Citrix Hypervisor vs VMware vSphere comparison

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Comparison Buyer's Guide
Executive Summary
Updated on Jan 9, 2023

We performed a comparison between Citrix Hypervisor and VMware vSphere based on our users’ reviews in five categories. After reading all of the collected data, you can find our conclusion below.

  • Ease of Deployment: Reviewers of both solutions report that their initial setup and deployment is straightforward and fast.
  • Features: Users of both products are happy with their stability and scalability.

    Citrix Hypervisor users say that it is secure and flexible with good customizations, and can easily move VMs between hosts. Several users mention that its backup tools could use improvement.

    VMware vSphere users say it is flexible and easy to use and has good virtualization and fast data recovery. Some VMware vSphere users say that the solution should improve its security and monitoring features.
  • Pricing: Citrix Hypervisor users say the solution is a low-cost product. In contrast, most VMware vSphere say the solution is expensive.
  • Service and Support: Reviewers of both solutions report being satisfied with the level of the support they receive.
  • ROI: Both Citrix Hypervisor and VMware vSphere users are satisfied with the ROI.

Comparison Results: Citrix Hypervisor wins out in this comparison. The main difference between the two solutions is that VMware vSphere is more expensive than Citrix Hypervisor and users say it also needs improved security and monitoring features.

To learn more, read our detailed Citrix Hypervisor vs. VMware vSphere Report (Updated: March 2024).
765,234 professionals have used our research since 2012.
Q&A Highlights
Question: What do each of the VMware and Citrix products do?
Answer: Sure, at a high level: VMware products allow you to set up multiple virtual servers on a single physical server. This allows you to run the virtual servers on the physical server resources. It is an easy way to replicate environments so that there are no surprises when you go to production. You can set up development, QA and UAT all on the same physical box which are identical. Citrix products allow you to process at a data center where your computing power is located. The user attaches to the Citrix network from remote location, uses the application which runs at the data center but only the screens and data is transferred. The process eliminates latency in distribution to remote user locations. Using Citrix a document can be created in Philadelphia and viewed in Hong Kong virtually without any user detectible delay because all of the processing was done at a data center in Philadelphia. Hope this helps. Let me know if you need more details.
Featured Review
Quotes From Members
We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use.
Here are some excerpts of what they said:
Pros
"The compatibility of the solution is its most valuable feature. It's compatible on almost every cloud these days.""Scripting can automate procedures.""Citrix Hypervisor is simple to use.""We can easily migrate VMs from one host to another.""The solution is extremely stable.""The most valuable feature of the solution is that it is very fast. It also works very well for physically small servers.""The onboarding process is pretty straightforward.""I've found the following features to be the most valuable: user personalization layer, app layering, provisioning, and notification services for integration between different domains."

More Citrix Hypervisor Pros →

"Provides good backup to our servers.""Its most valuable features are reliability, for sure, and quickness in getting the job done. I can spin off 100 or 200 machines in the matter of half an hour.""The most valuable features for us are HA, DRS, and SDRS.""Its dynamic resource scheduling and its fault tolerance capabilities are two features that I've found to be valuable. I also like that VMware vSphere is stable, scalable, and easy to install.""In the past, we struggled with VM encryption. We couldn't encrypt the virtual machines with older versions of vSphere without some kind of third-party tool. Now, with 6.7, it's all in the application itself, in vSphere. We no longer have to procure additional products to meet that requirement. We can just do it on the fly, and pass our audit with no issues.""The easy of use with reduced space provides a better use of infrastructure""The solution has high availability.""The virtualization this solution offer is very complete for the infrastructure."

More VMware vSphere Pros →

Cons
"It needs to have a more robust backup solution.""The manageability of the solution needs improvement. It's an extremely bad product to handle.""The interface has to be updated.""The self-service user portal needs to be more granular and be more customizable.""Citrix Hypervisor is expensive if you get it as a stand-alone product, so this is one area for improvement. Its price could be cheaper. We also found other areas for improvement in Citrix Hypervisor, for example, we can't use SCIM provisioning, and there are limitations to the size of the HDD. Another area for improvement is the pass-through storage, in particular the removable storage, because that also has limitations where you can't connect to the drive if it is more than one TB.""The solution needs better backup facilities that are available for virtual machines to create servers on.""The USB support for the virtual server needs improvement.""I think the technical support could be better."

