VMware Updates: Evolving the vSphere Release Model
This is great news and this move makes a lot of sense as vCenter is updated more often and folks tend to feel comfortable with those updates.
Forbes Guthrie writes on the vSphere Blog
As we approach the first Update release for vSphere 8.0, we have decided to make a further improvement to the process going forward: immediately upon the IA of an ESXi Update release, we’ll designate the vCenter component as GA. ESXi will continue to go through the IA phase to get wide adoption, but vCenter will be designated GA from the outset.
Excited to see how this begins to play out. I was skeptical at first about this release model as it can seem confusing, but I think as folks get comfortable with it, they will like it.