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Microsoft Remote Desktop Services vs VMware Fusion Pro comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Nov 5, 2024

Review summaries and opinions

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:
 

Categories and Ranking

Microsoft Remote Desktop Se...
Ranking in Virtual Desktop Infrastructure (VDI)
5th
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
6.0
Number of Reviews
84
Ranking in other categories
Remote Access (3rd)
VMware Fusion Pro
Ranking in Virtual Desktop Infrastructure (VDI)
3rd
Average Rating
8.8
Reviews Sentiment
5.8
Number of Reviews
9
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of February 2026, in the Virtual Desktop Infrastructure (VDI) category, the mindshare of Microsoft Remote Desktop Services is 5.9%, down from 7.6% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of VMware Fusion Pro is 12.6%, down from 25.0% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Virtual Desktop Infrastructure (VDI) Market Share Distribution
ProductMarket Share (%)
VMware Fusion Pro12.6%
Microsoft Remote Desktop Services5.9%
Other81.5%
Virtual Desktop Infrastructure (VDI)
 

Featured Reviews

reviewer2797143 - PeerSpot reviewer
Sr. Compliance Analyst at a computer software company with 51-200 employees
Rapid secure remote access has improved collaboration and centralized server management
The best features Microsoft Remote Desktop Services offers include being able to log in and being able to control other machines. Controlling other machines helps me in my role as it improves our workflow, allowing us to get in rapidly and do our work. Microsoft Remote Desktop Services has positively impacted my organization by allowing us to remote in rapidly and securely. The secure aspect of Microsoft Remote Desktop Services helps my team stay secure by supporting MFA, which allows us to secure who logs in. Microsoft Remote Desktop Services helps my team collaborate and work together by allowing us to put everything in one ecosystem with the integration, and it works very well with Windows Server, Active Directory, and Azure. Microsoft Remote Desktop Services handles updates and maintenance in my environment easily, as it is easy to manage. Microsoft Remote Desktop Services performs very well in terms of reliability and uptime for my organization, and I appreciate this feature. Microsoft Remote Desktop Services integrates with my existing security tools and policies and is compatible with our security stack, as we are a Microsoft shop, and it works well with us. When multiple users are logged in at the same time, we have not noticed any issues with Microsoft Remote Desktop Services. The user experience for my team with Microsoft Remote Desktop Services is intuitive and easy to use.
Bruce Lundberg - PeerSpot reviewer
Linux HPC Systems Administrator at a manufacturing company with 5,001-10,000 employees
Create custom virtual environments quickly with minor macOS integration issues
The primary advantage of VMware Fusion Pro is its simplicity in creating custom virtual machines. It allows quick construction and provides connectivity to full VMware server systems, enabling remote management. It facilitates downloading images from main VMware servers for local testing. The ability to construct a virtual environment on my laptop meets my needs, even ones I wasn't aware of.

Quotes from Members

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:
 

Pros

"The initial setup is not that difficult. I have gone through the RDS initialization steps, which only seem easy."
"Things can be made easier if someone is not with us or at a long distance since we can connect easily with those people. So, it's easy for us to use such features."
"We have scaled the solution and find this easy to do."
"The most valuable features are the desktop session and desktop virtualization."
"Microsoft Remote Desktop Services is highly stable."
"It's pretty stable."
"Good screen draw feature and ability to use two monitors."
"Installing Microsoft Desktop Services is straightforward."
"VMware Fusion Pro offers simplicity of use and stability."
"The most value that it provides is that it is versatile."
"The product is easy to use and has a simple user interface."
"It is a highly stable solution."
"The most important feature of VMware Fusion is that it helps me rapidly launch a new OS."
"VMware Fusion Pro offers simplicity of use and stability."
"The whole point of it is to run Windows VMs on a Mac. This is the most valuable feature. There is snapshotting, but we don't really use that. The Pro version allows me to actually attach to the Windows ESXi infrastructure at the backend, and I'm able to create a session that I can attach to the VMware hooks at the backend, so one is running a VM, and the whole operating system is running on the actual Mac. The other one is literally a frontend to the VMs that are running in the infrastructure at the backend. These are the two main features I use."
"The primary advantage of VMware Fusion Pro is its simplicity in creating custom virtual machines."
 

