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Horizon Cloud Service vs Microsoft Remote Desktop Services 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

Horizon Cloud Service
Ranking in Virtual Desktop Infrastructure (VDI)
10th
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
6.3
Number of Reviews
10
Ranking in other categories
Desktop as a Service (DaaS) (4th)
Microsoft Remote Desktop Se...
Ranking in Virtual Desktop Infrastructure (VDI)
5th
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
6.6
Number of Reviews
78
Ranking in other categories
Remote Access (2nd)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of February 2025, in the Virtual Desktop Infrastructure (VDI) category, the mindshare of Horizon Cloud Service is 1.3%, down from 3.4% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Microsoft Remote Desktop Services is 7.6%, down from 14.3% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Virtual Desktop Infrastructure (VDI)
 

Featured Reviews

Siva Kuppala - PeerSpot reviewer
Centralized management enhances multi-cloud flexibility with cost efficiency improvements
The cost of Horizon Cloud Service is high, however, it could be optimized. The licensing model is complex, particularly for hybrid deployments, and simplifying it could help. Improvements in application performance, especially for resource-heavy applications like intensive 3D workloads, are needed. More built-in automation for routine tasks like patching and upgrading could reduce administrative effort.
Terje Romen - PeerSpot reviewer
Accessing the same desktop experience from anywhere but user template creation needs improvement
Mostly we are quite happy with it. However, some of us want a more powerful desktop. When not present, we use a remote tool called Splashtop, which is a good solution for some users. We have about ten licenses for those who need a powerful workstation at the office. We have not used many different tools. We are never in contact with Microsoft. These are quite basic configurations, to be honest. It's not complicated. AI is coming to or is already in some applications we are using. Not system-wise, however, it might be good. I'd rate the solution seven out of ten. It's quite good, yet certainly not perfect.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"Horizon Cloud Service provides deployment flexibility across multiple clouds with a scalable architecture that easily scales virtual desktops and applications up or down based on demand."
"VMware Horizon Cloud is easy to use and the full development cloud is very good. The main features of VMware are included. It's a cloud-based virtual desktop infrastructure software that allows you to permit the virtual desktops and applications to any device from the single unified management control. These are managed from the dedicated remote session desktop."
"The interface is much easier to use compared to Microsoft and other VDI vendors that are well known on the market. I like VMware so much more than the others. With Horizon Cloud, you don't need to spend a lot of money upfront to buy the infrastructure. You can use it the on the cloud, so it lowers the barriers to entry. It's easier to test it and get started. Some clients stay in the cloud, but others prefer to go on-premise. It depends on the nature of the client."
"The most valuable feature of VMware Horizon Cloud is the ability to manage a great number of desktops at once and the remote access for users that are working from outside of the office or from different offices in the country."
"The tool remains pretty stable."
"The most valuable feature of VMware Horizon Cloud is all of its capabilities together."
"Horizon Cloud Service provides deployment flexibility across multiple clouds with a scalable architecture that easily scales virtual desktops and applications up or down based on demand."
"I honestly liked the application itself because it was just like using a desktop. You could copy and paste, inside and outside, and you could use multiple monitors. You could access it anytime, anywhere, no matter whether you were in the office or out of the office. I could leave the office, go somewhere, go back in, and everything would be there. I could just leave it up and running. I absolutely love this feature in VMware Horizon Cloud."
"It's pretty stable."
"The most valuable feature is the remote application access."
"The solution is really fast."
"The most valuable part of RDS is that it allows you to work from any location and check the server through a VPN connection."
"It works fine, and it is largely issue-free."
"The most valuable feature of Microsoft Remote Desktop Services is its security and simple configuration."
"The initial setup is not that difficult. I have gone through the RDS initialization steps, which only seem easy."
"The solution works well as a remote desktop."
 

