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

KVM vs Oracle VM VirtualBox vs VMware Workstation comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive Summary
 

Mindshare comparison

Server Virtualization Software
Server Virtualization Software
Virtual Desktop Infrastructure (VDI)
 

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.
Tomasz Pietas - PeerSpot reviewer
Good functionality and free to use with a useful snapshot feature
The functionality and productivity are very good. I can test and roll back features in my work. It's a big platform. It's very useful. I like that it has a snapshot feature. The virtual network is great. There are a lot of features. It has everything I need. The product is free to use. It's easy to set up.
Shambhu Narayan  Singh - PeerSpot reviewer
An easy-to-manage solution that has really good customer support compared to other market players
VMware Workstation makes it easy to manage all the resources that we are handling. VMware Workstation has reduced our infrastructure cost. If someone wants machines, I can create them easily using the solution. VMware Workstation is easier to manage than other workstations like Oracle Workstation. VMware Workstation is an easy-to-manage solution, and its support is really good compared to other market players. Overall, I rate VMware Workstation an eight out of ten.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"What I like most about KVM is that it's very easy to use. Everything is built-in, even when writing command lines."
"The product's scalability is good...It's a very stable product."
"The most valuable feature of KVM is its superior real-time performance, which results in lower latency compared to alternatives like VMware and Microsoft."
"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."
"The initial setup was very easy."
"A very reliable solution which can be used for x86 architecture virtualization with reasonable overhead."
"The product is scalable."
"The performance is great."
"The scalability of the solution is very good."
"The flexibility as well as performance wise and as well as data volume, we have huge volume stored."
"This is a highly scalable solution."
"The most valuable aspects of the solution were the support and performance of the product and the flexibility it gives you to work."
"The solution has high performance and is easy to use."
"The configuration and installation is pretty straightforward."
"This solution can be used on many different platforms including Windows and Linux."
"The initial setup was straightforward."
"The performance is good."
"Having ten people working off a single piece of hardware reduces costs."
"The most valuable feature of VMware Player is the ability to snapshot with or without memory."
"Technical support is very good."
"VMware Workstation allows you to run a virtual machine."
"The solution's customer service is good."
"We can undo some changes using the snapshot feature."
"VMware Workstation is great for migrating and patching operating systems."
 

