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Oracle VM VirtualBox vs RHEV comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Jun 3, 2026

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 June 2026, in the Server Virtualization Software category, the mindshare of Oracle VM VirtualBox is 6.3%, down from 6.5% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of RHEV is 2.4%, down from 3.7% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Server Virtualization Software Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Oracle VM VirtualBox6.3%
RHEV2.4%
Other91.3%
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

"For my users, it is very stable; we do home automation on it, and it works really well."
"The most valuable feature for us is the fact that it's free, it's also easy to install and configure, and we're able to share USB devices between host VMs."
"The pause feature is valuable, as I can pause, which is something that not all hypervisors allow, and the snapshot feature is also valuable."
"It is easy to use and does not require complex knowledge."
"We used different products from different vendors, but we chose VirtualBox because it's easy to use and is very stable."
"The solution's most valuable feature is the fact that it's enterprise based, especially the virtualization platform."
"The cloning feature is a very useful tool."
"VirtualBox provides an isolated, consistent environment"
"If you have a heterogenous data centre that is specially focused on Linux platforms, this is safe money, and good if you are looking for automation."
"One of the most valuable features of this solution is the popularity of the OS."
"It is easy to deal with when comes to application migration and its compatibility with the multiple component applications."
"The solution is stable."
"There aren't any bugs on the solution."
"It is a stable solution...It is a scalable solution."
"The solution is a great all-round product, and the virtualization is especially good."
"It's a very good platform to build your virtual machines on and highly integrated with Red Hat itself and its satellites."
 

Cons

"There were some minor issues with the initial setup, such as if we forgot to reinitialize the MAC addresses of the network cards. Also, setting up the network adaptors was a bit tricky."
"An area of improvement would be the added ability to create the Oracle RAC clusters we now need to edit a properties file in order to make a VM disk sharable."
"If the user faces a problem he has to read a large amount of docs to fix them."
"There are a few bugs that need to be updated."
"I stopped using it for one reason and one reason only, because Oracle closed off portions of the code, creating an OSE (open source edition) and a CSE (closed source edition) of the software."
"This should have better support for multiple network cards and some parts of the GUI should be improved."
"In Oracle VM a simple drag and drop of files and folders between the host machine and the virtual machine is not available."
"Basically, the GUI and command-line interface need improvement."
"RHEV can improve by keeping pace with new features and new enhancements."
"The support is tricky in a few places. We're facing some challenges within Malaysia where we don't really have the system integrators available who can provide extended support. When we need personnel on-site, we can't get them."
"I heard that there are big differences between Red Hat eight and seven, but it's still quite difficult for me to judge it. I found it a bit more difficult to manage than version seven, which was much easier. In term of features, though, it is still not yet clear which is better. I have no clear idea of which features need to be changed at the moment."
"It would be better to have more patches, especially kernel-level updates, live and online so that we can keep the business up and running during this period."
"The availability of technical expertise with the solution may be limited in some areas."
"RHEV can improve by keeping pace with new features and new enhancements. They should not be halted or delayed innovation because over the past quarter the enhancements have not been as fast as they have been previously."
"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."
"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."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"There are no licensing fees."
"The license I use is free."
"Available for free use"
"It is a very cost-effective solution."
"The product is free to use."
"It is an open-source solution."
"Pricing does not apply for us, we do not have to pay for the service."
"No licensing is required as it is open-source."
"The price of RHEV is high. It is an open-source solution, the price should be less. The price should not be on par with a solution, such as VMware. It's not more or equal to VMware, it's less, but the difference should be more substantial."
"We are using the free version of Red Hat."
"We have to pay extra for vulnerability and fault tolerance."
"Price-wise, RHEV is okay, in my opinion."
"This is an open-source solution."
"I would say the price is acceptable."
"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."
"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."
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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
14%
Financial Services Firm
9%
Computer Software Company
8%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Financial Services Firm
11%
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: June 2026.
900,644 professionals have used our research since 2012.