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Nutanix AHV Virtualization vs RHEV comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Nov 6, 2024

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

Nutanix AHV Virtualization
Ranking in Server Virtualization Software
4th
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
7.1
Number of Reviews
58
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
RHEV
Ranking in Server Virtualization Software
11th
Average Rating
7.8
Reviews Sentiment
6.3
Number of Reviews
37
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of April 2026, in the Server Virtualization Software category, the mindshare of Nutanix AHV Virtualization is 5.8%, down from 8.2% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of RHEV is 2.4%, down from 3.6% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Server Virtualization Software Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Nutanix AHV Virtualization5.8%
RHEV2.4%
Other91.8%
Server Virtualization Software
 

Featured Reviews

TAIYAB HASAN - PeerSpot reviewer
Windows Redhat Linux Vmware & Azure & Cloud & Nutanix Ahv-Vmware & Backup Senior System Administrator at AlDawaa Medical Services
Has provided seamless virtualization and centralized control with strong security and reliable performance
I find almost every feature of Nutanix AHV Virtualization useful, as it's a very nice HCI solution from Nutanix. AHV is their native product, so it's very integrated with all the hardware they provide. Integration is very nice with the baseline hardware. We are using all built-in security features of Nutanix AHV Virtualization, which include encryption. It is very effective in protecting our VMs, and it is very secure. The impact of AHV, such as micro-segmentation, is very effective for us and it's working as per our requirements. We are very happy with the features. Role-Based Access is also a very nice feature for us to define to whom to give admin access and to whom to give read-only access. This kind of authentication helps us distribute tasks within the teams. Using Nutanix AHV Virtualization in a single management pane is very important to me, as it allows us to see everything related to our hardware, software, servers, and VMs from one console. We can reach everything from this one console, which provides a nice inside view for our software, hardware applications, server details, issues, alerts, or any unwanted activity. We are using the non-disruptive operations feature because Nutanix AHV Virtualization is in our production environment, and this feature helps us perform any activity without any downtime.
Mike Neuliep - PeerSpot reviewer
Linux Systems Engineer at a tech services company with 10,001+ employees
Has supported virtualization projects in side jobs but has required workarounds due to lack of maintenance
In my opinion, the best features of RHEV are that it is a real hypervisor and it is free, so it performs better than VMware. I have used the live migration feature in the past with RHEV. There is a free clone of it that is based on the open source. Live migration is a nifty feature if your app is not highly available and you need to do maintenance on a machine. You can migrate the VM off of it, do your maintenance, and move it back when you are done. RHEV has a high availability architecture with a built-in monitoring feature where you could see machines other than the one you are operating on. I tend to implement high availability not so much in RHEV, but by using standard application high availability strategies. Red Hat has another product specifically for high availability.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"Nutanix AHV Virtualization is a very good system to approach."
"Nutanix AHV's most valuable feature is the one-click upgrade capability."
"Nutanix AHV works really well. It's much easier to administer and manage than VMware. Since we're not a large IT department within the finance sector, our team is relatively small. We don't have a huge team of IT professionals to manage all the other systems."
"We use Prism Central, the centralized management console for AHV clusters. It allows administrators to manage multiple clusters from a single interface and provides a unified view of the entire infrastructure."
"The interface is very good, and quite user-friendly."
"The most valuable aspect of this solution is that you don't need to pay for it, it's free, as opposed to paying for a VMware license."
"Nutanix is good for new implementations on the VM side. It's very good for disaster recovery and final storage."
"In terms of features, Acropolis is a good virtualization manager and that it is on-premise. I use almost every technology they provide."
"It's a very good platform to build your virtual machines on and highly integrated with Red Hat itself and its satellites."
"Customers are moving to open source and Red Hat is the leader in this particular space. I think customers feel more confident running Red Hat Virtualization than VMware."
"If you have a heterogenous data centre that is specially focused on Linux platforms, this is safe money, and good if you are looking for automation."
"Performance and security are key advantages of RHEV."
"We are very satisfied with it."
"The solution is overall very good with all the facilities, it is user friendly, easy to configure, has documentation, and support is available."
"Technically, the main reason why I'm using Red Hat is because of its stability."
"In my opinion, the best features of RHEV are that it is a real hypervisor and it is free, so it performs better than VMware."
 

