Fix VMware Tools Installation Stuck at Initializing

When This Happens

You're installing or upgrading VMware Tools on a Windows VM—say a Windows Server 2019 or Windows 10 guest—and the installer gets stuck at the Initializing screen. The progress bar shows 0% or just sits there for 10+ minutes. You try canceling, but it won't stop. You might even see a pop-up that says "VMware Tools installation is already in progress" even after a reboot. Sound familiar? This happens most often after a failed upgrade or when you've manually killed the installer mid-way.

Root Cause

The culprit here is almost always a stale MSI installation record stuck in the Windows Installer cache. VMware Tools uses Microsoft's MSI engine, and if a previous install gets interrupted, the MSI database holds a lock on the product code. The new installer sees this lock and hangs trying to overwrite it. Sometimes it's also the VMware Tools service itself left in a half-installed state. Reboots rarely fix it because the MSI database persists across restarts.

Don't bother trying to kill processes like vmtoolsd.exe or msiexec.exe manually—that usually makes the mess worse. The real fix is to clean up the MSI records and force a clean reinstall.

The Fix: Step-by-Step

Step 1: Kill Stuck Installer Processes

Open Task Manager as Administrator. End any setup.exe, vmtoolsd.exe, or msiexec.exe processes that aren't responding. Be careful—don't kill system-critical msiexec processes. If you're unsure, just skip to Step 2.

Step 2: Uninstall the Stale MSI Product

Run Command Prompt as Administrator. Type this command to get the VMware Tools product code:

wmic product where "Name like '%VMware%'" get IdentifyingNumber, Name

If nothing shows up, the MSI entry might be corrupted. Try this instead:

msiexec /x {ProductCode} /qn

But you need the GUID. If you don't see it, move to Step 3.

Step 3: Use Microsoft's MSI Cleanup Utility (or Manual Registry Edit)

Download the Microsoft Program Install and Uninstall Troubleshooter from Microsoft's site. Run it, select Installing, then find VMware Tools in the list and choose Uninstall. This tool scrubs orphaned MSI entries.

If that fails, go to the registry:

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Uninstall

Look for any key containing VMware Tools or a GUID that matches VMware (like {3D5D9E1C-1F3B-4C2D-9A4E-1F4A9E1C3D5D}). Delete the whole key. Be careful—only remove VMware entries.

Step 4: Clean Up Leftover Files

Delete these folders if they exist:

C:\Program Files\VMware\VMware Tools
C:\ProgramData\VMware\VMware Tools

Also delete this registry key if present:

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\VMware Tools

Step 5: Reboot and Reinstall

Restart the VM. Then mount the VMware Tools ISO from vCenter or ESXi host (right-click VM > Guest OS > Install VMware Tools). Run setup64.exe as Administrator. This time it should pass Initializing within a minute.

If It Still Fails

Check for anti-virus software that's blocking the installer. I've seen Sophos and McAfee flag the VMware Tools installer as suspicious. Temporarily disable real-time protection during install. Also verify the VM has enough free disk space—the installer needs at least 200 MB. If you're on a very old VM version (hardware version 8 or below), consider upgrading the VM hardware first. Finally, try the VMware Tools offline bundle from VMware's downloads site instead of the ISO. Sometimes the ISO itself gets corrupted during upload.

Last resort: create a new VM and migrate the workload. But that's rare—the steps above fix this 19 times out of 20.