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Oracle VM VirtualBox vs RHEV comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Nov 6, 2024

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

Oracle VM VirtualBox
Ranking in Server Virtualization Software
12th
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
7.1
Number of Reviews
65
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
RHEV
Ranking in Server Virtualization Software
13th
Average Rating
7.8
Reviews Sentiment
6.3
Number of Reviews
37
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of May 2026, in the Server Virtualization Software category, the mindshare of Oracle VM VirtualBox is 6.0%, down from 6.8% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of RHEV is 2.4%, down from 3.6% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Server Virtualization Software Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Oracle VM VirtualBox6.0%
RHEV2.4%
Other91.6%
Server Virtualization Software
 

Featured Reviews

Tanvir Siddique - PeerSpot reviewer
Technical Officer at ADN Telecom
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.
Mike Neuliep - PeerSpot reviewer
Linux Systems Engineer at a tech services company with 10,001+ employees
Has supported virtualization projects in side jobs but has required workarounds due to lack of maintenance
In my opinion, the best features of RHEV are that it is a real hypervisor and it is free, so it performs better than VMware. I have used the live migration feature in the past with RHEV. There is a free clone of it that is based on the open source. Live migration is a nifty feature if your app is not highly available and you need to do maintenance on a machine. You can migrate the VM off of it, do your maintenance, and move it back when you are done. RHEV has a high availability architecture with a built-in monitoring feature where you could see machines other than the one you are operating on. I tend to implement high availability not so much in RHEV, but by using standard application high availability strategies. Red Hat has another product specifically for high availability.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"I think VirtualBox has good stability because I use it in an environment with several resolutions, and I am able to run several guest environments on one node."
"Oracle VM VirtualBox is easy to install and easy to use."
"Our Return on Investment has been excellent."
"This solution creates a snapshot of virtual machines so you can create test environments."
"It's very simple to use."
"The product’s most valuable feature is the ability to manage multiple operating systems through one application."
"Automatic mirroring/backup using snapshots on the runtime can minimize the number of fail-recovery procedures and down time overall."
"The solution's most valuable feature is the fact that it's enterprise based, especially the virtualization platform."
"It is easy to deal with when comes to application migration and its compatibility with the multiple component applications."
"The solution makes migration easy."
"In my opinion, the best features of RHEV are that it is a real hypervisor and it is free, so it performs better than VMware."
"RHEV’s cost is much less compared to VMware."
"Customers are moving to open source and Red Hat is the leader in this particular space. I think customers feel more confident running Red Hat Virtualization than VMware."
"Whenever there's an issue or problem, I contact customer support and they take it seriously."
"The initial setup is fairly straightforward and well-documented. The process is very similar to its competitors. The success of your setup depends on how well you plan."
"We are very satisfied with it."
 

Cons

"I find the solution to be incredibly unstable, constantly falling over and not working properly."
"Sometimes on the Windows version, the product hangs for reasons unknown, but the Linux version is very stable."
"For some Linux distributions, I had a high CPU utilization when running Oracle VM Virtualbox."
"The solution needs to improve the methods used for starting and stopping the machine."
"It could improve slightly with enhanced reporting capabilities that show the current status of the network."
"Oracle’s support team should improve its response time."
"The user interface needs to be improved."
"They could improve the graphics functionality of the product."
"The GUI interface needs improvement. Not 90%, but 50% or 60% of the work is done from the command line and so on, so the GUI needs work because people are looking for an easier way to manage the environment."
"This solution could be more secure."
"Customers are not aware of this solution, they can improve by providing more awareness and solution availability."
"My teammates and I often complain that VMware is well-documented and has a large community since it is the de facto standard. I would love to see better documentation and ease of use."
"RHEV is not improving because it has been discontinued. It has been discontinued for years."
"It lags behind in that you need to go to something like Fedora to get all the extra bells and whistles."
"We would like the dashboard feature of this solution to be improved, as it is not very detailed at present."
"Scalability depends on the applications. Red Hat by itself is not scalable."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Available for free use"
"The tool is not as expensive as other products."
"The solution is free."
"Price wise, Oracle VM VirtualBox is a six on a scale from one to ten."
"It is pretty good for the price, which is free."
"There are no licensing fees."
"The license I use is free."
"This is an open-source product and it can be used free of charge."
"We buy a license for commercial use, and we also use the free editions."
"This product has a variety of licensing options available. However, the level of licensing, and therefore the cost of licensing, is dependent on the number of servers being utilized."
"RHEV offers pricing based on a per-physical-machine licensing model."
"It's a budget product as far as I'm concerned. It's way cheaper than any of its competitors. The only thing cheaper than Red Hat is that the people who take the Red Hat code clone it and then self-support it."
"We have to pay extra for vulnerability and fault tolerance."
"Its price depends on the use cases."
"The solution does not require licencing but a subscription is necessary, which is very affordable."
"This is an open-source solution."
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Comparison Review

VL
CIO at Robusta Technology & Training
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
Comms Service Provider
16%
Computer Software Company
9%
Financial Services Firm
8%
Manufacturing Company
7%
Financial Services Firm
12%
Computer Software Company
10%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Comms Service Provider
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business32
Midsize Enterprise20
Large Enterprise17
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business21
Midsize Enterprise5
Large Enterprise12
 

Questions from the Community

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 easy to set up and manage. It offers very good security. It has a virtual manag...
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 needs improvement with Oracle VM VirtualBox?
If there were more API access so that I could run it headlessly, similar to Proxmox where I can use API, it would be useful. Having some kind of API to maintain Oracle VM VirtualBox would be benefi...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for RHEV?
It's the open source. There's not much cost. It's very minimal comparably. Compared to what I am paying for VMware, it's negligible.
What needs improvement with RHEV?
RHEV is not improving because it has been discontinued. It has been discontinued for years. I would love to get back into RHEV, but the job market is difficult and no one is hiring. RHEV is designe...
What is your primary use case for RHEV?
I have done some consulting where I used RHEV, taking on side jobs to run virtual machines in the financial industry for a startup. The last time I used RHEV was in my home lab, but that has been d...
 

Comparisons

 

Also Known As

No data available
Red Hat Enterprise Virtualization
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Airbus, Colorado State University, SCS Africa, Wolf Medical Systems.
Qualcomm and Bonham's Auction House.
Find out what your peers are saying about Oracle VM VirtualBox vs. RHEV and other solutions. Updated: April 2026.
892,943 professionals have used our research since 2012.