CloudStack vs VMware Aria Operations comparison

Apache and Broadcom are both solutions in the Cloud Management category. Apache is ranked #7 with an average rating of 8.2, while Broadcom is ranked #1 with an average rating of 8.6. Apache holds a 2.1% mindshare in CM, compared to Broadcom’s 3.7% mindshare. Additionally, 94% of Apache users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 94% of Broadcom users who would recommend it.

CloudStack

Read 34 CloudStack reviews

3,636 Views
3,491 Comparison Views

94% willing to recommend

VMware Aria Operations

Read 376 VMware Aria Operations reviews

16,724 Views
11,038 Comparison Views

94% willing to recommend

CloudStack

VMware Aria Operations

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Executive SummaryUpdated on Dec 17, 2024

VMware Aria Operations and CloudStack both compete in the cloud management and virtualization domain. VMware Aria Operations seems to have the upper hand with its intensive monitoring and predictive analytics, which provides a proactive approach to IT management.

Features: VMware Aria Operations offers robust monitoring and management tools that allow users to collect data and use real-time analytics to adjust policies for optimized performance. Its dynamic thresholding and predictive analytics help anticipate and mitigate potential issues. CloudStack provides strong multi-hypervisor support and scalability, catering to diverse cloud environments. Its API integration facilitates diverse operations and supports different hypervisors efficiently.

Room for Improvement: VMware Aria Operations could enhance its usability by simplifying the interface and improving third-party tool integration. Users suggest the need for more intuitive reporting and automation features, along with expanded documentation for customizations. CloudStack users recommend interface improvements and enhanced documentation to better address integration capabilities and user feedback during deployment.

Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: VMware Aria Operations supports both on-premises and hybrid cloud environments, presenting users with flexible deployment choices. It generally receives positive feedback for customer service, though technical support experiences may vary. CloudStack also benefits from a strong community support structure and offers several deployment models, including public cloud capabilities, although professional support could be expanded for complex setups.

Pricing and ROI: VMware Aria Operations can be expensive, particularly for large deployments, but it promises a strong return on investment by optimizing operational efficiency and minimizing downtime. Licensing options are varied and should be closely aligned with business needs. As an open-source platform, CloudStack eliminates licensing fees, presenting a cost advantage, though there might be expenses related to dedicated support and additional features. This flexibility and cost-effectiveness make it appealing for organizations aiming to manage expenses.

To learn more, read our detailed CloudStack vs. VMware Aria Operations Report (Updated: August 2026).

Buyer's Guide

CloudStack vs. VMware Aria Operations

August 2026

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Review summaries and opinions

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

Categories and Ranking

CloudStack

Ranking in Cloud Management

7th

Average Rating

8.0

Reviews Sentiment

6.5

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

No ranking in other categories

VMware Aria Operations

Ranking in Cloud Management

1st

Average Rating

8.2

Reviews Sentiment

6.9

Number of Reviews

376

Ranking in other categories

Virtualization Management Tools (1st)

Mindshare comparison

As of August 2026, in the Cloud Management category, the mindshare of CloudStack is 2.1%, down from 4.7% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of VMware Aria Operations is 3.7%, down from 7.4% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

Cloud Management Mindshare Distribution
Product	Mindshare (%)
VMware Aria Operations	3.7%
CloudStack	2.1%
Other	94.2%

Cloud Management

Featured Reviews

Tharun Kumar Reddy Thamatam

Senior Infrastructure Consultant at Infosys

Achieving seamless infrastructure management with optimized network and user access controls

I believe enhancements could be made in CloudStack, particularly in the management servers. I had the opportunity to collaborate with one of the Apache CloudStack developers, leading to the installation of additional agents for better information retrieval from hypervisors. We implemented configurations, ensuring consistency across hosts and VMs. We also utilized Ansible or YAML files to automate password upgrades during patching activities and database management, showcasing our customization efforts for improvement. For future releases, it would be beneficial if Apache enhanced CloudStack by integrating alerting systems directly. We've had instances where hypervisors experienced overloads without prior alerts, so proactive alerts within the tool would better prepare us for addressing issues swiftly, preventing disruption in business operations. A portal summarizing system metrics alongside alert capabilities would greatly enhance our operational efficiency.

