NAT for host-only internet, Bridged for LAN access) | | CD/DVD | Point to your downloaded .iso file | Widely considered the "gold standard" for VMware