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.
"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."
"It is easy to use, stable, and flexible. It is a pretty mature product, and it is faster than VirtualBox."
"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."
"There is a strong emphasis on availability, and they have numerous API interfaces for distributed storage and the solution is quite known for its openness."
"KVM has a rich options set which can be directly used or via wrappers, such as libvirt."
"Good screen and keyboard sharing feature."
"Scaling the solution is easy. You just have to add more hardware."
"The product's scalability is good...It's a very stable product."
"This solution creates a snapshot of virtual machines so you can create test environments."
"The snapshot feature is very powerful; it protects us from disaster."
"The installation is easy."
"The most valuable feature is the ability to copy bidirectionally between the desktop and the virtual machine."
"This product is very user-friendly and easy to use."
"It is easy to use and does not require complex knowledge."
"I like that Oracle VM is safe and stable. It is also very easy to administer. For example, opening a VM or adding a host adapter is extremely easy."
"The cloning is a very useful tool."
"Technical support is not top-notch."
"KVM is very difficult to manage and run on daily operations."
"The KVM tech support is really bad. They are not very responsive."
"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."
"We would like to have a software lifecycle solution included in this solution. We can handle the software needed for KVM, but also the software that we provide. A lifecycle component would be very beneficial."
"Its resource usage can be improved."
"The main drawback in the solution is probably disaster recovery."
"Business continuity features need to be added."
"Having live migrations to move a running server to other hardware would be great."
"The installation is difficult and could be improved."
"It could improve slightly with enhanced reporting capabilities that show the current status of the network."
"It would be good if we could use Hyper-V Windows subsystems with Linux and VirtualBox on the same instance. Currently, to be able to use VirtualBox, we have to restart the machine into an instance of Windows where Hyper-V is disabled, which is understandably very inconvenient."
"Oracle VMs don't have a solid web interface of their own. This is an area where Oracle is lagging behind. Now, we use headless servers, install Oracle VMs, and manage them remotely. We could use phpVirtual Box, but it is a third-party solution. A lot of people contribute to it, and it's not authenticated by Oracle. As a result, I don't find it to be a good option. Therefore, I would like to see Oracle offer an extension pack or a licensed version that fixes this problem."
"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 product lacks scalability since it is for desktops and not for servers."
"This should have better support for multiple network cards and some parts of the GUI should be improved."
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.