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Red Hat Enterprise Virtualization for Desktops vs VMware Workstation comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Nov 5, 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

Red Hat Enterprise Virtuali...
Ranking in Virtual Desktop Infrastructure (VDI)
14th
Average Rating
7.0
Reviews Sentiment
2.4
Number of Reviews
2
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
VMware Workstation
Ranking in Virtual Desktop Infrastructure (VDI)
2nd
Average Rating
8.8
Reviews Sentiment
5.7
Number of Reviews
57
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of May 2026, in the Virtual Desktop Infrastructure (VDI) category, the mindshare of Red Hat Enterprise Virtualization for Desktops is 1.4%, up from 0.7% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of VMware Workstation is 10.4%, down from 17.0% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Virtual Desktop Infrastructure (VDI) Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
VMware Workstation10.4%
Red Hat Enterprise Virtualization for Desktops1.4%
Other88.2%
Virtual Desktop Infrastructure (VDI)
 

Featured Reviews

RobertThompson 1 - PeerSpot reviewer
Information Security Manager at a university with 1,001-5,000 employees
Free version available but hard to understand
Personally, I don't think it has any commendable features. The biggest thing about it is that, compared to what you can do with VMware and Horizon, it just seems like there's an awful lot of extra work involved with the Red Hat virtualization. It doesn't just work out of the box. You have to read through about six different documents, and everybody's experience is different. So it's kind of annoying. That would be the main thing. If you're not a Linux geek, it's very hard to understand. And it's probably because I came out of the Windows world. I learned this as part of my cross-training, but I just found the way that it happens with VMware and all that stuff to be easier to use.
GC
Director of IT at a comms service provider with 1,001-5,000 employees
Creating and destroying test machines has simplified our operations and reduced manual recovery time
The Snapshot feature has helped with workflows by allowing us to more easily reconstruct something if we lose it or need it. We've been making Snapshots on a consistent basis, mainly of servers. The VX Rail has worked effectively because we can create machines as we need them. It's helpful for resetting and has helped with our operations because I had set up failover servers on Vertex, but we don't have to do that anymore since VMware will just create a new machine immediately if we have a problem. We're doing our domain servers on there, and we've been very happy with that. We appreciate that we can create machines simply to test things out and then destroy them. I use it for a test machine for checking emails, so if the email has a virus in it, we can just destroy the machine and create a new one. We're slowly moving into the VMware environment, although the pricing with Broadcom has been a disaster.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"There's lots of good support out there in the community."
"The most valuable features are automated deployment and transparent movement for virtual machines over all our locations."
"The most valuable features are automated deployment and transparent movement for virtual machines over all our locations."
"The improvement to our organization is managing all our KVM-based virtual machines in a management environment."
"The simplicity of the deployment and the implementation, and the footprint for the hardware are some of the solution's valuable features."
"Simple free virtualization solution that you can depend on."
"It is much more mature compared to Nutanix or SimpliVity when it's cross-platform based."
"It has given us the flexibility to recreate live server scenarios including the supporting networks and AD domain controllers; these are then used to test upgrades or migrations with no impact on the live servers or network."
"VMware Workstation’s most valuable feature is virtualization technology."
"VM management - ability to very easily create and manage multiple VMs of various platforms, with portability and ease of saving and copying entire VMs from machine to machine."
"Overall, this is a good product and I recommend it."
"VMware Workstation has tons of third-party support, the largest partner ecosystem. VMware works with a ton of different vendors. They have plugins for almost everything. Other hypervisors lack the flexibility that VMware Workstation offers."
 

Cons

"The best improvement for oVirt 4.2 is to enable backup features for major backup products of virtual machines."
"The best improvement for oVirt 4.2 is to enable backup features for major backup products of virtual machines."
"The biggest thing about it is that, compared to what you can do with VMware and Horizon, it just seems like there's an awful lot of extra work involved with Red Hat virtualization."
"The network configuration was not as easy as it could be and could take less time. We faced challenges with backup due to limitations in the free version, requiring us to switch to a paid version."
"It could have more platforms and CPUs."
"Its price could be better."
"Installing VMware Workstation isn't so easy. It's highly complex compared to Windows."
"VMware Workstations is for desktop use only and is pricey."
"VMware Workstation’s scalability could be improved."
"The GUI interface could be improved."
"The product's integration capabilities are an area with certain shortcomings where improvements are required."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"I use the free developer stuff right now."
"The licensing costs are cheap. I pay approximately $100 per year."
"The cost differs depending on the customer's requirement."
"The product has a moderate price."
"VMware Workstation has a high price than competitors in the market."
"VMware is expensive. Licensing can be tricky. For example, I recently had a client running VMware vSphere Essentials and wanted to migrate to a more scalable solution. However, they had no choice but to purchase a completely new license and deploy a completely new instance of VMware."
"The solution's pricing is almost the same as what Google Cloud, AWS, or Microsoft would charge you."
"With a VDI solution, there is always extra cost running a VDI solution but it's not for cost purposes anymore. In the beginning, it was to save money on hardware but at the moment it's other aspects that are more important why you should use a VDI solution."
"The solution is moderately priced. I rate the pricing a six out of ten."
report
Use our free recommendation engine to learn which Virtual Desktop Infrastructure (VDI) solutions are best for your needs.
893,244 professionals have used our research since 2012.
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
No data available
Comms Service Provider
12%
University
9%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Computer Software Company
8%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
No data available
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business32
Midsize Enterprise15
Large Enterprise17
 

Questions from the Community

What needs improvement with Red Hat Enterprise Virtualization for Desktops?
Personally, I don't think it has any commendable features. The biggest thing about it is that, compared to what you can do with VMware and Horizon, it just seems like there's an awful lot of extra ...
What is your primary use case for Red Hat Enterprise Virtualization for Desktops?
I've used it more as a user than as an administrator setting it up. Just mainly getting access to legacy systems and programming that's not Windows 11 compatible.
Which VMware solution would you go with - Workstation or vSphere?
VM Workstation’s setup is so easy, you can use it almost instantly, it works well with Windows and Linux. We like VM Workstation primarily to test environments to determine how well a solution will...
What do you like most about VMware Workstation?
The product is stable, very easy to deploy, easy to use, easy to configure, and easy to set up.
What needs improvement with VMware Workstation?
The product's integration capabilities are an area with certain shortcomings where improvements are required.
 

Also Known As

Enterprise Virtualization for Desktops
No data available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Casio, Telef‹nica, British Airways
Akademiska Hus
Find out what your peers are saying about Red Hat Enterprise Virtualization for Desktops vs. VMware Workstation and other solutions. Updated: April 2026.
893,244 professionals have used our research since 2012.