Read full review

AldoDomini

Senior System Network Analyst at Net spa

Have faced limitations due to high costs but have maintained reliability over time

The primary issue is the pricing, which is very expensive for my company's budget. We cannot afford to pay such a large fee. We are not Microsoft or BMW; we are a small company. As a small company, I have no power to negotiate directly with VMware. Perhaps larger companies have more opportunity to contract directly with VMware, but I do not have that leverage. The only path I can follow is to change solutions. Net.spA is a company working in the field of waste management. We are not a technological company, so we do not have a large margin to justify purchasing and maintaining the VMware infrastructure at current costs.

Read full review

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"Multiple types of hypervisor support, multi-zone support, and VPC are great valuable features."

"The API with CloudStack made integration into various external facing web applications simple enough."

"The initial implementation process was quite good."

"We like the virtualization capabilities."

"It is very easy to install and manage. It has the all modules in one node, unlike other software (OpenStack). The product allows a customized look and feel, and the ability to add custom workflows."

"You can manage infrastructure with a few people, since product is monolithic. We had three engineers (storage, virtual, Linux admins) only. Also, CS supports different flavours of hypervisors."

"CloudStack supports every operating system that supports hypervisors, which makes the product more attractive, compared to vCloud Director or Azure."

"CloudStack, by default, gives us a zone-based setup which makes it easier to manage datacenters located in different geographical areas."

More CloudStack pros

"We've been able to reclaim capacity by using data from vROps, so that's been very helpful."

"It has great charts and graphs which provide a high level overview of our environment. Being able to click through those to deep dive, we can easily get to the information that we are looking for."

"One of the most valuable features is the ability to compare between AWS/Azure and the local cloud. When customers deploy something on the local cloud, with the same configuration that would apply to AWS or Azure, we can calculate the estimated cost difference between the local cloud and the public cloud. We do this kind of analysis for optimization and it is one of the best features of vROps."

"It gives us a single pane of glass to be able to look into our environment and find what the problems are."

"I completely recommend vROps to other users as it will make their lives much easier."

"The most valuable feature for me that the pre-implemented, existing dashboards. The fact that I don't need to create a dashboard myself is helpful"

"From a troubleshooting standpoint, beforehand it took us a lot of time to actually go into esxtop, pull the actual raw data that was actually happening from a storage level, a network level, a CPU/VCPU and memory level. But having all of these resources at our fingertips, from a graphical user interface, we can pinpoint the pitfall very easily"

"We've explored a number of products. We've used SolarWinds and their VMWare add-ons. But to be able to actually see what our infrastructure does, vRealize Operations Manager has been the closest match as part of our Enterprise agreement."

More VMware Aria Operations pros

Cons

"My teammates have complained about the upgrade. The source code had massive files that had to be merged with our own development to upgrade to the latest version of CloudStack. It was quite painful for them. CloudStack could add some cost management tools to give me some control over the costs associated with the number of users of my services."

"The product has evolved a lot since the first versions in which it was very complicated to do version updates, and had various problems."

"We recognize that CloudStack is an easy-to-use cloud management platform and, in my opinion, there has been a large number of improvements in the past few years, particular when it comes to the modern UI and overall ease of management. However, I believe that CloudStack needs to grow their marketing in the commercial side. They don't have a great piece of market share right now."

"This product needs a lot improvement on the development side. Every new version introduces new bugs. It lacks many features needed for NFV like DPDK, SR-IOV support, etc."

"With all that simplicity come limitations that need to be understood and planned for: Accounts, domains, and user accounts are set up with public cloud in mind, not private."

"More integration with third-party products (we know that OpenStack has a better level of integration)."

"The product does not have an easily implementable payment gateway."

"The area of improvement could be the regionalization aspect. For example, managing multiple regions or HubStack deployments together was not thought out thoroughly in the versions I used. We faced issues around managing the global infrastructure and had to develop around it."

More CloudStack cons

"The dashboard which provides the information; if it could be like Salesforce, that kind of dashboard."

"If this tool can integrate with other products, for example, those that monitor the network devices or any other storage devices, it will be very beneficial."

"Also, it is very CPU intensive."

"We've run into some small issues with our storage, but I don't believe it's because of the storage."

"The password changes: One of the drawbacks I hear from the portability side is the number of passwords it takes to keep it up and running."

"The only concern that we do have, at times, is the availability of that support."

