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

KVM vs VMware Workstation comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive Summary

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

KVM
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
7.4
Number of Reviews
43
Ranking in other categories
Server Virtualization Software (4th)
VMware Workstation
Average Rating
8.8
Reviews Sentiment
7.2
Number of Reviews
55
Ranking in other categories
Virtual Desktop Infrastructure (VDI) (1st)
 

Mindshare comparison

While both are Virtualization solutions, they serve different purposes. KVM is designed for Server Virtualization Software and holds a mindshare of 10.5%, down 12.5% compared to last year.
VMware Workstation, on the other hand, focuses on Virtual Desktop Infrastructure (VDI), holds 16.9% mindshare, up 13.5% since last year.
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.
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

"If you are a Linux desktop user, KVM is the solution to go with if you have to start virtual machines with Linux or other operating systems with almost zero extra configuration needed."
"The tool's most valuable feature is backup. The product makes it easy to manage virtual machines. Other tools require third-party applications like VMware and vSphere. However, KVM doesn't require these applications."
"The initial setup was very easy."
"Scaling the solution is easy. You just have to add more hardware."
"I like that it's easy to manage. It's also more powerful when it comes to security than others. That point of view is the one consideration. The other consideration is that it's cost-effective."
"The performance is great."
"It offers a high-availability environment."
"I find the density of the product most valuable. It is density that a technologist can just assign page merging. This is what makes KVM one of the important players of the virtualization market."
"I haven't faced any inconveniences working with this solution. It is very easy to use."
"We are able to simultaneously run multiple operating systems in a single machine and have virtually no performance hit."
"The most valuable features of VMware Workstation are the DirectX support, you can run Microsoft Hyper-V in virtual environments which is good for me to test different installations. Additionally, you can set up different VLANs, and overall it is a complete solution."
"The solution's customer service is good."
"The simplicity of the deployment and the implementation, and the footprint for the hardware are some of the solution's valuable features."
"The features are good."
"I appreciate the ease of backup and snapshot creation. The ability to revert to previous versions without losing data is very useful for our team."
"The most valuable feature of VMware Player is the ability to snapshot with or without memory."
 

Cons

"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."
"Monitoring and resolution could be improved."
"The stability of this solution is less than other products in the same category."
"The solution’s user interface could be improved and made more user-friendly."
"Lacks high availability across clusters as well as support for Apache CloudStack."
"The speed is around thirty percent slower than another competitor. This would be something to work on."
"KVM is very difficult to manage and run on daily operations."
"The networking with wireless devices needs improvement."
"Its price could be better."
"The support can be improved."
"It would be great if VMware Workstation had more networking options and compatibility, that would be great. I would like to deploy virtual switches and play around with networking a bit more. Otherwise, I have to deploy ESXi Virtual Edition and emulate it, which is painful and clunky."
"The product's integration capabilities are an area with certain shortcomings where improvements are required."
"The product’s virtual machine data backup feature needs upgrading."
"The price of VMware Workstation could improve."
"Lacks the ability to clone onto another system rather than starting from scratch."
"It would be helpful if VMware Workstation included an in-built monitoring tool for monitoring things."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The solution is extremely cheap in China."
"KVM is an open-source solution."
"This solution came with the Linux license."
"I use KVM for free through Proxmox, which offers a free license alternative."
"We had some problems with the licensing."
"One only needs a subscription to Oracle Linux. So, it's cheaper with Oracle Linux's subscription. It is not very expensive. In short, the solution is open source, and you need only a subscription."
"It is cheaper than other solutions out there on the market."
"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 the free version of VMware Workstation."
"The licensing costs are cheap. I pay approximately $100 per year."
"The solution is moderately priced. I rate the pricing a six out of ten."
"VMware Workstation has a high price than competitors in the market."
"VMware is expensive. Licensing can be tricky. For example, I recently had a client running VMware vSphere Essentials and wanted to migrate to a more scalable solution. However, they had no choice but to purchase a completely new license and deploy a completely new instance of VMware."
"The tool is not the cheapest."
"VMware Workstation's costs are lifetime."
"VMware Workstation is an expensive solution in Asian countries."
report
Use our free recommendation engine to learn which Server Virtualization Software solutions are best for your needs.
837,501 professionals have used our research since 2012.
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
16%
Financial Services Firm
11%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Comms Service Provider
8%
Computer Software Company
16%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Comms Service Provider
8%
Government
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.
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 Workstation primarily to test environments to determine how well a solution will...
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

 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

MediaWiki, Wikimedia Foundation, Wikipedia, Wikivoyage, Wikidata, Wikiversity, Commons
Akademiska Hus
Find out what your peers are saying about Proxmox, VMware, Microsoft and others in Server Virtualization Software. Updated: January 2025.
837,501 professionals have used our research since 2012.