We primarily use the solution for our virtual environment.
Operation Engineer at a healthcare company with 1,001-5,000 employees
Great documentation, good reporting, and helpful technical support
Pros and Cons
- "The solution is very scalable."
- "The initial setup is quite complex."
What is our primary use case?
What is most valuable?
The VM features are all very good.
We've been very happy with the reporting aspects of the solution.
The documentation of the product is excellent. It's very helpful.
The product has been very stable. It's quite reliable.
The solution is very scalable.
We've found the technical support to be very helpful and responsive.
What needs improvement?
The initial setup is quite complex.
We would like the pricing to be lower. It's very expensive right now.
There could be more security features added to the product.
For how long have I used the solution?
I've been using the solution for about five years or so. It's been a while at this point. I have a good amount of experience on it.
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What do I think about the stability of the solution?
The stability is very good. It's reliable. The performance is good. There are no bugs or glitches. It doesn't crash or freeze.
What do I think about the scalability of the solution?
The scalability is very good. If a company would like to expand, it can do so.
In our organization, ten to 15 people are using the solution.
How are customer service and support?
We've been in touch with technical support in the past. They've always been responsive. They are helpful and effective at solving issues. We're quite satisfied with the level of support our organization receives.
How was the initial setup?
The initial setup is not straightforward. It's pretty complex.
What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?
The licensing is on a subscription basis.
The solution, in general, is quite expensive. They should work to make it less costly for their customer base.
What other advice do I have?
We are customers and end-users of the product.
We are using the latest version of the solution at this time.
We've just deployed it ourselves, and it is very small. We haven't had any difficulties with it at all so far and it's been five years.
I'd recommend the solution to other organizations.
I'd rate the solution at an eight out of ten. We've been largely very satisfied with the capabilities.
Which deployment model are you using for this solution?
On-premises
Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.

Senior System Engineer at a computer software company with 11-50 employees
Highly-available, feature-rich, priced-well, and easy to set up
Pros and Cons
- "The most valuable features are the vMotion, the storage vMotion, the DRS, and the high availability function."
- "The way that vSphere manages the alerts on the data machine is not easy to configure."
What is our primary use case?
We are resellers and consultants who provide solutions for our clients.
They manage the virtual machines, such as CPU usage, or memory usage, or disk space.
What is most valuable?
The most valuable features are the vMotion, the storage vMotion, the DRS, and the high availability function.
What needs improvement?
The way that vSphere manages the alerts on the data machine is not easy to configure.
For how long have I used the solution?
I have been working with vSphere for approximately 15 years.
We started with version 4.
What do I think about the stability of the solution?
It's a stable solution.
What do I think about the scalability of the solution?
VMware vSphere is scalable.
Our clients are medium size companies.
How are customer service and technical support?
We have not used technical support.
How was the initial setup?
The initial setup was easy.
What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?
In my opinion, the essential version is a good price.
What other advice do I have?
This is a good solution and I will recommend it. They are choosing a good product.
I would rate this solution a ten out of ten.
Disclosure: My company has a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer: reseller
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VMware vSphere
April 2025

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System Architect at KT Bank
High availability feature allows for automatic recovery of failed hosts
Pros and Cons
- "Using vSphere we have virtualized over one thousand servers and this gave us management, cost and datacenter space advantages."
- "Although vSphere is a nearly perfect product, it does need a little improvement. Datacenter and Cluster structure should be mixed so that the management of clusters would be easier."
What is our primary use case?
We are virtualizing our x86 server infrastructure with VMware vSphere. It consolidates our environment dramatically. Our virtualization ratio is over 92%.
How has it helped my organization?
Using vSphere we have virtualized over one thousand servers and this gave us management, cost and datacenter space advantages.
What is most valuable?
vSphere offers the High Availability feature which serves automatic recovery of failed host's virtual machines on another host or hosts in the cluster. Also, DRS makes the cluster balanced.
What needs improvement?
Although vSphere is a nearly perfect product, it does need a little improvement. Datacenter and Cluster structure should be mixed so that the management of clusters would be easier.
For how long have I used the solution?
More than five years.
Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.
IT Professional with 5,001-10,000 employees
We have seen a significant lift in terms of delivery of applications
Pros and Cons
- "Its most valuable features are reliability, for sure, and quickness in getting the job done. I can spin off 100 or 200 machines in the matter of half an hour."
