AVD Hybrid Support
AVD Hybrid Support extends Azure Virtual Desktop (AVD) to on-premises infrastructure, enabling organizations to run AVD session hosts on their existing hypervisor environments via Azure Arc — without requiring a full migration to Azure or Azure Local. Designed for organizations seeking to move away from legacy VDI solutions such as Citrix or Omnissa while continuing to leverage existing hardware investments, AVD Hybrid Support uses Nerdio Manager as its operational layer, extending industry-leading automation, lifecycle management, and reporting capabilities to on-premises session hosts alongside Azure-hosted resources.
Note: This feature is in Public Preview.
Key capabilities
Deploy and manage AVD session hosts on supported on-premises hypervisors directly from Nerdio Manager.
Manage your entire desktop estate — including Windows 365, Azure VMs, Azure Local VMs, and on-premises session hosts — from a single Nerdio Manager console.
Automate VM lifecycle and power management for on-premises session hosts.
Streamline image management, patching, and updates across all AVD host pools.
Prerequisites
The following prerequisites apply to AVD Hybrid environments regardless of your infrastructure provider. For prerequisites specific to your infrastructure, refer to the documentation for your infrastructure provider.
Domain join
Session Host VMs must be domain joined before the Azure Arc extension is installed.
Network connectivity
NME requires network access to the on-premises platform (e.g., Nutanix Prism Element or Prism Central for AHV workloads).
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Session Host VMs require outbound internet connectivity to the following Azure endpoints:
Role-based access control (RBAC) and permissions
Nerdio Manager roles
This procedure requires the Admin Nerdio Manager role to carry out the tasks outlined below.
Azure built-in roles
Role |
Description |
Purpose |
|---|---|---|
Allows an account to onboard Azure Arc-enabled servers |
The administrator requires write access to the resource group where Arc machines are registered in order to onboard session host VMs to Azure Arc. |
|
Allows management of user access to Azure resources |
The administrator requires write access to the target resource group in order to assign the Reader role to the System Managed Identity created when a hybrid host pool is created. |
Additional permissions
No additional permission are needed.
Supported operating systems
The following table outlines supported operating systems and deployment types for AVD Hybrid Support:
Operating system |
Virtual machine |
Physical machine |
|---|---|---|
Windows Server (all supported versions) |
✓ |
✓ |
Windows 11 Enterprise (single-session) |
✓ |
✗ |
Windows 11 Enterprise Multi-Session |
✗ |
✗ |
Limitations and known issues
Issue/limitation |
Impact |
Mitigation/planned fix |
|---|---|---|
Session hosts on cloud providers (Azure, GCP, AWS, Alibaba) are not supported |
AVD Hybrid Support is limited to on-premises infrastructure only |
Deploy session hosts on supported on-premises hypervisors |
Windows 11 Enterprise Multi-Session is not supported on non-Azure infrastructure |
Deployments on supported on-premises hypervisors are limited to Windows 11 Enterprise (single-session) or Windows Server (single or multi-session) |
Refer to the documentation for your infrastructure provider for guidance on supported operating systems and deployment types |
Infrastructure-specific documentation
For deployment considerations, configuration guidance, and support resources specific to your infrastructure, refer to the documentation for your infrastructure provider:
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