Cons

"In our setup, we do not have any dashboards or orchestration, and it is hard to manage. We have 25 gig network cards, but the software driver we have only supported 10 gigs."
"The solution overall is just okay."
"The speed is around thirty percent slower than another competitor. This would be something to work on."
"We still occasionally build Interlaced Wireless Protection within our environment. The ecosystem entails areas, where we support agents, and release backup and security solutions. Collaboration with independent software vendors (ITOLs or ITOLED) is necessary to offer these solutions to customers. However, the scope of the ecosystem in KVM is not as extensive as that of VMware's. In contrast, VMware boasts a robust partner network, allowing for comprehensive customer solutions. On the other hand, KVM’s ecosystem is comparatively limited in comparison. I would like to see FT features in KVM."
"Lacks high availability across clusters as well as support for Apache CloudStack."
"The only negative aspect of needing hardware support is a fully functional KVM can be dropped. It would be nice if the support for other platforms, like ARM or Risk, were as good as the x86 one. However, with the democratization of Chromebooks based on these chips and mobile devices, it will not take long for that to happen."
"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."
"One problem I have is that it's not very scalable when it comes to resizing the VM disk dimensions. For example, if you have initially set a virtual drive to 10 GB and you want to upgrade it to 15 GB, it's not that easy."
"The solution is a bit less stable than I would like."
"The technical support needs to improve."
"Oracle’s support team should improve its response time."
"The interface should be easier to comprehend"
"It has some issues when you have some weird device drivers. For instance, when you have a weird sound driver working on your machine, and the VirtualBox needs to output the sound of the virtual machine into the sound driver of the physical machine, the bare metal, it doesn't work too well. If you tweak lots of drivers and play around with the different kinds of drivers and machines, you will probably break something. I have not played with it too much and maybe it already supports it, but it would probably be good to have the ability to use a container from the virtual machine environment instead of spinning off a complete virtual machine. There are other tools for that. On Linux, you have a DXE, LXC framework, and you have Docker as well. Docker is good because it is multi-platform, and you can run Docker on pretty much anything, even different processors, but it would be good if we had a VirtualBox running on it while spinning off containers instead of full virtual machines. The other thing that will become important, and I'm pretty sure that they are thinking about it as well is that there's this new hardware platform that Apple is releasing, which is an ARM-based new chip. So, VirtualBox will probably have to work on ARM-based CPUs as well."
"The solution has to do a better job of promoting the product and its licensing capabilities."
"This solution needs improvement with the business continuity planning, disaster and recovery management and using centralized data storage."
"The communications setup lags. It does not connect properly so the batching and networking is a bit slow."
"The tool has limited scalability."
"Its networking features need improvement."
"It would be better if software updates occur automatically."
"I would want to see features included that make deployment easier."
"Installing VMware Workstation isn't so easy. It's highly complex compared to Windows. I rate it four out of 10 for ease of installation. Setting up a remote desktop only takes a minute or so, but the Workstation itself takes some time."
"The solution freezes sometimes."
"VMware Workstation could improve the export and import of virtual machines."
"It takes too much time to load all the plug-ins and software."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The product's pricing is above average but cheaper than that of VMware. I can't provide specific licensing costs, but we have a contract with Red Hat for client support that covers everything. There are no additional costs beyond the standard licensing fees."
"I use KVM for free through Proxmox, which offers a free license alternative."
"This solution is an open-source, free platform with paid support."
"​It is free and can be run from your laptop, if needed, unlike VMware.​"
"KVM is an open-source product that works well for us."
"KVM is priced reasonably."
"It is free for everyone."
"It is cheaper than other competitors like VMware or Hyper-V."
"Oracle should consider reducing the cost of the product."
"It is a very cost-effective solution."
"The license I use is free."
"The product is free to use."
"The solution is free."
"It is pretty good for the price, which is free."
"Everything is free within limitations. Once you go over a certain level of usage you have to license the product."
"Pricing does not apply for us, we do not have to pay for the service."
"The price of the solution per workstation is approximately 200 Francs annually. We pay a total of 800 francs. Everything is included in the price such as the support."
"The solution's pricing is almost the same as what Google Cloud, AWS, or Microsoft would charge you."
"It has the best licensing modules."
"With all its support and ease of use, VMware Player's pricing is fair."
"VMware Workstation has a high price than competitors in the market."
"Licensing fees are paid on an annual basis."
"The product is expensive."
"The pricing is a bit steep in my opinion for testing and there are other options."
report
Use our free recommendation engine to learn which Server Virtualization Software solutions are best for your needs.
817,457 professionals have used our research since 2012.
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
16%
Financial Services Firm
10%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Comms Service Provider
7%
Computer Software Company
16%
Educational Organization
9%
Manufacturing Company
9%
University
8%
Computer Software Company
16%
Government
9%
Manufacturing Company
8%
University
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 im...
Why KVM??? Help please!
Small support team, small cluster, low core count, use VMware products Large support team, large clusters with many c...
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 ...
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...
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 af...
Which VMware solution would you go with - Workstation or vSphere?
VM Workstation’s setup is so easy, you can use it almost instantly, it works well with Windows and Linux. We like VM ...
What do you like most about VMware Workstation?
The product is stable, very easy to deploy, easy to use, easy to configure, and easy to set up.
What needs improvement with VMware Workstation?
The product's integration capabilities are an area with certain shortcomings where improvements are required.
 

Comparisons

 

Learn More

Video not available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

MediaWiki, Wikimedia Foundation, Wikipedia, Wikivoyage, Wikidata, Wikiversity, Commons
Airbus, Colorado State University, SCS Africa, Wolf Medical Systems.
Akademiska Hus
Find out what your peers are saying about Proxmox, VMware, Microsoft and others in Server Virtualization Software. Updated: November 2024.
817,457 professionals have used our research since 2012.