"The only thing is, we're on Essentials Plus. There are some things we want to do that that particular version of the license will not allow, so we would need to upgrade to a higher one."

"I want vROps to have wider compatibility with older hardware."

More VMware Aria Operations cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The solution is open-source and free."

"The Apache CloudStack is open source, so you do not have licenses to purchase."

"It is a 100% open-source solution needing just an Apache license. Also, there are no hidden fees to be paid."

"CloudStack is an open-source product."

"CloudStack is an open source solution, so you don't need to pay anything for it. When our company develops something specially for CloudStack, it is donated to the Apache Software Foundation and provided to anyone that wants to use it."

"There is no license, so the product is free unless you are buying professional technical support services."

"Give an effort to planning. If possible, contract a specialized consultant company for the initial setup and knowledge transfer."

"As far as I know, CS is still free of charge. If you want to pay some money, Citrix Cloud Platform is based on CS, I think. As for hypervisors – everything as usual, you need to pay for VMware and vCenter. As for XenServer, recently they changed the free feature list, so you may need to pay some money to get useful features like XenMotion."

"It was cost effective, because it fixed our problems."

"Pricing is good for us. We're non-profit so we get a break on that."

"There has been a bit of cost savings in that we could decide to move workloads around a bit better."

"Don't overallocate! This means that you don't have to buy many hosts. You can save money that way."

"I would give the solution a three out of five, with one being cheap and five being expensive. There are some elements of the pricing that are good, and some areas where I feel like I'm being charged for something the product can't provide yet."

"In terms of the pricing for VMware vRealize Operations (vROps), I can't remember exactly how much it costs, but it was included in the VMware vSphere enterprise plus licensing package my company paid for."

"The solution has helped to reduce the time to troubleshoot issues."

"We have licenses on a three year basis. Licensing costs are much higher, but given the stability of the solution, it is a reasonable price."

More VMware Aria Operations pricing and cost advice

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Construction Company

Outsourcing Company

Comms Service Provider

Manufacturing Company

Construction Company

13%

Financial Services Firm

10%

Manufacturing Company

Outsourcing Company

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	13
Midsize Enterprise	6
Large Enterprise	12

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	66
Midsize Enterprise	61
Large Enterprise	281

Questions from the Community

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for CloudStack?

CloudStack is open-source, so there is no cost apart from learning. Billing solutions, if outsourced, come at a moderate cost.

See all answers

What needs improvement with CloudStack?

Enhancements for CloudStack can focus on integrating more hypervisors, as mentioned regarding current features. We're working on a new feature that will allow for certain limited functions, but ove...

See all answers

What is your primary use case for CloudStack?

My usual use cases for CloudStack involve an AWS style private cloud or public cloud. I can deploy an AWS style cloud using the open source tool that is CloudStack. The use case depends on the cust...

See all answers

What's the difference between VMware vRA (automation) and vROps (operations)?

vROP is a virtualization management solution from VMWare. It is efficient and easy to manage. You can find anything you need from the software interface. It provides complete visibility over applic...

See all answers

Is VMware Aria Operations a user friendly solution?

In terms of user-friendliness, VMware Aria Operations is one of the best solutions out there. It is not overly complex to set up and you can rely on the technical support to provide you with assis...

See all answers

What is the most useful new feature of VMware Aria Operations?

For me, the alerts features are the most unique part of this product, no matter the current name it uses. When they introduced the new version of VMware Aria Operations, they also introduced more a...

See all answers

Comparisons

OpenNebula vs CloudStack

Compared 11% of the time

VMware Aria Automation vs CloudStack

Compared 9% of the time

Turbo360 (Formerly Serverless360) vs CloudStack

Compared 6% of the time

Sangfor HCI - Hyper Converged Infrastructure vs CloudStack

Compared 5% of the time

IBM Turbonomic vs CloudStack

Compared 3% of the time

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SolarWinds Virtualization Manager vs VMware Aria Operations

Compared 7% of the time

IBM Turbonomic vs VMware Aria Operations

Compared 7% of the time

VMware Aria Automation vs VMware Aria Operations

Compared 5% of the time

Nutanix Cloud Manager (NCM) vs VMware Aria Operations

Compared 5% of the time

Densify vs VMware Aria Operations

Compared 4% of the time

More VMware Aria Operations Competitors

Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

CloudStack

August 2026

Download CloudStack product report

Buyer's Guide

VMware Aria Operations

July 2026

Download VMware Aria Operations product report

Also Known As

Vmops, Cloud.com

VMware vRealize Operations (vROps), vCenter Operations Manager (VCOPS)

Overview

CloudStack offers an easy-to-manage platform compatible with multiple hypervisors, enabling seamless networking and efficient workload scaling. Its advanced APIs and open-source nature facilitate automation and customization, making it ideal for extensive cloud environments.

