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Citrix XenServer vs Oracle VM VirtualBox vs VMware vSphere comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive Summary

Review summaries and opinions

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:
 

ROI

Sentiment score
5.3
Citrix XenServer is praised for reducing costs and enhancing efficiency through virtualization, offering stability and effective management features.
Sentiment score
5.3
Oracle VM VirtualBox offers quick ROI by reducing costs and streamlining processes, with users reporting high satisfaction and time savings.
Sentiment score
7.1
VMware vSphere increases ROI by reducing server needs, costs, and deployment time, improving efficiency and hardware utilization.
My clients generally maintain their Citrix infrastructure without shifting, suggesting stability and reliable operation as Citrix XenServer is fully established.
I did not perform any long-term stress tests, just for a couple of hours or days on every application.
We can say 10% is the approximate amount of savings because most of the things are automated and streamlined, so the manual work is eliminated in most cases.
 

Customer Service

Sentiment score
3.9
Citrix XenServer support ranges in effectiveness, with concerns about response speed and access, often relying on community channels.
Sentiment score
7.7
VirtualBox users prefer online documentation and community support over Oracle's support, which is seen as capable but slow.
Sentiment score
6.8
VMware vSphere support is efficient and knowledgeable, though delays occur for low-priority issues; community forums provide additional help.
With valid licenses, we can access hotfixes, service packs, knowledge base, self-help tools, diagnostics, downloads, live chat, and phone support.
They do not provide adequate support for midsize businesses.
There appear to be very few engineers at Citrix who understand the problems.
Their forum and documentation is more than enough for technical support.
Priority one issues are usually addressed by engineers within one to two hours.
Recently, support has been less friendly and slower, especially after the company was acquired by Broadcom.
If we have issues, the support tends to be unreliable
 

Scalability Issues

Sentiment score
6.5
Citrix XenServer is highly scalable, easily integrates new hosts, and effectively manages virtualization with minor disk management concerns.
Sentiment score
7.2
Oracle VM VirtualBox is valued for scalable environments, though hardware limitations and memory overhead can impede performance.
Sentiment score
7.4
VMware vSphere is praised for its scalable architecture, allowing efficient expansion with minimal downtime, despite potential hardware and licensing issues.
Familiarity with Linux can enhance its performance and usability.
Scaling is easy, whether it is hyperconverged or a three-tier architecture.
VMware vSphere is highly scalable in terms of the number of users and the number of servers it can handle.
It is a highly scalable solution.
 

Stability Issues

Sentiment score
7.5
Citrix XenServer is stable and reliable, praised for minimal issues, good support, and consistent updates by users.
Sentiment score
7.1
Oracle VM VirtualBox is generally stable but faces occasional issues, especially on Windows, rated around eight for stability.
Sentiment score
7.9
VMware vSphere is highly stable and reliable, with minimal downtime and strong performance, widely regarded as a robust platform.
I haven't had any significant issues with Citrix XenServer installations over the last 10-15 years.
The snapshot functionality in Oracle VM VirtualBox is effective for management purposes.
It is a very stable hypervisor solution.
While they are generally stable, if outages occur, they tend to be due to brands like HP or Dell, not VMware vSphere itself.
I would rate the stability of VMware vSphere as eight out of ten.
 

Room For Improvement

Citrix XenServer needs improved backup, storage, Linux support, UI, multi-language, third-party integration, and lower licensing for better accessibility.
Oracle VM VirtualBox users desire better networking, stability, resource management, and enhanced integration with diverse hardware and remote solutions.
VMware vSphere's cost, stability, integration, and usability issues lead organizations to consider alternatives and seek improved solutions.
Although the product is technically competitive, it is not widely known or used due to poor marketing.
Citrix needs to improve the hypervisor, specifically in security and performance.
We can implement high availability and live migration with pools, along with security and backup to enable role-based access control for safer management.
Having some kind of API to maintain Oracle VM VirtualBox would be beneficial.
The cost changed from perpetual to subscription, and there is a need for alternative solutions.
Another area is the stability during upgrades from older versions to newer versions, where we face issues.
Sometimes, it is difficult to find documentation for specific tools and solutions.
 

Setup Cost

Citrix XenServer offers cost-effective licensing with strong support, making it a popular low-cost alternative to VMware.
Oracle VM VirtualBox provides a free version popular for cost-effectiveness, with enterprise licensing seen as expensive by some.
VMware vSphere is reliable, but its high pricing and complex licensing can challenge budget-conscious enterprises compared to competitors.
It is cheaper compared to its competitors.
Organizations save substantial money because competing solutions, such as VMware, cost double or triple.
The pricing and licensing policy of Citrix XenServer is not transparent and quite confusing.
In the enterprise scenario, all software solutions, including Oracle VM VirtualBox, are expensive.
Many customers are trying to avoid it due to its high cost.
Costs significantly increased from perpetual to subscription, with prices rising by two to three times over three to five years.
The solution is too expensive.
 