Cons

"The application remoting features have some room for improvement."
"The product has a lot of bugs."
"In the design phase, sometimes the tools for designing Horizon solutions have issues when they're calculating the number of nodes and platforms needed to support the VDI systems."
"There should be more emphasis on the Workspace One access part of the solution. This is essentially identity management provided with Horizon. There needs to be some kind of integration because you are able to have all of these desktops on any device, but you have to have this other component to make it easier from a single sign-on perspective. That's why there should be an emphasis on Workspace One access. It actually comes free with the product, but people don't really know how powerful it can be."
"It can be very expensive to scale up because each part of scaling up requires you to have new components of the infrastructure."
"The cost of Horizon Cloud Service is high, however, it could be optimized. The licensing model is complex, particularly for hybrid deployments, and simplifying it could help."
"It is very expensive. Its price needs to be improved. They can do a better job with external resources such as a USB or a hard drive. When I tried to connect using these external resources, it failed a lot of times. I had to do a shared connection with a local laptop and then connect from a network standpoint, rather than through VMware Horizon point. They definitely have weaknesses with external connections. A lot of companies probably don't let people use external connections because it defeats the purpose of having a cloud solution and keeping the data in a secure area. You can copy to an external device, and you can lose the data. A lot of companies may not focus on this feature, but if you are providing it, you should make it work."
"Logging into VMware Horizon Cloud could be made easier. Additionally, the VMs could be better in their performance."
"It could be made simpler from a management perspective."
"I would like to be able to leverage it on other operating systems."
"The only issue I experienced was with the initialization of the session, which affected the stability of the solution."
"I would like to see a web-based interface, instead of client installation to refresh the UI through HTML."
"The solution should have better security."
"Sometimes the server stops working, and we don’t know why. Occasionally we’ll get a message to the effect of "There is no remote license.""
"We've had issues with security breaches."
"My customers are worried that the RDP protocol can be easily compromised and would like the option to use an alternative like Blast."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"There is a license required for the use of this solution and there are different tier levels available."
"I rate VMware Horizon Cloud pricing a ten out of ten."
"VMware Horizon Cloud is a low-cost solution. The model that they have is consumption-based. However, some features are expensive."
"It is too expensive as compared to other solutions because of which we don't use it that much. We tend to go more for Hyper-V or Azure just because VMware licensing is quite up there. We sway people away from VMware Horizon Cloud. We have some clients who already have it. They stay on it for a little while, and then most of them end up moving off when we provide them a better solution that isn't as license heavy cost-wise."
"Initially, the product is cheap, but it starts to get expensive when users try to scale out."
"For what you get, it is very compelling. You've got to look at the total cost of ownership of this type of piece of software in terms of being able to utilize it as a cloud service. I don't have to run everything on-premises. When you look at the total cost of just being able to use it and then being able to point it to any public or private cloud, it is very compelling. You have one less thing to manage."
"VMware Horizon Cloud is an expensive solution. This solution is approximately 30 percent more than Microsoft Azure Cloud. There can be extra costs."
"I rate the price of Microsoft Remote Desktop Services a three out of five."
"It's not an expensive solution."
"Microsoft Remote Desktop Services comes free as part of Microsoft Windows."
"The pricing could always be improved."
"The solution comes free with Microsoft Windows."
"The tool must be cheaper."
"Microsoft Remote Desktop Services is less expensive than some other solutions on the market."
"It will probably cost about $500 USD to get the resources set up in the cloud."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
12%
Government
9%
Financial Services Firm
9%
Healthcare Company
8%
Computer Software Company
13%
Financial Services Firm
9%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Government
8%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for VMware Horizon Cloud?
Initially, the product is cheap, but it starts to get expensive when users try to scale out. Though I find Citrix to be an expensive product compared to VMware Horizon Cloud because of all the feat...
What needs improvement with VMware Horizon Cloud?
VMware Horizon Cloud's VDI stacks are being sold off. Considering VMware Horizon Cloud's VDI stacks complexity, even before its sell out, I feel Citrix can do a couple of pieces of infrastructure t...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Microsoft Remote Desktop Services?
I've never had an issue with it. I've always thought the pricing for RDS was reasonable.
What needs improvement with Microsoft Remote Desktop Services?
We would like configuration to be automatic and the price to be close to zero, however, that's not realistic. Everyone wants to join some kind of cloud service today. We have decided to keep our ER...
 

Also Known As

VMware Horizon Cloud, VMware Horizon DaaS
Remote Desktop Services
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Marriott, Sprint
Bank Alfalah Ltd.
Find out what your peers are saying about Horizon Cloud Service vs. Microsoft Remote Desktop Services and other solutions. Updated: January 2025.
838,640 professionals have used our research since 2012.