Try our new research platform with insights from 80,000+ expert users

Hyper-V vs VMware vSphere comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Oct 8, 2024

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
6.8
Organizations reported significant cost savings and ROI with Hyper-V over VMware, benefiting from included Windows Server licenses.
Sentiment score
7.2
VMware vSphere enables cost savings by reducing physical servers, optimizing resources, and decreasing setup time and operational costs.
 

Customer Service

Sentiment score
6.7
Hyper-V support quality varies, with first-level mixed and higher levels better; users often rely on personal resources.
Sentiment score
7.2
VMware vSphere's support is praised for knowledgeable service but criticized for variable response times and declining quality over time.
The technical support for Hyper-V is excellent
The technical support is very good
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
6.4
Hyper-V is considered scalable and effective, though performance varies with architecture planning and hardware compatibility in clusters.
Sentiment score
7.4
VMware vSphere offers seamless scalability and flexibility, efficiently handling large environments with minimal performance issues and strategic adaptability.
The scalability of Hyper-V is great; I would rate it nine out of ten.
Scaling is easy, whether it is hyperconverged or a three-tier architecture.
 

Stability Issues

Sentiment score
7.5
Hyper-V is generally stable and reliable, with improved performance and security, though some experience occasional I/O instability.
Sentiment score
8.0
VMware vSphere is highly stable and reliable, with minor issues often due to hardware or third-party integrations.
Automation is unavailable, and reporting is difficult.
It is a very stable hypervisor solution.
 

Room For Improvement

Hyper-V seeks enhanced third-party integration, simplified management, and improved performance to compete with VMware in virtualization.
VMware vSphere users seek improvements in cost, support, interface, integration, performance, setup complexity, automation, documentation, and fault tolerance.
All the actions are manual, and if customization is needed, it is difficult with Hyper-V.
Hyper-V should ensure the features of VMware are covered within its platform.
I suggest improvements in platform support and performance considerations for Hyper-V.
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

Hyper-V is considered cost-effective and flexible, with competitive pricing and potential additional costs for management and features.
VMware vSphere pricing is high but offers value in stability; consult VMware or resellers to customize licensing.
Hyper-V is completely free and requires no licensing fee.
Until 2019, Hyper-V was a cost-effective solution because it was available as a free product.
Costs significantly increased from perpetual to subscription, with prices rising by two to three times over three to five years.
 

Valuable Features

Hyper-V is valued for cost-effectiveness, scalability, ease of use, and seamless integration with Microsoft solutions and Azure.
VMware vSphere excels in ease of use, robust features, and efficient resource management, ideal for diverse virtualization needs.
It is completely free, which is a significant advantage.
I find the quick provision feature in Hyper-V to be extremely helpful.
The most valuable features of Hyper-V include high availability and management for virtual machine management.
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

Hyper-V
Ranking in Server Virtualization Software
3rd
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
6.8
Number of Reviews
141
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 January 2025, in the Server Virtualization Software category, the mindshare of Hyper-V is 15.2%, down from 16.6% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of VMware vSphere is 19.4%, up from 18.9% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Server Virtualization Software
 