Valuable Features

Citrix XenServer is a secure, cost-effective virtualization platform offering user-friendly, efficient resource management with robust features and scalability.
Oracle VM VirtualBox is free, versatile, and easy to use, ideal for testing, education, and stable multi-platform virtualization.
VMware vSphere provides efficient virtualization with high availability, scalability, and robust performance, enhancing agility and minimizing downtime.
The most valuable feature is transferring and sharing applications that allow users to move files between devices, including smartphones, tablets, and computers without needing USB cables, internet connections, or data usage.
It provides secure access to applications and resources, which is crucial for us and our clients.
It is user-friendly and easy to deploy, making it an attractive option.
Its snapshot functionality helps with backup management.
The guest OS compatibility was tremendous because I used Oracle VM VirtualBox on Linux and ran Windows applications on top of that, working seamlessly.
The vMotion feature is beneficial for online migration of virtual machines from one host to another without downtime.
The tool is highly available, which is crucial for implementing critical applications requiring 24/7 availability.
The high availability feature is significant.
 

Mindshare comparison

As of September 2025, in the Server Virtualization Software category, the mindshare of Citrix XenServer is 4.8%, up from 4.6% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Oracle VM VirtualBox is 6.1%, down from 9.4% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of VMware vSphere is 16.5%, down from 19.8% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Server Virtualization Software Market Share Distribution
ProductMarket Share (%)
VMware vSphere16.5%
Oracle VM VirtualBox6.1%
Citrix XenServer4.8%
Other72.6%
Server Virtualization Software
 

Featured Reviews

Jörg Köhler - PeerSpot reviewer
Consulting benefits from robust consulting while also recognizing the need for improved disk management
When it comes to optimization, that's one of the weaker points of Citrix XenServer, especially regarding disk management, which is somewhat clumsy. Backup-related issues and disk management should be improved. Especially concerning backup, as discussions with Veeam engineers about Citrix XenServer backup strategy indicate there might not be a solution from Veeam soon. License optimization is not such a significant problem, but licenses are quite complicated. Vendors constantly invent new license models, making it difficult to order the correct licenses needed. There is not a big difference between Citrix and VMware products because Citrix can implement Windows and Linux anyway.
Tanvir Siddique - PeerSpot reviewer
Easily accesses open solutions with seamless compatibility for testing and development
The most valuable feature is the seamlessness. When I install a Linux operating system, I can use Windows applications through Oracle VM VirtualBox seamlessly. There are many applications that work only on Windows. For desktop testing purposes, I used Oracle VM VirtualBox, and it works fine. The guest OS compatibility was tremendous because I used Oracle VM VirtualBox on Linux and ran Windows applications on top of that, working seamlessly.
Neeraj Mehra - PeerSpot reviewer
Streamlines virtualization and has features like high availability and vMotion
The primary use case is for virtualization, including the implementation of vSphere, vCloud Foundation, vCloud Director, and cloud automation with vSphere My customers, particularly SMBs, mainly utilize High Availability (HA), DRS, and vMotion features. The vMotion feature is beneficial for…
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Comparison Review

VL
Jan 13, 2015
vSphere vs. RHEV vs. Hyper-V vs. XenServer
We have used the following functions: 1. Hypervisor: to ensure that the virtual server provide web and email services to the company, thus providing a stable operation a with single sign-on integration of an AD server and vCenter. 2. Network and Storage: centralized data server…
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
14%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Comms Service Provider
8%
Financial Services Firm
8%
Computer Software Company
16%
Comms Service Provider
13%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Educational Organization
8%
Computer Software Company
14%
Financial Services Firm
11%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Government
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business29
Midsize Enterprise8
Large Enterprise18
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business32
Midsize Enterprise20
Large Enterprise17
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business173
Midsize Enterprise137
Large Enterprise256
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about Citrix Hypervisor?
The core function enables multiple virtual machines to run on a single physical server. This maximizes hardware utili...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Citrix Hypervisor?
Licensing with Citrix XenServer is very cost-effective. Organizations save substantial money because competing soluti...
What needs improvement with Citrix Hypervisor?
I would say I would need a self-service portal as an additional feature to see in the future to make it even better.
How does KVM compare to Oracle VM VirtualBox?
KVM is easy to use, stable and flexible. It is mature and very fast. It is an affordable open-source solution that is...
What do you like most about Oracle VM VirtualBox?
The product’s most valuable feature is the ability to manage multiple operating systems through one application.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Oracle VM VirtualBox?
Maintenance is not necessary because I did not use it for heavy loads.
What is IOMMU?
DEEPEN DHULLA did explain well IOMMU. IOMMU has to be activated at the bios level. It exists on Intel and AMD platfor...
Why KVM??? Help please!
We use VMware and KVM. We find that KVM is a lot simpler to use and it provides the virtualization we need for Linux...
What is the biggest difference between Nutanix Acropolis and VMware vSphere?
We found the reduced power consumption with Nutanix Acropolis AOS a very attractive feature. We also like the interfa...
 

Also Known As

Hypervisor
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Overview

 

Sample Customers

U.S. Army Shared Services Center, SoftLayer, Educational Services of America, Independent Bank, and SK Telecom.
Airbus, Colorado State University, SCS Africa, Wolf Medical Systems.
Abu Dhabi Ports Company, ACS, AIA New Zealand, Consona, Corporate Express, CS Energy, and Digiweb.
Find out what your peers are saying about Proxmox, VMware, Microsoft and others in Server Virtualization Software. Updated: September 2025.
868,229 professionals have used our research since 2012.