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Hyper-V vs VMware vSphere comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Jan 12, 2025

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
6.8
Organizations reported significant cost savings and ROI with Hyper-V over VMware, benefiting from included Windows Server licenses.
Sentiment score
7.2
VMware vSphere delivers substantial savings, faster deployment, increased efficiency, and high ROI through reduced hardware and operational costs.
 

Customer Service

Sentiment score
6.7
Hyper-V support quality varies, with first-level mixed and higher levels better; users often rely on personal resources.
Sentiment score
7.2
VMware vSphere's customer service is praised for expertise but criticized for delayed responses and inconsistent lower-tier support quality.
The technical support for Hyper-V is excellent
The technical support is very good
Priority one issues are usually addressed by engineers within one to two hours.
My team solves most tickets, needing support only about once or twice a year.
 

Scalability Issues

Sentiment score
6.4
Hyper-V is considered scalable and effective, though performance varies with architecture planning and hardware compatibility in clusters.
Sentiment score
7.4
VMware vSphere excels in scalability, seamlessly integrating new resources for efficient, robust performance across diverse enterprise environments.
The scalability of Hyper-V is great; I would rate it nine out of ten.
Scaling is easy, whether it is hyperconverged or a three-tier architecture.
 

Stability Issues

Sentiment score
7.5
Hyper-V is generally stable and reliable, with improved performance and security, though some experience occasional I/O instability.
Sentiment score
8.0
VMware vSphere is praised for stability, with issues usually related to hardware and resolvable through patches and maintenance.
Automation is unavailable, and reporting is difficult.
It is a very stable hypervisor solution.
 

Room For Improvement

Hyper-V seeks enhanced third-party integration, simplified management, and improved performance to compete with VMware in virtualization.
VMware vSphere faces criticism for high costs, unresponsive GUI, limited features, poor support, and inadequate security and integration.
All the actions are manual, and if customization is needed, it is difficult with Hyper-V.
Hyper-V should ensure the features of VMware are covered within its platform.
I suggest improvements in platform support and performance considerations for Hyper-V.
Sometimes, it is difficult to find documentation for specific tools and solutions.
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.
 

Setup Cost

Hyper-V is considered cost-effective and flexible, with competitive pricing and potential additional costs for management and features.
VMware vSphere offers stability and robust features but is costly, with complex licensing, especially challenging for smaller organizations.
Hyper-V is completely free and requires no licensing fee.
Until 2019, Hyper-V was a cost-effective solution because it was available as a free product.
Costs significantly increased from perpetual to subscription, with prices rising by two to three times over three to five years.
 

Valuable Features

Hyper-V is valued for cost-effectiveness, scalability, ease of use, and seamless integration with Microsoft solutions and Azure.
VMware vSphere enhances virtualization with seamless VM movement, high availability, resource optimization, scalability, and efficient centralized management, reducing costs.
It is completely free, which is a significant advantage.
I find the quick provision feature in Hyper-V to be extremely helpful.
The most valuable features of Hyper-V include high availability and management for virtual machine management.
The vMotion feature is beneficial for online migration of virtual machines from one host to another without downtime.
The high availability feature is significant.
VMware vCenter is extremely useful as we can manage between 100 and 1,000 hosts using just one management tool.
 

Categories and Ranking

Hyper-V
Ranking in Server Virtualization Software
3rd
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
6.8
Number of Reviews
141
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
VMware vSphere
Ranking in Server Virtualization Software
2nd
Average Rating
8.8
Reviews Sentiment
7.1
Number of Reviews
452
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of January 2025, in the Server Virtualization Software category, the mindshare of Hyper-V is 15.2%, down from 16.6% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of VMware vSphere is 19.4%, up from 18.9% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Server Virtualization Software
 

Q&A Highlights

Julia Miller - PeerSpot reviewer
Jan 05, 2018
 

Featured Reviews

NagendraC - PeerSpot reviewer
Quickly provisions virtual machines with ease and efficiency
I use Hyper-V primarily to create virtual machines (VMs) I find the quick provision feature in Hyper-V to be extremely helpful. Additionally, the ease of setup since we have been using it for a long time also adds value. Hyper-V supports the creation of VMs efficiently. Today, most backup tools…
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

it_user234735 - PeerSpot reviewer
May 10, 2015
Hyper-V 2012 R2 vs. VMware vSphere 5.5
I was won with Hyper-V 2012R2 recently and the table below based on customer RFP (edited). This articles all about technical, there is not related with TCO/ROI, licensing cost, “political”, etc. Another to noted is the Windows Server 2012 licenses is based on 2 socket CPU, meanwhile…
 

Answers from the Community

Julia Miller - PeerSpot reviewer
Jan 5, 2018
Jan 5, 2018
HyperV. I am using HyperV past few years without any problems, before I used VMware. In my last two companies I migrated the infrastructure from VMware to HyperV. One big reason is the cost. VMware is still very expensive. HyperV is coming for free. If you have budget , it is nice to buy system center and then manage it with VMM but if you are too small for System Center you can buy third part...
2 out of 26 answers
it_user84306 - PeerSpot reviewer
Apr 7, 2014
VMware vs Hyper-V ? Both are good, both do exactly what they say they're able to do, both have pros and cons. Which one do I prefer? both and none :), actually being an IT consultant I tend to provide the best solution to our costumers needs, this means for some customers it's VMware, because they have multitudes of servers with linux, specific needs for automation, the IT staff is Linux/Unix world oriented /competent fearless to the black windows (CLI), for other customers Hyper-V would be the perfect fit, because the company has an open software contract with MS, because the admins are Windows SuperHeros and the Darkest Errors logs won't beat them.... Vmware with it's latest release comes with good features, Hyper-V with the release of windows 2012 R2 becomes what they call an "Entreprise Level Product" very mature, stable lots of good functionality etc .
it_user103077 - PeerSpot reviewer
Apr 7, 2014
http://www.infoworld.com/d/virtualization/virtualization-showdown-microsoft-hyper-v-2012-vs-vmware-vsphere-51-217125
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Educational Organization
37%
Computer Software Company
10%
Manufacturing Company
6%
Government
6%
Educational Organization
30%
Computer Software Company
11%
Financial Services Firm
8%
Manufacturing Company
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

How does KVM compare with Hyper-V?
KVM is better. But let's just look at the software instead of judging. Hyper-V was a free solution from Microsoft to virtualize Server or Client OS as it is a feature on Windows Server since 2008 a...
How does Proxmox VE compare with Hyper-V?
One of the best things about Proxmox VE is that it is open-source and very inexpensive. You get all of the same features as with the more well-known products. Proxmox VE is very easy to deploy - it...
What do you like most about Hyper-V?
The initial setup is not difficult at all. It is very easy.
What is IOMMU?
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 pr...
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 and Windows. For us, VMware does not offer any advantage. Moreover, KVM is free.
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 interface that allows you to talk directly to your VM from the present software. We fou...
 

Comparisons

 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Large customer base from all industries, all over the world. Two major Hyper-V customers are Telefonica and EmpireCLS.
Abu Dhabi Ports Company, ACS, AIA New Zealand, Consona, Corporate Express, CS Energy, and Digiweb.
Find out what your peers are saying about Hyper-V vs. VMware vSphere and other solutions. Updated: January 2025.
831,481 professionals have used our research since 2012.