Try our new research platform with insights from 80,000+ expert users

VMware ESXi vs VMware vSphere 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:
 

ROI

Sentiment score
4.6
VMware ESXi boosts efficiency and saves costs, but some users consider alternatives due to rising expenses and ROI challenges.
Sentiment score
7.1
VMware vSphere increases ROI by reducing server needs, costs, and deployment time, improving efficiency and hardware utilization.
We can say 10% is the approximate amount of savings because most of the things are automated and streamlined, so the manual work is eliminated in most cases.
 

Customer Service

Sentiment score
7.4
VMware ESXi support is generally positive, though Broadcom acquisition caused some delays; users praise higher-level support efficiency.
Sentiment score
6.8
VMware vSphere support is efficient and knowledgeable, though delays occur for low-priority issues; community forums provide additional help.
I rate the technical support from VMware as nine or ten out of ten.
In the last three or four years, we did not require any support from VMware engineers, indicating its high reliability.
Customer service and support are good; they are reachable, and at times remote support suffices.
Priority one issues are usually addressed by engineers within one to two hours.
Recently, support has been less friendly and slower, especially after the company was acquired by Broadcom.
If we have issues, the support tends to be unreliable
 

Scalability Issues

Sentiment score
7.8
VMware ESXi is highly scalable, widely used globally, supporting extensive infrastructures despite some licensing challenges, rated 8-9/10.
Sentiment score
7.4
VMware vSphere is praised for its scalable architecture, allowing efficient expansion with minimal downtime, despite potential hardware and licensing issues.
The solution is scalable, allowing us to scale up or down regardless of infrastructure size.
vCenter Server can manage up to 1,000 ESXi servers within a single UI interface, allowing extensive deployment and management capabilities.
My customers are highly satisfied with its scalability.
Scaling is easy, whether it is hyperconverged or a three-tier architecture.
VMware vSphere is highly scalable in terms of the number of users and the number of servers it can handle.
It is a highly scalable solution.
 

Stability Issues

Sentiment score
8.2
VMware ESXi is praised for stability, resolved issues, and dependable performance, with occasional downtime and seamless integration noted.
Sentiment score
7.9
VMware vSphere is highly stable and reliable, with minimal downtime and strong performance, widely regarded as a robust platform.
ESXi is stable, and our business operations depend on it year after year.
It is a very stable hypervisor solution.
While they are generally stable, if outages occur, they tend to be due to brands like HP or Dell, not VMware vSphere itself.
I would rate the stability of VMware vSphere as eight out of ten.
 

Room For Improvement

Users seek cost-effective VMware ESXi with simpler licensing, improved support, easier management, and better scalability post-Broadcom acquisition.
VMware vSphere's cost, stability, integration, and usability issues lead organizations to consider alternatives and seek improved solutions.
Providing a mobile application for remote access to ESXi servers would be beneficial.
It's not cost-effective for small users and creates a gap for alternatives, while favoring larger clients.
The cost of VMware ESXi is very high, especially after the acquisition by Broadcom, which led to price increases.
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.
Sometimes, it is difficult to find documentation for specific tools and solutions.
 

Setup Cost

VMware ESXi's high pricing and complex licensing model post-acquisition lead to increased costs, requiring tailored licensing for efficiency.
VMware vSphere is reliable, but its high pricing and complex licensing can challenge budget-conscious enterprises compared to competitors.
The product is very cost-effective, though not fixed, as pricing tends to fluctuate over time.
The solution is moderately priced, not exactly cheap yet not overly expensive either.
The pricing is expensive, with the cost for customers ranging from $10,000 to $20,000 yearly.
Many customers are trying to avoid it due to its high cost.
Costs significantly increased from perpetual to subscription, with prices rising by two to three times over three to five years.
The solution is too expensive.
 

Valuable Features

VMware ESXi provides efficient server management with features like vMotion and disaster recovery, plus seamless third-party integration and scalability.
VMware vSphere provides efficient virtualization with high availability, scalability, and robust performance, enhancing agility and minimizing downtime.
Its capability to move virtual machines to physical machines is very efficient for our live environment.
As a level one or bare metal hypervisor, its unmatched scalability depends on underlying hardware, capable of managing large numbers of physical servers with one management platform.
The most important features are having a lot of code and CPU threads to ensure the system doesn't lag.
The vMotion feature is beneficial for online migration of virtual machines from one host to another without downtime.
The tool is highly available, which is crucial for implementing critical applications requiring 24/7 availability.
The high availability feature is significant.
 

Categories and Ranking

VMware ESXi
Ranking in Server Virtualization Software
7th
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
6.9
Number of Reviews
32
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
VMware vSphere
Ranking in Server Virtualization Software
2nd
Average Rating
8.8
Reviews Sentiment
7.0
Number of Reviews
456
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of August 2025, in the Server Virtualization Software category, the mindshare of VMware ESXi is 1.3%, up from 0.0% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of VMware vSphere is 16.4%, down from 20.0% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Server Virtualization Software
 

Featured Reviews

Syed Ali Waqas - PeerSpot reviewer
Efficiently manages development environments with robust network integration
I recommend new users download and evaluate the free version from VMware's website. Once satisfied, they should purchase the professional version for a smooth and secure IT infrastructure. The professional version is cost-effective, allowing one to create multiple servers on a single server. I'd rate the solution ten out of ten.
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…
report
Use our free recommendation engine to learn which Server Virtualization Software solutions are best for your needs.
865,576 professionals have used our research since 2012.
 

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…
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Manufacturing Company
18%
Computer Software Company
10%
Financial Services Firm
9%
Educational Organization
6%
Computer Software Company
14%
Financial Services Firm
11%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Government
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about VMware ESXi?
My customers are satisfied with the solution’s performance.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for VMware ESXi?
VMware ESXi is extremely expensive now compared to a few years ago. It's a core-based license now. We have bought VCF for about more than 2,000 cores. It's not a user-based license, and when you co...
What needs improvement with VMware ESXi?
It would be better if it had some scaling out features such as Kubernetes, automatic scale-out features, or automatic scheduling scale-out features, without being in a containerized platform such a...
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

Information Not Available
Abu Dhabi Ports Company, ACS, AIA New Zealand, Consona, Corporate Express, CS Energy, and Digiweb.
Find out what your peers are saying about VMware ESXi vs. VMware vSphere and other solutions. Updated: July 2025.
865,576 professionals have used our research since 2012.