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Citrix XenServer vs VMware vSphere comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Jan 12, 2025

Review summaries and opinions

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

ROI

Sentiment score
7.8
Citrix XenServer offers virtualization benefits, cost savings, improved management, and value with high availability despite higher licensing costs.
Sentiment score
7.2
VMware vSphere delivers substantial savings, faster deployment, increased efficiency, and high ROI through reduced hardware and operational costs.
My clients generally maintain their Citrix infrastructure without shifting, suggesting stability and reliable operation as Citrix XenServer is fully established.
 

Customer Service

Sentiment score
5.1
Citrix XenServer support is knowledgeable and helpful, but slow response times and accessibility challenges can affect user satisfaction.
Sentiment score
7.2
VMware vSphere's customer service is praised for expertise but criticized for delayed responses and inconsistent lower-tier support quality.
They do not provide adequate support for midsize businesses.
Since being acquired, Citrix's customer service has experienced delays in response time.
Priority one issues are usually addressed by engineers within one to two hours.
My team solves most tickets, needing support only about once or twice a year.
 

Scalability Issues

Sentiment score
7.9
Citrix XenServer is praised for its scalability, seamless expansion, ease of use, and suitability for diverse deployment sizes.
Sentiment score
7.4
VMware vSphere excels in scalability, seamlessly integrating new resources for efficient, robust performance across diverse enterprise environments.
Familiarity with Linux can enhance its performance and usability.
Scaling is easy, whether it is hyperconverged or a three-tier architecture.
 

Stability Issues

Sentiment score
7.7
Citrix XenServer is praised for stability, effective updates, strong support, and minimal issues, supporting enterprises of all sizes.
Sentiment score
8.0
VMware vSphere is praised for stability, with issues usually related to hardware and resolvable through patches and maintenance.
It is a very stable hypervisor solution.
 

Room For Improvement

Citrix XenServer needs enhancements in startup, memory, backup, support, interface, and community, with better integration and reduced costs.
VMware vSphere faces criticism for high costs, unresponsive GUI, limited features, poor support, and inadequate security and integration.
Although the product is technically competitive, it is not widely known or used due to poor marketing.
Citrix needs to improve the hypervisor, specifically in security and performance.
Sometimes, it is difficult to find documentation for specific tools and solutions.
The cost changed from perpetual to subscription, and there is a need for alternative solutions.
Another area is the stability during upgrades from older versions to newer versions, where we face issues.
 

Setup Cost

Citrix XenServer offers free and paid versions, with paid providing enhanced features and support at a notable price.
VMware vSphere offers stability and robust features but is costly, with complex licensing, especially challenging for smaller organizations.
It is cheaper compared to its competitors.
The pricing and licensing policy of Citrix XenServer is not transparent and quite confusing.
Costs significantly increased from perpetual to subscription, with prices rising by two to three times over three to five years.
 

Valuable Features

Citrix XenServer is favored for its high availability, ease of use, affordability, and seamless integration with Citrix solutions.
VMware vSphere enhances virtualization with seamless VM movement, high availability, resource optimization, scalability, and efficient centralized management, reducing costs.
It is user-friendly and easy to deploy, making it an attractive option.
It provides secure access to applications and resources, which is crucial for us and our clients.
The vMotion feature is beneficial for online migration of virtual machines from one host to another without downtime.
The high availability feature is significant.
VMware vCenter is extremely useful as we can manage between 100 and 1,000 hosts using just one management tool.
 