More Citrix Hypervisor Cons →

"If they improve on the knowledge base and documentation, it would be extremely helpful.""The biggest room for improvement would be just simplicity. It is very intuitive, but it needs somebody with a lot of IT background.""The ability to run ARM based VMs on an x86 platform for testing purposes. With the growing use of SBCs running on ARM architectures for IoT devices, it would be very useful if developers could build and deploy VMs running operating systems like Raspbian used on Raspberry Pi devices on their existing x86 ESXi environments. Even if this is not possible through some form of emulation, the ability to add ARM hypervisors to vSphere environments would be very useful. This will enable more rapid development cycles for customers just getting started with IoT but already existing vSphere users.""The latest version of the solution has a few bugs.""In addition, I think some of the backup features or the prediction features can be improved.""We need to improve availability and disaster recovery in VMware vSphere.""The integration with containers should be addressed.""There are some limitations with the solution regarding migrating."

More VMware vSphere Cons →

Pricing and Cost Advice
  • "The pricing and licensing is so important. Customers do consider the price seriously."
  • "The most valuable feature is the cost; it is a free product."
  • "To subscribe to the paid version with support, it is approximately $6,000 per year."
  • "There are free and paid versions. The free version is limited in features but not by time limit. The paid version has more features."
  • "While it is free for small networks, the pricing is high if your network grows past a certain size."
  • "We migrated from VMware to XenCenter to cut costs."
  • "This solution is open source, it's free."
  • "Citrix is a good low-cost alternative to VMware, so if budgeting is an issue then I would recommend it."
  • More Citrix Hypervisor Pricing and Cost Advice →

  • "My advice when it comes to pricing is that pricing is a bummer, especially when it comes to SnS coverage."
  • "Purchase only the cheaper solution with support. I don’t recommend high-end licenses."
  • "Pricing needs to be competitive since Microsoft Hyper-V has come a long way; they are both around the same price range."
  • "VMware is consistently expensive and their pricing arrogance is what will drive us and other customers away."
  • "Start with the lowest and upgrade if, and only if, absolutely necessary."
  • "Compared with other vendors’ products, the pricing of the license is slightly lower. The annual S&S price is very affordable."
  • "The product is worth what you pay for it. I definitely feel like I"m getting good value."
  • "​The only issue with vSphere might be with the cost of the tools and the software.​"
  • More VMware vSphere Pricing and Cost Advice →

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    Comparison Review
    Thang Le Toan (Victory Lee)
    Answers from the Community
    Avigail Sugarman
    Yasser Ghonaim - PeerSpot reviewerYasser Ghonaim
    Real User

    VMware and Citrix server virtualization do almost the same thing with nearly same options, on the other hand Citrix Xenapp and Xendesktop is far more advanced and efficient and have their own secured protocol. I've been using Citrix Xenapp for long time, it is an amazing solution saving huge cost related to communication channels and software license. Also I implemented Citrix Xenapp on VMware and HyperV. The stability of Citrix over VMware is far more better than over HyperV. We used the Citrix Xenapp to streaming Oracle EBS and Microsoft office to remote users (about 13000 user) it served up to 1600 concurrent user very efficient.

    it_user86838 - PeerSpot reviewerit_user86838 (Implementation Unit at a tech services company with 51-200 employees)
    Consultant

    Hi,

    VMware and Citrix XenServer both are Bare metal (Type1) Virtualization Software. Both are good. But VMware is too user friendly and good for Enterprise as well. Whereas, Citrix is good for SMB.

    it_user127791 - PeerSpot reviewerit_user127791 (IT Representative at a manufacturing company with 51-200 employees)
    Vendor

    In short, there are so many options with each company that it is hard to provide a short sweet answer.  From my experience, Citrix has been used primarily to enable one to access computers and systems remotely as well as a tool to enable folks to get together via an online meeting format.  VMWare, conversely, has been used for virtual environments where one could host their servers, say up to 4 or 5 of them, virtually, on each ESXi host machine.  Again, each company has many products, however I have thought of them as an apples verses oranges comparison in as far as the service/products they offer. One can explore Citrix products at http://www.citrix.com/products.html?posit=glnav and VMWare products at http://www.vmware.com/products/. 