Cons

"Nutanix’s support team is not very efficient compared to others."
"The product must provide geo clusters."
"An improvement would be for Nutanix AHV to support VMDK, AOS, Hyper-V, and VMware."
"Server migration from physical to virtual must be supported by Nutanix AHV Virtualization, but it is currently not supported."
"Honestly, there's a lot to work on the product, especially for someone like me who has worked on VMware. VMware offers a significant level of customization when configuring virtual machines, and that level of detail is not as pronounced on Nutanix AHV Virtualization."
"I would like to see more automation of Day One operations, such as DRS, and HA."
"For the moment, the graphic user interface is not good, and it needs to be improved."
"There is room for improvement in the USB mapping."
"We'd like it if it would be possible on Red Hat Virtualization to possibly connect two or three VMs to the same disk."
"The UI should be more interactive with additional features."
"The documentation is not as good as it should be. There is a need for making it descriptive and in sequence."
"You need to buy support from red hat and you need to renew support every year in order to keep getting support from red hat."
"When we do a direct comparison, then obviously VMware does better in terms of having Fault Tolerance and doing active disaster recovery and these kind of things."
"While everything needs improvement in some way, I have no specifics."
"The Administration of the Oracle database and the SAP ERP needs improvement."
"Specifically, enhancements in managing virtual machine migrations, cloning, and the creation of different VMs could further optimize its functionality."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"When comparing this solution to others on the market, such as VMware and Citrix, the price could be reduced."
"I would rate the pricing a three out of five. It is expensive, but it also provides the value for money and performance that you require as a hyperconverged and virtualization software."
"The price of Nutanix AHV is reasonable."
"Nutanix AHV is low cost."
"The licensing overall from Nutanix AHV is very good compared to other solutions."
"AHV is free, it's an open-source solution."
"The price of the solution can always be lower. However, the price of the solution is reasonable."
"I rate the product's price an eight on a scale of one to ten, where one is cheap, and ten is costly. I don't think there are any extra costs in addition to the standard licensing fees of the solution."
"It's a budget product as far as I'm concerned. It's way cheaper than any of its competitors. The only thing cheaper than Red Hat is that the people who take the Red Hat code clone it and then self-support it."
"The price of RHEV is high. It is an open-source solution, the price should be less. The price should not be on par with a solution, such as VMware. It's not more or equal to VMware, it's less, but the difference should be more substantial."
"I believe we pay on a yearly basis."
"We buy a license for commercial use, and we also use the free editions."
"This is an open-source solution."
"The solution does not require licencing but a subscription is necessary, which is very affordable."
"We have to pay extra for vulnerability and fault tolerance."
"Its price depends on the use cases."
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Comparison Review

VL
CIO at Robusta Technology & Training
Jan 13, 2015
vSphere vs. RHEV vs. Hyper-V vs. XenServer
We have used the following functions: 1. Hypervisor: to ensure that the virtual server provide web and email services to the company, thus providing a stable operation a with single sign-on integration of an AD server and vCenter. 2. Network and Storage: centralized data server…
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Manufacturing Company
11%
Computer Software Company
10%
Financial Services Firm
9%
Government
8%
Financial Services Firm
12%
Computer Software Company
11%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Comms Service Provider
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business20
Midsize Enterprise15
Large Enterprise23
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business21
Midsize Enterprise5
Large Enterprise12
 

Questions from the Community

How does Nutanix AHV compare with VMware vSphere?
To understand which is better - Nutanix AHV or VMware vSphere - you need to do a product comparison. Both products support hypervisors. However, Nutanix supports some of the most popular ones and m...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Nutanix AHV Virtualization?
Regarding the cost, Nutanix AHV Virtualization is not very expensive and not very low-priced. It's reasonable for us, and the budget is there.
What needs improvement with Nutanix AHV Virtualization?
In our comparison during migration from another virtualization platform, we found a limitation with Nutanix AHV Virtualization, which is that physical server migration to the AHV environment is not...
What do you like most about RHEV?
The initial setup is fairly straightforward and well-documented. The process is very similar to its competitors. The success of your setup depends on how well you plan.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for RHEV?
It's the open source. There's not much cost. It's very minimal comparably. Compared to what I am paying for VMware, it's negligible.
What needs improvement with RHEV?
RHEV is not improving because it has been discontinued. It has been discontinued for years. I would love to get back into RHEV, but the job market is difficult and no one is hiring. RHEV is designe...
 

Comparisons

 

Also Known As

No data available
Red Hat Enterprise Virtualization
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

JetBlue, International Speedway Corporation, SAIC Volkswagen
Qualcomm and Bonham's Auction House.
Find out what your peers are saying about Nutanix AHV Virtualization vs. RHEV and other solutions. Updated: April 2026.
886,664 professionals have used our research since 2012.