Upgrade Firewalls Using Panorama

After upgrading Panorama, commit and push the configuration to the firewalls you are planning to upgrade.
The PAN-OS 9.1 release introduces universally unique identifiers (UUIDs) for policy rules. If you manage firewall policy from Panorama, these UUIDs are generated on Panorama and therefore must be pushed from Panorama. If you do not push the configuration from Panorama prior to upgrading the firewalls, the firewall upgrade will not succeed because it will not have the UUIDs.
Save a backup of the current configuration file on each managed firewall you plan to upgrade.
Although the firewall automatically creates a configuration backup, it is a best practice to create and externally store a backup before you upgrade.
From the Panorama web interface, select
Panorama
Setup
Operations
and click
Export Panorama and devices config bundle
to generate and export the latest configuration backup of Panorama and of each managed appliance.

Save the exported file to a location external to the firewall. You can use this backup to restore the configuration if you have problems with the upgrade.
Update the content release version on the firewalls you plan to upgrade.
Refer to the Release Notes for the minimum content release version required for PAN-OS 9.1. Make sure to follow the Best Practices for Application and Threat Updates when deploying content updates to Panorama and managed firewalls.
Select
Panorama
Device Deployment
Dynamic Updates
and
Check Now
for the latest updates. If an update is available, the Action column displays a
Download
link.

If not already installed,
Download
the latest content release version.
Click
Install
, select the firewalls on which you want to install the update, and click
OK
. If you are upgrading HA firewalls, you must update content on both peers.

By default, you can upload a maximum of two software or content updates of each type to a Panorama appliance and if you download a third update of the same type, Panorama will delete the update for the earliest version of that type. If you need to upload more than two software updates or content updates of a single type, use the
setmax-num-images count <number>
CLI command to increase the maximum.
(HA firewall upgrades only)
If you will be upgrading firewalls that are part of an HA pair, disable preemption. You need only disable this setting on one firewall in each HA pair.
Select
Device
High Availability
and edit the
Election Settings
.
If enabled, disable (clear) the
Preemptive
setting and click
OK
.

Commit
your change. Make sure the commit is successful before you proceed with the upgrade.
Determine the Upgrade Path to PAN-OS 9.1
You cannot skip installation of any feature release versions in the path from the currently running PAN-OS version to PAN-OS 9.1.0. Review the known issues and changes to default behavior in the Release Notes and upgrade/downgrade considerations in the New Features Guide for each release through which you pass as part of your upgrade path.
If upgrading more than one firewall, streamline the process by determining upgrade paths for all firewalls before you start downloading images.
Download the target PAN-OS 9.1 release image.
Select

Panorama

Device Deployment

Software

and

Check Now

for the latest release versions.

Download

the firewall-specific file (or files) for the release version to which you are upgrading. You must download a separate installation file for each firewall model (or firewall series) that you intend to upgrade.



For example, to upgrade your PA-220, PA-820, and VM-300 firewalls to PAN-OS 9.1.0, download the

PanOS_220-9.1.0

,

PanOS_vm-9.1.0

, and

PanOS_800-9.1.0

images. After you successfully download an image, the Action column changes to

Install

for that image.


Install the PAN-OS 9.1 software update on the firewalls.
Click
Install
in the Action column that corresponds to the firewall models you want to upgrade. For example, if you want to upgrade your PA-820 firewalls, click
Install
in the row that corresponds to PanOS_800-9.1.0.
In the Deploy Software file dialog, select all firewalls that you want to upgrade. To reduce downtime, select only one peer in each HA pair. For active/passive pairs, select the passive peer; for active/active pairs, select the active-secondary peer.
(HA firewall upgrades only)
Make sure
Group HA Peers
is not selected.
Select
Reboot device after install
.
To begin the upgrade, click
OK
.

After the installation completes successfully, reboot using one of the following methods:
If you are prompted to reboot, click
Yes
.
If you are not prompted to reboot, select
Device
Setup
Operations
and
Reboot Device
.
After the firewalls finish rebooting, select
Panorama
Managed Devices
and verify the Software Version is 9.1.0 for the firewalls you upgraded. Also verify that the HA status of any passive firewalls you upgraded is still passive.
(HA firewall upgrades only)
Upgrade the second HA peer in each HA pair.
(Active/passive upgrades only)
Suspend the active device in each active/passive pair you are upgrading.
Switch context to the active firewall.

In the High Availability widget on the

Dashboard

, verify that

Local

firewall state is

Active

and the

Peer

is

Passive

).



Select

Device

High Availability

Operational Commands

Suspend local device

.



Go back to the High Availability widget on the

Dashboard

and verify that

Local

changed to

Passive

and

Peer

changed to

Active

.


Go back to the Panorama context and select
Panorama
Device Deployment
Software
.
Click
Install
in the Action column that corresponds to the firewall models of the HA pairs you are upgrading.
In the Deploy Software file dialog, select all firewalls that you want to upgrade. This time, select only the peers of the HA firewalls you just upgraded.
Make sure
Group HA Peers
is not selected.
Select
Reboot device after install
.
To begin the upgrade, click
OK
.
After the installation completes successfully, reboot using one of the following methods:
If you are prompted to reboot, click
Yes
.
If you are not prompted to reboot, select
Device
Setup
Operations
and
Reboot Device
.
(Active/passive upgrades only)
From the CLI of the peer you just upgraded, run the following command to make the firewall functional again:
request high-availability state functional
Verify the software and content release version running on each managed firewall.
On Panorama, select

Panorama

Managed Devices

.

Locate the firewalls and review the content and software versions in the table.

For HA firewalls, you can also verify that the HA Status of each peer is as expected.

If your HA firewalls have local policy rules configured, upon upgrade to PAN-OS 9.1, each peer independently assigns UUIDs for each rule. Because of this, the peers will show as out of sync until you sync the configuration (

Dashboard

Widgets

System

High Availability

Sync to peer

).


(HA firewall upgrades only)
If you disabled preemption on one of your HA firewalls before you upgraded, then edit the
Election Settings
(
Device
High Availability
) and re-enable the
Preemptive
setting for that firewall and then
Commit
the change.