We performed a comparison between KVM and RHEV based on our users’ reviews in four categories. After reading the collected data, you can find our conclusion below.
Comparison Results: KVM wins out in this comparison. Users find it very fast and super easy to use and manage. It provides excellent security and scales easily. Many users feel RHEV is lacking in some documentation capabilities and security features and that it can be challenging to scale up when needed.
"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 product is really good...One can get good performance because of kernel-based virtualization."
"The most valuable feature of KVM is its stability."
"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."
"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."
"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."
"The initial setup was very easy."
"It is an easily scalable solution."
"Technically, the main reason why I'm using Red Hat is because of its stability."
"What they provide is way beyond the essential requirements of customers."
"It is easy to deal with when comes to application migration and its compatibility with the multiple component applications."
"The most valuable feature of this solution is the support portal."
"The price is the solution's most valuable aspect. It's much cheaper than, for example, VMware."
"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."
"Red Hat is the most stable system."
"It is a scalable solution."
"The solution should be more user friendly. We are struggling with the command lines."
"The solution’s user interface could be improved and made more user-friendly."
"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."
"KVM is very difficult to manage and run on daily operations."
"The initial setup of this solution is more difficult than some of the competing products and it could be improved."
"Technical support is not top-notch."
"The stability of this solution is less than other products in the same category."
"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."
"Customers are not aware of this solution, they can improve by providing more awareness and solution availability."
"It would be better to have more patches, especially kernel-level updates, live and online so that we can keep the business up and running during this period."
"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 solution has a very small lifecycle."
"The availability of technical expertise with the solution may be limited in some areas."
"We would like the dashboard feature of this solution to be improved, as it is not very detailed at present."
"I heard that there are big differences between Red Hat eight and seven, but it's still quite difficult for me to judge it. I found it a bit more difficult to manage than version seven, which was much easier. In term of features, though, it is still not yet clear which is better. I have no clear idea of which features need to be changed at the moment."
KVM is ranked 4th in Server Virtualization Software with 39 reviews while RHEV is ranked 10th in Server Virtualization Software with 32 reviews. KVM is rated 8.0, while RHEV is rated 7.6. The top reviewer of KVM writes "Delivers good performance because of kernel-based virtualization". On the other hand, the top reviewer of RHEV writes "Offers frameworks with well-documented API and easy to use". KVM is most compared with Proxmox VE, Oracle VM VirtualBox, Hyper-V, VMware vSphere and Citrix Hypervisor, whereas RHEV is most compared with VMware vSphere, Proxmox VE, Hyper-V, Oracle VM and Nutanix AHV Virtualization. See our KVM vs. RHEV 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.