What is our primary use case?
I'm building a VDI center and a second-tier user. In terms of mission-critical apps, we use it for our executive pool of users to secure their everyday work. Sometimes we use it for distance education programs as well.
It has been performing pretty well.
How has it helped my organization?
We have seen a boost in performance in terms of delivery, but in everyday work, it's just like any other. Our delivery lift is probably more than 50 percent.
In terms of delivery, very often we would have requests for adding some new applications which were not previously there. And in previous deliveries, we would have to lose a day or so to prepare the application. Today it takes me about two hours at the most.
What is most valuable?
Its most valuable features are reliability, for sure, and quickness in getting the job done. I can spin off 100 or 200 machines in the matter of half an hour.
What needs improvement?
If I could talk to the engineers I would probably suggest a little bit different approach. There's a process that includes base-lining, then installing the program, and then doing the differentiation. That kind of approach for delivering applications, in my opinion, is way quicker. That approach would take me not more than half an hour to prepare any application. That's a feature I would like to see.
For how long have I used the solution?
One to three years.
What do I think about the stability of the solution?
We haven't had any stability problems.
What do I think about the scalability of the solution?
From my point of view, it scales really well; in terms of storage, I don't know.
What other advice do I have?
Test it, give it a try, and see how it goes. Definitely try it.
For me, the most important criteria when looking for a vendor are
- reliability
- ease of use
- customer support.
I would rate it at eight out of 10 because there is still room for improvement. However, we are not using the full extent of the product so I might be wrong. There is some room for improvement in the ease of use.
Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.
Infrastructure Engineer at a non-profit with 5,001-10,000 employees
It enabled deployment of the virtual machines via templates and distributed switches. If the browser crashes, then any progress is lost on the vCenter.
What is most valuable?
vMotion between the hosts, deployment of the virtual machines via templates and distributed switches are some valuable features of this product.
How has it helped my organization?
It allowed us to move from a physical environment to a virtual environment. It also allowed us to install much more of the hardware, i.e., up to 30+ virtual machines on a single physical server.
What needs improvement?
There is need for high availability for the vCenter and also a faster/responsive vCenter web interface. True high availability for a vCenter is required in the current virtualised world. With the introduction of 6.5, VMware has now introduced true HA with heartbeat monitoring.
As VMware have gradually decided to move from the C++ thick client to the flash based web portal, and now to the HTML5 web based portal, the legacy flash based web portal for vCenter 5/6.0 was sluggish and slow. On many occasions when going through nested windows for VMware configuration, the flash plugin or browser would crash. Fingers crossed with the new HMTL5 based web portal as so far it's been solid. Even though it doesn't currently have all the features of the flash based portal, I hope VMware releases a fully-functioning HTML5 in the next release of vCenter.
For how long have I used the solution?
I have used this solution for six years.
What do I think about the stability of the solution?
Sometimes we have encountered vCenter/vSphere issues that requires the service to restart or the server restarts. The web interface has a lot going on and if the browser crashes, then any progress is lost on the vCenter.
What do I think about the scalability of the solution?
I did not encounter any scalability issues for the VMs.
How are customer service and technical support?
The technical support is good. I had to use it for iSCSI related issues and was told to upgrade to latest build. However, it didn't fix the issue.
Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?
I was not using any other solution previously.
How was the initial setup?
I set up a clustered virtual environment and distributed switches with integration into EMC VNX using VLANs for each SP for iSCSI traffic.
What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?
It is expensive for the private sector but it does have a good pricing policy for the charity sector.
Which other solutions did I evaluate?
We tested Hyper-V - but this was back in 2009. It was very basic then.
What other advice do I have?
You need to place more time into the design phase. You should also build higher spec servers in order to save costs on the licensing.
Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.
System Administrator at a tech services company with 51-200 employees
It makes servers easier to manage and offers increased redundancy, although I think the product licensing should be simplified on a sliding scale.
What is most valuable?
The 3D Graphics isn’t something I have used yet, but will be very nice for VDI environments. Also, the improvements in vMotion will bring on some major changes.
How has it helped my organization?
In general, VMware improves the way almost every business using it operates. Server virtualization cuts down on operating costs by a lot, makes servers easier to manage, and offers increased redundancy.
What needs improvement?