Q&A Highlights

Julia Miller - PeerSpot reviewer
Jan 05, 2018
 

Featured Reviews

Ramon Ruiz - PeerSpot reviewer
A cost-effective solution with easy configuration and integration with Azure
Scaling was a major issue with Hyper-V—it wasn't scalable and didn't work well. The only way to get it functioning was to manage everything manually, starting with the installation. Now, it's much more scalable, but the key is to plan the architecture based on the workloads you want to offer. You need to design an architecture that can handle the demands of heavy workloads. If the customer has different types of workloads, each requires a tailored architecture. Using the same setup for all workloads will lead to inefficiencies and wasted time and resources. To ensure scalability, it's crucial to build the infrastructure correctly, especially regarding storage, networking, CPU, and RAM resources. When done properly, Hyper-V scales very well.
Vikas Dhumale - PeerSpot reviewer
Offers good performance and is useful for banking systems
Speaking about the application deployment process, I work at the L1 level in my company. In my company, the L3 is a different department that manages the application deployment process, and most of them go for tools apart from the ones under VMware to manage the VMs. I am only creating new VMs and assigning RAM space, and if something comes up, then I create new RHEL-based systems. When it comes to the application deployment process, my company manually deploys the applications. For automation purposes, our company uses Jenkins to collect the logs and provide a GUI with the help of a username and password to the end user, after which they can collect the logs from Jenkins. I work at an L1 level in my company. The integrations and infrastructure-related areas of the product are managed by another team in my company. I recommend the product to those who plan to use it. Nowadays, people don't prefer to go for cloud-based solutions. Most of the companies prefer VMware as they want some level of security in the environment. VMware allows users to have in-house products. Most companies or banks are not moving over to cloud-based tools. VMware is used in banking systems. I rate the tool an eight out of ten.
report
Use our free recommendation engine to learn which Server Virtualization Software solutions are best for your needs.
825,399 professionals have used our research since 2012.
 

Comparison Review

it_user234735 - PeerSpot reviewer
May 10, 2015
Hyper-V 2012 R2 vs. VMware vSphere 5.5
I was won with Hyper-V 2012R2 recently and the table below based on customer RFP (edited). This articles all about technical, there is not related with TCO/ROI, licensing cost, “political”, etc. Another to noted is the Windows Server 2012 licenses is based on 2 socket CPU, meanwhile…
 

Answers from the Community

Julia Miller - PeerSpot reviewer
Jan 5, 2018
Jan 5, 2018
HyperV. I am using HyperV past few years without any problems, before I used VMware. In my last two companies I migrated the infrastructure from VMware to HyperV. One big reason is the cost. VMware is still very expensive. HyperV is coming for free. If you have budget , it is nice to buy system center and then manage it with VMM but if you are too small for System Center you can buy third part...
2 out of 26 answers
it_user84306 - PeerSpot reviewer
Apr 7, 2014
VMware vs Hyper-V ? Both are good, both do exactly what they say they're able to do, both have pros and cons. Which one do I prefer? both and none :), actually being an IT consultant I tend to provide the best solution to our costumers needs, this means for some customers it's VMware, because they have multitudes of servers with linux, specific needs for automation, the IT staff is Linux/Unix world oriented /competent fearless to the black windows (CLI), for other customers Hyper-V would be the perfect fit, because the company has an open software contract with MS, because the admins are Windows SuperHeros and the Darkest Errors logs won't beat them.... Vmware with it's latest release comes with good features, Hyper-V with the release of windows 2012 R2 becomes what they call an "Entreprise Level Product" very mature, stable lots of good functionality etc .
it_user103077 - PeerSpot reviewer
Apr 7, 2014
http://www.infoworld.com/d/virtualization/virtualization-showdown-microsoft-hyper-v-2012-vs-vmware-vsphere-51-217125
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Educational Organization
37%
Computer Software Company
10%
Manufacturing Company
6%
Government
6%
Educational Organization
30%
Computer Software Company
12%
Financial Services Firm
8%
Manufacturing Company
6%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

How does KVM compare with Hyper-V?
KVM is better. But let's just look at the software instead of judging. Hyper-V was a free solution from Microsoft to virtualize Server or Client OS as it is a feature on Windows Server since 2008 a...
How does Proxmox VE compare with Hyper-V?
One of the best things about Proxmox VE is that it is open-source and very inexpensive. You get all of the same features as with the more well-known products. Proxmox VE is very easy to deploy - it...
What do you like most about Hyper-V?
The initial setup is not difficult at all. It is very easy.
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...
 

Comparisons

 

Learn More

 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Large customer base from all industries, all over the world. Two major Hyper-V customers are Telefonica and EmpireCLS.
Abu Dhabi Ports Company, ACS, AIA New Zealand, Consona, Corporate Express, CS Energy, and Digiweb.
Find out what your peers are saying about Hyper-V vs. VMware vSphere and other solutions. Updated: December 2024.
825,399 professionals have used our research since 2012.