Categories and Ranking

Citrix XenServer
Ranking in Server Virtualization Software
11th
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
7.1
Number of Reviews
49
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
VMware vSphere
Ranking in Server Virtualization Software
2nd
Average Rating
8.8
Reviews Sentiment
7.1
Number of Reviews
452
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of February 2025, in the Server Virtualization Software category, the mindshare of Citrix XenServer is 5.0%, up from 3.9% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of VMware vSphere is 18.1%, down from 19.1% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Server Virtualization Software
 

Q&A Highlights

AS
Mar 05, 2019
 

Featured Reviews

Tonatiuh Torres Zamorano - PeerSpot reviewer
Offers comprehensive solutions for small and medium businesses with a straightforward setup
I find Citrix XenServer valuable for small to medium-sized businesses. It is user-friendly and easy to deploy, making it an attractive option. When included with Citrix virtualization solutions, it provides a comprehensive package with existing licenses. Despite being effective for small to medium infrastructures, it may not be the best hypervisor for larger deployments.
Neeraj Mehra - PeerSpot reviewer
Streamlines virtualization and has features like high availability and vMotion
The primary use case is for virtualization, including the implementation of vSphere, vCloud Foundation, vCloud Director, and cloud automation with vSphere My customers, particularly SMBs, mainly utilize High Availability (HA), DRS, and vMotion features. The vMotion feature is beneficial for…
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Comparison Review

VL
Jan 13, 2015
vSphere vs. RHEV vs. Hyper-V vs. XenServer
We have used the following functions: 1. Hypervisor: to ensure that the virtual server provide web and email services to the company, thus providing a stable operation a with single sign-on integration of an AD server and vCenter. 2. Network and Storage: centralized data server…
 

Answers from the Community

AS
Mar 5, 2019
Mar 5, 2019
Sure, at a high level: VMware products allow you to set up multiple virtual servers on a single physical server. This allows you to run the virtual servers on the physical server resources. It is an easy way to replicate environments so that there are no surprises when you go to production. You can set up development, QA and UAT all on the same physical box which are identical. Citrix products...
2 out of 9 answers
it_user99459 - PeerSpot reviewer
Jul 23, 2014
Vmware and Citrix both do similar things. They both offer server virtualization and desktop virtualization (plus other related software). VMware is the clear market leader for server virtualzation (Vsphere) and Citrix is the leader in desktop / application virtualization (Xendesktop / Xenapp). They both offer network software enhancements (and Citrix has NetScaler hardware). If you have any questions, please email howieb@hotmail.com
it_user113568 - PeerSpot reviewer
Jul 23, 2014
Adding to Howard's points above, VMware uses their existing Hypervisor platform to enable customers build their own Cloud too.
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Educational Organization
54%
Computer Software Company
7%
Financial Services Firm
4%
Manufacturing Company
4%
Educational Organization
31%
Computer Software Company
11%
Financial Services Firm
8%
Manufacturing Company
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about Citrix Hypervisor?
The core function enables multiple virtual machines to run on a single physical server. This maximizes hardware utilization and efficiency.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Citrix Hypervisor?
The pricing and licensing policy of Citrix XenServer is not transparent and quite confusing. The sales channel has deteriorated over the years and sales margins have dropped significantly, making i...
What needs improvement with Citrix Hypervisor?
The marketing of Citrix lacks effectiveness. Although the product is technically competitive, it is not widely known or used due to poor marketing. Additionally, the technical support for midsize b...
What is IOMMU?
DEEPEN DHULLA did explain well IOMMU. IOMMU has to be activated at the bios level. It exists on Intel and AMD platforms. It is used a lot inside virtualization platforms like VMware VSphere. It pr...
Why KVM??? Help please!
We use VMware and KVM. We find that KVM is a lot simpler to use and it provides the virtualization we need for Linux and Windows. For us, VMware does not offer any advantage. Moreover, KVM is free.
What is the biggest difference between Nutanix Acropolis and VMware vSphere?
We found the reduced power consumption with Nutanix Acropolis AOS a very attractive feature. We also like the interface that allows you to talk directly to your VM from the present software. We fou...
 

Also Known As

Hypervisor
No data available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

U.S. Army Shared Services Center, SoftLayer, Educational Services of America, Independent Bank, and SK Telecom.
Abu Dhabi Ports Company, ACS, AIA New Zealand, Consona, Corporate Express, CS Energy, and Digiweb.
Find out what your peers are saying about Citrix XenServer vs. VMware vSphere and other solutions. Updated: January 2025.
837,501 professionals have used our research since 2012.