We performed a comparison between KVM and VMware VSphere based on our users’ reviews in five categories. After reading all of the collected data, you can find our conclusion below.
Comparison Results: VMware VSphere is the winner in this comparison. It is a powerful solution with good customer support and a proven ROI. It is, however, more expensive.
"The key aspect is that the KVM directly interacts with the Kronos. There's no clear indication of indirect communication with Kronos. It is not linked to Kronos, and interaction is straightforward without any intermediaries."
"KVM has a rich options set which can be directly used or via wrappers, such as libvirt."
"The product is really good...One can get good performance because of kernel-based virtualization."
"If you prefer command-line, there are all kinds of command-line options."
"I like that this is an open-source solution. It is very powerful, and it's easy."
"Scaling the solution is easy. You just have to add more hardware."
"The product's scalability is good...It's a very stable product."
"KVM is stable."
"I find that the Virtual Center Management, iSCSI support, and VMotion hot migration are very beneficial."
"VMware vSphere allows you to run multiple virtual machines."
"Virtualization, VDI and application publishing are the most valuable features of VMware vSphere."
"It is easy to maintain our data machines and take snapshots with the solution."
"VMware vSphere is easy to scale. We haven't had any problems scaling what we're scaling now."
"The virtualization is set by itself. vSphere is the best way to have a non-host based fixed solution. We always try to find an agnostic environment where we can restore agnostics or just say, "I need resources, capacity." That's why VMware vSphere in particular, has been the best in the past but now also with the evolution of their product. Nowadays, you don't have to use any STEM infrastructure anymore because the bandwidth and the land speeds are getting steeper."
"The enterprise direction is very complete and the data center provides almost everything you need."
"VMware vSphere has plenty of features."
"There are some issues with the graphics and some software that is very complex."
"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."
"We are not getting good support from KVM, and it is not that user-friendly."
"Technical support could be better. In the next release, I would like to see an improved user interface and dashboard. This type of improvement will make it easy or help our engineers understand the solution from a requirement point of view."
"The stability of this solution is less than other products in the same category."
"In KVM, snapshots and cloning are areas where there could be a little more sophistication, like VMware."
"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."
"The grid interface of KVM needs improvement. It could be more beautiful, especially when compared to VMware."
"The technical support could improve by being a little faster."
"It would be nice to see it a little more tightly integrated with the patching solution so you could do it in one pane of glass. Right now, you have to jump back and forth. It's still not difficult, but you have to jump back and forth to do your update definitions and then go back and actually do the updates themselves."
"Technical support could be faster in terms of response times."
"In the past, little changes have broken things in vSphere. Going from 6.0, which worked perfectly fine on the Mac Pro, there were certain changes in hardware drivers, when 6.5 came out. Some were no longer present or had been deprecated. As a result, it didn't work on the Mac Pro anymore, which was business critical."
"The only improvement that is needed that come to mind are improvements in the vRealize Automation and vRealize Operations management simplicity."
"I would like to see the UI incorporating all of the functionality that the thick client had."
"In the next release, I would love to have Java as a service, platform as a service, and container as a service."
"The biggest room for improvement would be just simplicity. It is very intuitive, but it needs somebody with a lot of IT background."
KVM is ranked 4th in Server Virtualization Software with 38 reviews while VMware vSphere is ranked 2nd in Server Virtualization Software with 443 reviews. KVM is rated 8.0, while VMware vSphere is rated 8.8. The top reviewer of KVM writes "Delivers good performance because of kernel-based virtualization". On the other hand, the top reviewer of VMware vSphere writes "Allows for easy management of snapshots for virtual machines and good web console ". KVM is most compared with Proxmox VE, Oracle VM VirtualBox, Hyper-V, VMware Workstation and Oracle VM, whereas VMware vSphere is most compared with Hyper-V, Proxmox VE, VMware Workstation, Oracle VM and Nutanix AHV Virtualization. See our KVM vs. VMware vSphere report.
See our list of best Server Virtualization Software vendors.
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