     
    -Jeff

    Dan Withrow - PeerSpot reviewerDan Withrow
    Real User

    Adding to Howard's points, you can virtualize NetScaler as well. It is now replacing Cisco's Load Balancing line of products. Citrix XenServer also allows for users to build their own Cloud.
    As with Rakesh's comments, Citrix can provide some of same benefits.
    1. Reduce physical space in the data center, thereby reducing physical server maintenance, cooling costs and OPEX.
    2. Using templates, you can deploy virtual servers in hours instead of days or weeks with physical purchases.
    3. With Desktop virtualization, Microsoft has VDA licensing. Server OS licensing remains the same.

    Overall, both vendors have their own key points of expertise, it will depend on what you really want to accomplish with virtualization.

    it_user134880 - PeerSpot reviewerit_user134880 (IT Manager at a non-tech company)
    Vendor

    Haven't used citrix but had been useing VMWARE , I will therefore concentrate on VMware alone.
    VMWare benefits on Multiple fronts
    1. Reduce Physical Space of Data Center
    2. Reduces Physical Server Maintenance Cost and thereby OPEX
    3. Make implementing Redundancy much Easier
    4. Servers are Up in Days compared to conventional methods where we needed to procure physical Servers
    5. Reduce Energy Cost as we have reduced number of Physical Servers
    6. Reduces Windows OS licensing cost

    it_user113568 - PeerSpot reviewerit_user113568 (Account Manager at a tech company with 10,001+ employees)
    Real User

    Adding to Howard's points above, VMware uses their existing Hypervisor platform to enable customers build their own Cloud too.

    it_user99459 - PeerSpot reviewerit_user99459 (Infra Director with 51-200 employees)
    Vendor

    Vmware and Citrix both do similar things. They both offer server virtualization and desktop virtualization (plus other related software). VMware is the clear market leader for server virtualzation (Vsphere) and Citrix is the leader in desktop / application virtualization (Xendesktop / Xenapp). They both offer network software enhancements (and Citrix has NetScaler hardware). If you have any questions, please email howieb@hotmail.com

    Questions from the Community
    Top Answer:Citrix Hypervisor is expensive. The cloud licenses are expensive. Only Citrix is earning money off those. It's the same with VMware and Microsoft.
    Top Answer:Citrix is not investing in the virtual surroundings. Third-party tools are bad for Citrix at the moment. No good backup recovery is available. On Microsoft, we can use Veeam, which is a great product… more »
    Top Answer:DEEPEN DHULLA did explain well IOMMU. IOMMU has to be activated at the bios level. It exists on Intel and AMD platforms. It is used a lot inside virtualization platforms like VMware VSphere. It… more »
    Top Answer:We use VMware and KVM. We find that KVM is a lot simpler to use and it provides the virtualization we need for Linux and Windows. For us, VMware does not offer any advantage. Moreover, KVM is free.
    Top Answer:We found the reduced power consumption with Nutanix Acropolis AOS a very attractive feature. We also like the interface that allows you to talk directly to your VM from the present software. We found… more »
    Ranking
    Views
    10,912
    Comparisons
    7,644
    Reviews
    8
    Average Words per Review
    580
    Rating
    8.8
    Views
    44,230
    Comparisons
    36,500
    Reviews
    17
    Average Words per Review
    366
    Rating
    8.9
    Comparisons
    Also Known As
    XenServer
    Learn More
    Overview

    Citrix Hypervisor is a leading virtualization management platform optimized for application, desktop and server virtualization infrastructures. Consolidation and containment of workloads on Citrix Hypervisor enables organizations of any vertical or size to transform their business IT compute infrastructures.

    VMware vSphere is a powerful and complete server virtualization platform that allows its users to create and manage virtual data centers and machines. VMware vSphere is designed to help IT departments set up and run applications using the most cost-effective computer resources. By using vSphere, organizations save the time and energy necessary for purchasing infrastructure and software and reduce ongoing maintenance and operational burdens on IT teams.

    Infrastructure administrators and network operators can access and manage the vSphere server by using a web-based cross-platform client application or via the vSphere client tool provided with vSphere. 