Cons

"There is a limitation on the number of concurrent users."
"Its look and feel could be updated. In Azure Remote Desktop Services (RDS), which is a VDI solution, we would like to see linked clones. It is a Hyper-V solution, and it doesn't support linked clones and uses a lot of storage. That's why we don't use it. VMware has a similar solution that supports linked clones for the master image."
"The user interface needs improvement."
"The only issue I experienced was with the initialization of the session, which affected the stability of the solution."
"Microsoft still has some really bad remote desktop appliance for Mac."
"We would like configuration to be automatic and the price to be close to zero, however, that's not realistic."
"Microsoft Remote Desktop Services could improve by having graphical acceleration."
"In the next release, I would like to see better performance over slower networks, and integration with Linux, but this is something that we're going to get out of Microsoft in terms of a unified solution."
"Fusion is not meant to be scalable. It runs on desktops and laptops, indicating limitations in scalability."
"I would like to see newer and updated cloud functions."
"VMware Fusion's licensing cost needs improvement."
"Additionally, enhancing the API interactions could improve the ability to manage VS and deploy various kinds of guests."
"Its installation process could be simpler."
"The only issue I've experienced with VMware Fusion Pro is that it doesn't register correctly with the main macOS system, causing repeated notifications about background installations. This is a minor inconvenience."
"The way they handle snapshotting can be improved. One time, I moved a machine from one to another, and I tried to pull it up on the second machine, but it didn't work. This was because I had not cleaned up the snapshot before I deleted it and moved it across. So, when I tried to pull it up, it wouldn't let me bring it up. The backups for the VMs themselves can also be improved. I pretty much have to rely on Windows backups and not something on VMware. That's where it needs improvement. I am able to upload from my Fusion into the ESXi easily. I'm able to spin something up on Fusion and push it into the big arena, but the reverse is not as easy, that is, trying to pull something down from that. I would love to have a functionality where I could pull something from the VMware infrastructure into Fusion, but I'm not sure if I can take something from ESXi and pull it into Fusion."
"The only issue I've experienced with VMware Fusion Pro is that it doesn't register correctly with the main macOS system, causing repeated notifications about background installations."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The solution has a pretty comparable pricing."
"The price of Microsoft Remote Desktop Services is reasonable."
"The tool must be cheaper."
"The solution is expensive. My company pays toward the monthly licensing costs of the solution...The additional cost, apart from the solution's licensing cost, is related to the technical support a user wants."
"I am aware that for Azure we do have an extra license because we are leveraging on different tenants."
"The solution is expensive. Since things are made to be a bit easier in the solution, the solution's cost is a bit on the higher side."
"The price of Microsoft Remote Desktop Services is reasonable. The solution can come for free for some clients with certain agreements."
"I rate the price of Microsoft Remote Desktop Services a three out of five."
"Starting with version 12, it is now free on a Mac for personal use. Fusion Pro has a cost."
"The cost varies depending on the season and whether it is scaled up or scaled down, but I would guess that it's approximately $1,000 per month."
"I rate the product's pricing a seven or eight. It is highly-priced."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Manufacturing Company
12%
Computer Software Company
10%
Government
8%
Comms Service Provider
7%
Comms Service Provider
15%
University
11%
Computer Software Company
9%
Manufacturing Company
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business41
Midsize Enterprise16
Large Enterprise32
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business2
Midsize Enterprise6
Large Enterprise4
 

Questions from the Community

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Microsoft Remote Desktop Services?
In limited use cases, Microsoft Remote Desktop Services is free as it is defaulted by any Microsoft license. The paid version for enterprise requires RDS ( /products/amazon-rds-reviews ) CALs, or c...
What needs improvement with Microsoft Remote Desktop Services?
Microsoft Remote Desktop Services could be improved because we have keyboard compatibility issues with some platforms; on macOS, we sometimes experience keyboard connectivity issues, and it can be ...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for VMware Fusion?
The pricing of VMware Fusion Pro is reasonable. The licensing covers all minor version updates, while major updates require payment every three years. Buying it once can sustain you for years witho...
What needs improvement with VMware Fusion?
In future updates of VMware Fusion Pro, I think there should be another community to input features. It is an infrastructure tool that may need embedding some AI to help or catching up with the new...
What is your primary use case for VMware Fusion?
My specialty is about IBM AS/400 applications, so I got to be in contact with several packages, including LX, which is why I had this research on your website.I'm mostly interested in ERP packages;...
 

Also Known As

Remote Desktop Services
No data available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Bank Alfalah Ltd.
NetApp
Find out what your peers are saying about Microsoft Remote Desktop Services vs. VMware Fusion Pro and other solutions. Updated: February 2026.
881,821 professionals have used our research since 2012.