We performed a comparison between KVM and Oracle VM VirtualBox based on our users’ reviews in five categories. After reading all of the collected data, you can find our conclusion below.
Comparison Results: Both KVM and Oracle VM VirtualBox have their strengths and weaknesses. Oracle VM VirtualBox seems to be the more favorable choice of the two, since it offers good scalability whereas scalability seems to be an ongoing issue for KVM users.
"I appreciate the network passcode feature in KVM, as it provides a convenient way to manage DNS and cloud hosting."
"It is easy to use, stable, and flexible. It is a pretty mature product, and it is faster than VirtualBox."
"If you prefer command-line, there are all kinds of command-line options."
"The most helpful aspect of KVM is the fact that the interface is so minimal. It includes just what you need to set up the VMs and manage them, and it's very simple to do so."
"Documentation and problem-solving troubleshooting are the most valuable features. Performance (when fine-tuned and with "special" HW) is awesome, equal to or more than other enterprise closed-source solutions."
"I like that this is an open-source solution. It is very powerful, and it's easy."
"A very reliable solution which can be used for x86 architecture virtualization with reasonable overhead."
"The most valuable feature of KVM is its stability."
"It is a stable product."
"The flexibility as well as performance wise and as well as data volume, we have huge volume stored."
"Technical support is good."
"I like that it has a snapshot feature."
"The installation is easy."
"VirtualBox provides an isolated, consistent environment"
"The flexibility and the closed platform, so it allows you to run in multiple platforms, Windows, Linux, Macintosh."
"The pause feature is valuable. I can pause, which is something that not all hypervisors allow. The snapshot feature is also valuable."
"Technical support could be better. In the next release, I would like to see an improved user interface and dashboard. This type of improvement will make it easy or help our engineers understand the solution from a requirement point of view."
"We are not getting good support from KVM, and it is not that user-friendly."
"Support for VF is needed, where you can, for example, export from VMware to KVM."
"The speed is around thirty percent slower than another competitor. This would be something to work on."
"There are some issues with the graphics and some software that is very complex."
"I have encountered difficulties in getting the tool's documentation."
"Business continuity features need to be added."
"I have previously used VMware and KVM is easier to use. However, they both have their strengths depending on their use cases. They are mostly equal. One of VMware's advantages is it has better support."
"We're working with them to be able to allow the local USB ports to be ported over to the remote desktop, running VirtualBox."
"The installation is difficult and could be improved."
"The solution needs to improve the methods used for starting and stopping the machine."
"The product lacks scalability since it is for desktops and not for servers."
"They could improve the graphics functionality of the product."
"Oracle needs to improve its hot virtual machine migration. It didn't work as intended. It should allow us to migrate between virtual machines, without stopping the database."
"Oracle’s support team should improve its response time."
"The solution could be more user-friendly."
KVM is ranked 4th in Server Virtualization Software with 39 reviews while Oracle VM VirtualBox is ranked 5th in Server Virtualization Software with 61 reviews. KVM is rated 8.0, while Oracle VM VirtualBox is rated 8.2. The top reviewer of KVM writes "Delivers good performance because of kernel-based virtualization". On the other hand, the top reviewer of Oracle VM VirtualBox writes "The solution is versatile, simple to use, and stable". KVM is most compared with Proxmox VE, Hyper-V, VMware vSphere, VMware Workstation and Oracle VM, whereas Oracle VM VirtualBox is most compared with Proxmox VE, Hyper-V, Oracle VM, VMware Workstation and VMware vSphere. See our KVM vs. Oracle VM VirtualBox report.
See our list of best Server Virtualization Software vendors.
We monitor all Server Virtualization Software reviews to prevent fraudulent reviews and keep review quality high. We do not post reviews by company employees or direct competitors. We validate each review for authenticity via cross-reference with LinkedIn, and personal follow-up with the reviewer when necessary.