    VMware vSphere provides visibility into VMs and enables its users to carry out operations to manage VMs. This includes tasks such as:

    • Powering VMs on and off
    • Launching the VM console
    • Shutting down guest operating systems
    • Settings configurations
    • Taking system snapshots

    VMware vSphere Benefits

    Some of the benefits of using VMware vSphere include: 

    • Reduced costs: Since VMware applications are run on a server, it is not necessary to spend large amounts of your organization’s money on hardware, software, and infrastructure.
    • Increased productivity and customer satisfaction: VMware is able to operate multiple complex processes simultaneously. With all your applications being managed and run on the cloud, downtime, failures, and application errors are rare. VMware easily scales up and down to meet your computing needs. The high availability that VMware provides allows your IT staff to focus on other issues and keeps your customers satisfied with the service they receive.
    • Unlimited access to your VMs: VMware’s user-friendly cloud-based interface allows any employee to work from any location at any time.
    • Enhanced security: VMware’s security tools deliver full visibility into your entire system. This keeps your applications and data more secure, in any type of environment. VMware provides multiple protective tools including antiviruses and anti-malware, as well as backup and recovery services.

    VMware vSphere Features

    Below is a list of some of VMware vSphere’s key features:

    • Transferable virtual machine images: Export and import virtual machine images from your local environment. This gives users the ability to set up and configure their systems locally and only upload them to the server once everything is working properly. VM images can be moved back and forth between vendors, ensuring that your company is never tied up to a specific cloud vendor.
    • User-friendly interface: Using VMware’s intuitive console, you can easily create, manage, share, and deploy virtual machines.
    • API integration: VMware’s APIs support integration with third-party applications for data protection, multipathing, and disk array solutions.
    • Distributed power management: Automate efficiency by continuously optimizing server power consumption within each cluster.

    Reviews from Real Users

    VMware vSphere stands out among its competitors for a number of reasons. A few major ones are its virtualization abilities, its flexibility and availability, and its user-friendly interface.

    Felix D., an Automation project administrator, DCS, I&E at Centennial Cayman Corp, writes, “The connectivity is fantastic, and many functions can run together in one server. If you need to scale, we can continue to add components or modules. It's a beautiful virtual solution that has many advantages over physical hardware, where you have to use devices and wiring to connect all your projects.”

    Sample Customers
    U.S. Army Shared Services Center, SoftLayer, Educational Services of America, Independent Bank, and SK Telecom.
    Abu Dhabi Ports Company, ACS, AIA New Zealand, Consona, Corporate Express, CS Energy, and Digiweb.
    Top Industries
    REVIEWERS
    Comms Service Provider17%
    Healthcare Company10%
    Manufacturing Company10%
    Computer Software Company7%
    VISITORS READING REVIEWS
    Educational Organization48%
    Computer Software Company7%
    Comms Service Provider6%
    Government5%
    REVIEWERS
    Financial Services Firm13%
    Energy/Utilities Company10%
    Manufacturing Company7%
    Computer Software Company6%
    VISITORS READING REVIEWS
    Educational Organization26%
    Computer Software Company12%
    Financial Services Firm7%
    Government7%
    Company Size
    REVIEWERS
    Small Business55%
    Midsize Enterprise16%
    Large Enterprise30%
    VISITORS READING REVIEWS
    Small Business16%
    Midsize Enterprise55%
    Large Enterprise30%
    REVIEWERS
    Small Business30%
    Midsize Enterprise25%
    Large Enterprise45%
    VISITORS READING REVIEWS
    Small Business20%
    Midsize Enterprise34%
    Large Enterprise46%
    Buyer's Guide
    Citrix Hypervisor vs. VMware vSphere
    March 2024
    Find out what your peers are saying about Citrix Hypervisor vs. VMware vSphere and other solutions. Updated: March 2024.
    765,234 professionals have used our research since 2012.

    Citrix Hypervisor is ranked 8th in Server Virtualization Software with 45 reviews while VMware vSphere is ranked 2nd in Server Virtualization Software with 443 reviews. Citrix Hypervisor is rated 8.2, while VMware vSphere is rated 8.8. The top reviewer of Citrix Hypervisor writes "Good features, fair pricing, and excellent reliability". On the other hand, the top reviewer of VMware vSphere writes "Allows for easy management of snapshots for virtual machines and good web console ". Citrix Hypervisor is most compared with Proxmox VE, Hyper-V, Oracle VM VirtualBox, KVM and Nutanix AHV Virtualization, whereas VMware vSphere is most compared with Hyper-V, Proxmox VE, VMware Workstation, Oracle VM and IBM PowerVM. See our Citrix Hypervisor vs. VMware vSphere 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.