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 an easily scalable solution."
"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."
"The product's scalability is good...It's a very stable product."
"The KVM service is well managed with a central policy interface."
"Scaling the solution is easy. You just have to add more hardware."
"The GUI interface makes the management of KVM easier than ever before."
"The pause feature is valuable. I can pause, which is something that not all hypervisors allow. The snapshot feature is also valuable."
"The snapshot feature is very powerful; it protects us from disaster."
"It is a stable product."
"The solution is very stable."
"The product’s most valuable feature is the ability to manage multiple operating systems through one application."
"Technical support is good."
"This solution can be used on many different platforms including Windows and Linux."
"Oracle VM Virtualbox is easy to use and does not require much training."
"The speed is around thirty percent slower than another competitor. This would be something to work on."
"The networking with wireless devices needs improvement."
"Its resource usage can be improved."
"The stability of this solution is less than other products in the same category."
"The initial setup of this solution is more difficult than some of the competing products and it could be improved."
"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."
"I would like to see more focus on microservices and integration with Kubernetes or OpenShift."
"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 think that this solution should be more user-friendly."
"The solution should have more enterprise features, like migration, high availability storage, disaster recovery, and the ability to deploy to enterprise-scale usage. They should not just offer desktop usage."
"The user interface needs to be improved."
"Oracle’s support team should improve its response time."
"One valuable feature would be for it to work right the first time but it doesn't necessarily do that."
"The solution is not flexible."
"The solution lacks some open source remote administration tools. The reload of individual virtual machine definitions through the vboxweb service (via its API) without restarting it and the access to shared storage (to use teleport functions) need to be improved."
"The solution needs to improve its flexibility. It's not as flexible as VMware."
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.