I think the product licensing is very confusing still and should be simplified on a sliding scale. i.e. one to three servers are essential for four to 10 standard, etc. Instead of licensing per core.
For how long have I used the solution?
I was using this product at home during the early testing phases and once released we rolled this out to a few of our customers.
What was my experience with deployment of the solution?
No issues encountered.
What do I think about the stability of the solution?
In the early builds there were some stability issues, but that was resolved early on and is not an issue.
What do I think about the scalability of the solution?
No issues encountered.
How are customer service and technical support?
Customer Service:
9/10.
Technical Support:10/10.
Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?
I have used Hyper-V, but it does not even come close to comparing to vSphere. There are plenty of features you cannot do easily in Hyper-V that vSphere makes a breeze.
How was the initial setup?
Very straightforward. Just like moving to any other vSphere release.
What about the implementation team?
We did it in-house. We are a VMware partner so we set this up for our customers.
What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?
The licensing can be a little strange, since the per CPU licensing will hopefully be gone in the future. Just make sure to know exactly what you need to make sure you purchase exactly what you need. Also, it is pretty easy to use a licensing calculator.
Which other solutions did I evaluate?
No other options were looked at.
What other advice do I have?
You should work with an existing VMware partner to deploy, but seek proper training or coursework for day to day management.
Disclosure: My company has a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer: We're a VMware partner.
Sr. IT Technical Engineer & Solutions Architect at a hospitality company with 1,001-5,000 employees
When we release our new applications, we just scale out without investing in new infrastructure. It's missing centralized management, however, which limits our troubleshooting ability.
Valuable Features
The level of consolidation that you can implement from a hardware reduction element – it is so valuable to us in our industry. Ease of use and simplicity.
Improvements to My Organization
The cost savings in itself from having to buy 15 servers in each hotel. Now we have one server for each hotel. When we release our new applications, we don’t have to invest in new infrastructure, we just scale because its already in place. We're on a five-year lifecycle so we can scale for five years with no further investments.
Room for Improvement
Centralized management could be better. A server can only be managed by one vCenter. This limits our visibility to remediate, troubleshoot and fix problems efficiently.
Stability Issues
It's very reliable. They're is not another product similar, and we've had no major outages for seven to eight years. We have hotels where you can barely reach and because of the stability of the product they can trust the reliability.
Scalability Issues
It grows beyond belief. In my situation, because Im always dealing with corporate, I have shown that virtual machines can scale to whatever we have asked it to do. If we need to scale we can, and the hardware just needs to be ordered, and setup.
Customer Service and Technical Support
I love them, they are the best in the world. We only call in emergencies, and they are the best in the world. We are changing to v6 and the support model is changing so we to procure the enterprise support even for the basic offices. In the earlier versions, I had it but now we're trying to persuade VMware for that additional 24/7 service.
Initial Setup
It's straightforward, and couldn't be any easier. I did training around the world for IT resources, even teams who have never seen it can adopt it, both in terms of administrative and installation.
Implementation Team
Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.
Senior Infrastructure Engineer at a insurance company with 501-1,000 employees
We're able to accept every request to build new VMs and can leverage it with the API's, although it still requires programming experience as the process isn't fully automated.
Valuable Features
It's flexibility is most valuable, as we're able to move things around without downtime.
Improvements to My Organization
We now have 200 virtual machines because building a machine is so easy that anyone can do it. Now, our answer is "yes" for any requests for new VMs.
Room for Improvement
More automation would be good. You can leverage CLI or vSphere with the API’s so that allows you to do anything, but if you don’t have programming experience you are limited.
Stability Issues
Pretty solid, like any technology there are gonna be some pitfalls, nothing is perfect, but there is no clear disadvantage for making it virtual.
Scalability Issues
Very scalable, I don’t think we’ve hit a limit. Were running 2000 virtual machines on 50 hosts and that’s one data center, and we haven’t nearly hit our ceiling.
Customer Service and Technical Support
I haven’t used it that often – they are responsive. It's pretty standard, not above average.
Initial Setup
Pretty straightforward, I've installed vCenter dozens of times, and I've run into a few issues, but other than that its pretty easy.
Other Solutions Considered
We've looked at Hyper-V, Citrix, Openstack, but we continue to use vSphere, because it’s a market leader – it’s a stable company, not going anywhere.
25% of the server costs are now going to VMware; it's expensive. The stability of the company is always important to look at though.
Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.

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