CloudStack is recognized for ease of setup, robust networking, and hypervisor compatibility. Supporting a range of workloads, it scales efficiently, offering flexible features like VM migration, private networking, and multi-zone support. Its user-friendly open-source design aids troubleshooting and customization, making it ideal for managing broad cloud deployments. Despite needing upgrades in interface and integration with third-party vendors and container technology, CloudStack remains a strong choice for businesses seeking effective virtualization solutions. Improvements in documentation, regional management, and emerging tech support would enhance usability and performance.

What are CloudStack's notable features?

Hypervisor compatibility: Supports diverse virtualization technologies for flexible deployment.
Robust networking: Ensures reliable and scalable network infrastructure management across zones.
Advanced APIs: Facilitates automation and integration to streamline cloud operations.
VM migration: Enhances operational flexibility with seamless virtual machine relocations.
Private networking: Provides secure and isolated network environments for critical tasks.
Multi-zone support: Offers scalable solutions for distributed cloud management.

What benefits and ROI should users consider?

Open-source model: Allows extensive customization without licensing costs, enhancing ROI.
Ease of management: Simplifies operations, reducing time and resources spent on maintenance.
Scalability: Enables growth and adaptability, fostering agility in expanding businesses.
Flexibility: Supports various workloads and environments, meeting diverse operational needs.

CloudStack is implemented across industries, used in managing virtual environments, offering IaaS in public, private, and hybrid cloud models. Companies use it for internal virtualization and customer service, integrating with hypervisors across data centers to orchestrate virtual machines and support development and testing globally.

Apache

VMware Aria Operations provides detailed metrics, graphing capabilities, and historical data for proactive infrastructure management, offering a single pane of glass for comprehensive views, alert notifications, and seamless integration with VMware tools.

VMware Aria Operations is designed for monitoring and optimizing virtual environments, empowering businesses to enhance infrastructure efficiency and manage workloads. With stress ratings and capacity planning, it facilitates troubleshooting performance issues while forecasting resource needs. Automation and integration with VMware tools streamline operations, making it indispensable for maintaining system health and enabling data-driven decisions. Users appreciate its comprehensive infrastructure views, though they note the interface complexity and high pricing as key considerations. Improved automation, third-party integration, and usability are desired enhancements.

What are the key features of VMware Aria Operations?

Single Pane of Glass: Provides comprehensive views of infrastructure for easy management.
Performance Monitoring: Tracks performance with detailed metrics and trend analysis.
Capacity Planning: Offers insights into stress ratings and future resource needs.
Alert Notifications: Effectively notifies users of potential system issues.
Automation and Integration: Streamlines operations with VMware tools.

What benefits should users consider in reviews?

Infrastructure Efficiency: Ensures optimal use of virtual environments for effective workload management.
Operational Visibility: Improves decision-making with detailed insights and analytics.
Resource Optimization: Helps forecast and allocate resources efficiently.
Proactive Management: Facilitates early detection of issues to maintain system health.

VMware Aria Operations' implementation across industries like finance, healthcare, and education showcases its utility in maintaining operational efficiency. It aids in tracking usage metrics and integrating workflows, benefiting sectors with critical performance and resource management needs.

Broadcom

Sample Customers

GreenQloud, Exoscale, TomTom, ASG, PC Extreme, ISWest, Grid'5000

Science Applications International Corporation, Tribune Media, Heartland Payment Systems, Telkom Indonesia, Columbia Sportswear, iGATE, CSS Corp, Angel Broking, Adira Finance, Hipskind, Beiersdorf Shared Services, Innovate Mas Indonesia, Adobe, Cleveland Clinic Abu Dhabi , Join Experience S.A, Borusan Holdings, Department of Transport - Abu Dhabi

Buyer's Guide

CloudStack vs. VMware Aria Operations

August 2026

Free Report: CloudStack vs. VMware Aria Operations

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