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KVM vs Oracle VM VirtualBox comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Apr 20, 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
8.5
KVM users save $20,000 monthly due to its open-source nature, eliminating license fees and offering cost-effective virtualization.
Sentiment score
4.0
Oracle VM VirtualBox boosts ROI by virtualizing servers, enhancing efficiency, and providing quick setups with significant financial returns.
KVM definitely saves costs since it is open-source and does not obligate us to pay for licenses as necessary with other virtualization solutions.
 

Customer Service

Sentiment score
8.7
KVM relies on community support; effectiveness varies, with some preferring paid options like Red Hat for dedicated assistance.
Sentiment score
7.7
Many users find community support and comprehensive documentation sufficient, reducing the need for Oracle VM VirtualBox's customer service.
Paid support is also obtainable from companies like Red Hat for more critical issues.
 

Scalability Issues

Sentiment score
7.7
KVM offers high scalability for enterprise environments, leveraging Linux kernel architecture, though rapid expansion may challenge larger companies.
Sentiment score
7.2
Oracle VM VirtualBox offers moderate to high scalability, efficiently supporting various environments despite some hardware limitation concerns.
 

Stability Issues

Sentiment score
7.8
KVM is generally stable and reliable, though occasional issues arise during I/O tasks or hardware changes, requiring careful handling.
Sentiment score
7.0
Oracle VM VirtualBox is stable for most users but can have issues with Windows, snapshots, and multiple monitors.
The snapshot functionality in Oracle VM VirtualBox is effective for management purposes.
 

Room For Improvement

KVM needs user interface improvements, better networking, enhanced tools, platform compatibility, optimized resources, and improved support and documentation.
Users desire improved network options, better integration, enhanced usability, stability, compatibility, and remote management features for virtual machines.
In comparison to VMware, which offers a more balanced set of management features, KVM could improve in terms of user-friendly tooling.
 

Setup Cost

KVM is a cost-effective, open-source virtualization platform often preferred over VMware, with affordable support options enhancing its appeal.
Oracle VM VirtualBox is cost-effective and available for free, but licensing issues require careful enterprise evaluation.
Compared to VMware and Microsoft, KVM offers better pricing and licensing options.
In the enterprise scenario, all software solutions, including Oracle VM VirtualBox, are expensive.
 

Valuable Features

KVM excels in performance, scalability, ease of management, and security, offering seamless Linux integration and cost-effective virtualization.
Oracle VM VirtualBox is a versatile, user-friendly, open-source virtualization solution offering cross-platform support and advanced management features.
The most valuable feature of KVM is its superior real-time performance, which results in lower latency compared to alternatives like VMware and Microsoft.
Its snapshot functionality helps with backup management.
 

Categories and Ranking

KVM
Ranking in Server Virtualization Software
4th
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
7.4
Number of Reviews
43
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
Oracle VM VirtualBox
Ranking in Server Virtualization Software
7th
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
7.0
Number of Reviews
64
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of April 2025, in the Server Virtualization Software category, the mindshare of KVM is 10.3%, down from 12.2% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Oracle VM VirtualBox is 6.9%, down from 10.3% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Server Virtualization Software
 

Featured Reviews

Lan Tuong - PeerSpot reviewer
Useful to manage the virtual environments
The most valuable features of KVM for us are the console, which allows us to build or clone VMs quickly, and the ability to take snapshots and recreate new VMs rapidly. That's one of the things we love about KVM. The built-in management console, Auto KVM, is the most valuable tool for managing our virtual environments. We use it most to create and fire up new VMs or clone them for customers based on requests. The migration tools have worked quite well for us. We're moving from an Oracle Solaris platform for KVM logical domains, upgrading, and using KVM from Red Hat. It's slightly different but very similar to Oracle Unbreakable Linux, which is basically a clone of Red Hat. Oracle's console is easier to use than Red Hat's, though.
Kopano  Ramaphoi - PeerSpot reviewer
A flexible and easy-to-deploy product that provides a great user experience
The product should improve its scalability. It should be more flexible to be used with desktops with different capacities. We do not have much storage on our desktops, and we must allocate a certain amount of memory to install the product. When we install a virtual machine, we have a limit that we cannot exceed 80% of RAM.
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
16%
Financial Services Firm
10%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Comms Service Provider
8%
Computer Software Company
16%
Comms Service Provider
10%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Financial Services Firm
8%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

Why KVM??? Help please!
KVM scales better, orchestration better, performs better and supports a wider range of hardware and, also, you can implement at ZERO cost and with a very powerful web interface for management, from...
Why KVM??? Help please!
Small support team, small cluster, low core count, use VMware products Large support team, large clusters with many cores, use KVM. KVM scales better, orchestration better, performs better and supp...
Why KVM??? Help please!
Far from being an expert, my opinion is that the positive sides of KVM are: Lower costs and open-source which gives the abilities to customize it according to the specific needs of each customer.
How does KVM compare to Oracle VM VirtualBox?
KVM is easy to use, stable and flexible. It is mature and very fast. It is an affordable open-source solution that is easy to set up and manage. It offers very good security. It has a virtual manag...
What do you like most about Oracle VM VirtualBox?
The product’s most valuable feature is the ability to manage multiple operating systems through one application.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Oracle VM VirtualBox?
The pricing is flexible. When Oracle bought VirtualBox, they introduced some licensing issues. However, it did not affect the terms of licenses and additional costs. The price is okay. I rate the p...
 

Comparisons

 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

MediaWiki, Wikimedia Foundation, Wikipedia, Wikivoyage, Wikidata, Wikiversity, Commons
Airbus, Colorado State University, SCS Africa, Wolf Medical Systems.
Find out what your peers are saying about KVM vs. Oracle VM VirtualBox and other solutions. Updated: April 2025.
848,576 professionals have used our research since 2012.