Comparison of platform virtualization software

Platform virtualization software, specifically emulators and hypervisors, are software packages that emulate the whole physical computer machine, often providing multiple virtual machines on one physical platform. The table below compares basic information about platform virtualization hypervisors.

General

{| class="wikitable sortable sticky-header" style="font-size: smaller; text-align: center; width: auto; table-layout: fixed;"

! Name

! Creator

! Host CPU

! Guest CPU

! Host OS

! Guest OS

! License

! 86Box

| Miran Grča

| x86, x86-64, ARMv7, AArch64

| x86 (Intel 8086 to Pentium II and compatible)

| Windows, Linux, macOS

| Windows, Linux, DOS, BSD, OS/2, Haiku

! bhyve

| FreeBSD

| x86-64

| x86, x86-64

| FreeBSD, Illumos

| FreeBSD, FreeNAS, pfSense, OpenBSD, Linux, Windows, Illumos

| x86-64, (up to 64 physical CPUs), ARMv8

| Windows 8, 8.1, 10, and Windows Server 2012 (R2) w/Hyper-V role, Microsoft Hyper-V Server

| Supported drivers for Windows NT, FreeBSD, Linux (SUSE 10, RHEL 6, CentOS 6)

| . Component of various Windows editions.

! INTEGRITY

| Green Hills Software

| x86, ARM, PowerPC

| Same as host

| Linux, Windows

| INTEGRITY native, Linux, Android, AUTOSAR, Windows (on some platforms)

! Integrity Virtual Machines

| Hewlett-Packard

| IA-64

| HP-UX

| HP-UX, Windows, Linux (OpenVMS announced)

! JPC (Virtual Machine)

| University of Oxford

| Any running the Java Virtual Machine

| x86

| Java Virtual Machine

| DOS, Linux, Windows up to 3.0

! KVM

| Qumranet, now Red Hat

| x86, x86-64, IA-64, with x86 virtualization, s390, PowerPC, OpenVMS/x86-64.

! Virtual Iron 3.1

| Virtual Iron Software, Inc., acquired by Oracle

| x86 VT-x, x86-64 AMD-V

| x86, x86-64

| No host OS

| Windows, Linux

| , some components GPLv2

! Wind River Hypervisor

| Wind River

| x86, x86-64, PowerPC, ARM

| Same as host

| No host OS

| Linux, VxWorks, unmodified guests (including MS Windows and RTOSes such ach OSE, QNX and others), bare metal virtual board

! Xen

| Xensource, Now Citrix Systems

| x86, x86-64, ARM, IA-64 (inactive), PowerPC (inactive)

| Same as host

| Linux, Unix-like

| Linux, FreeBSD, MiniOS, NetBSD, Solaris, Windows 7/XP/Vista/Server 2008 (requires Intel VT-x (Vanderpool) or AMD-V (Pacifica)-capable CPU), Plan 9

! XCP-ng

| By Vates SAS

| x86, x86-64, ARM, IA-64 (inactive), PowerPC (inactive)

| Same as host

| No host OS

| Linux, FreeBSD, MiniOS, NetBSD, Solaris, Windows, Windows Server 2008 (with Intel VT-x or AMD-V), Plan 9

! XenServer

| By Citrix Systems

| x86, x86-64, ARM, IA-64 (inactive), PowerPC (inactive)

| Same as host

| No host OS

| Linux, FreeBSD, MiniOS, NetBSD, Solaris, Windows 7/XP/Vista/Server 2008 (with Intel VT-x or AMD-V), Plan 9

! XtratuM

| fentISS

| SPARC v8 LEON2/3/4, ARM v7

| Same as host

| No host OS

| GPOS: Linux, RTOS: LithOS, RTEMS

| , GPL version 2 depending on versions

! z/VM

| IBM

| z/Architecture

| z/Architecture, z/VM does not run on predecessor mainframes

| No host OS, itself (single or multiple levels/versions deep; e.g., VM/ESA running in z/VM 4.4 in z/VM 5.2 in z/VM 5.1.)

| Linux on IBM Z, z/OS, z/VSE, z/TPF, z/VM, VM/CMS, MUSIC/SP, OpenSolaris for System z, predecessors

! z LPARs

| IBM

| z/Architecture

| No host OS, Integrated in firmware of System z mainframes

| Linux on IBM Z, z/OS, z/VSE, z/TPF, z/VM, MUSIC/SP, and predecessors

|- class="sortbottom"

! Name

! Creator

! Host CPU

! Guest CPU

! Host OS(s)

! Guest OS(s)

! License

Features

{| class="wikitable sortable sticky-header" style="font-size: smaller; text-align: center; width: auto; table-layout: fixed;"

|- class="sortbottom"

! Name

! Guest OS SMP available

! Runs arbitrary OS

! Supported guest OS drivers

! Method of operation

! Typical use

! Speed relative to host OS

! Commercial support available

! Containers, or Zones

| , over 500-way on current systems

| Uses native device drivers

| Operating system-level virtualization

| Server consolidation with workload isolation, single workload containment, hosting, dev/test/prod

| Near native

! Hyper-V Server 2008 R2

| , up to 4 VCPUs per VM

| Virtualization

| Server consolidation, service continuity, dev/test, desktop virtualization, cloud computing

| Up to near native

! OpenVZ

| Compatible

| Operating system-level virtualization

| Virtualized server isolation

| Up to near native

! KVM

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! Containers, or Zones

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! Cooperative Linux (coLinux)

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! CHARON

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! Denali

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! DOSBox

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! DOSEMU

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! FreeBSD Jail

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! GXemul

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! Hercules

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! Hyper-V (2008 R2)

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! Hyper-V (2012)

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! Hyper-V (2012 R2)

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! Integrity Virtual Machines

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! JPC (Virtual Machine)

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! Linux-VServer

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! LynxSecure

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! LXC

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! OpenVZ

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! Oracle VM Server for x86

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! Oracle VM Server for SPARC (LDoms)

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! OVPsim

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! Parallels Desktop for Mac

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! Parallels Workstation

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! PearPC

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! PikeOS

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! PowerVM

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! QEMU

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! QEMU w/ kqemu module

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! QEMU w/ qvm86 module

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! QuickTransit

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! SIMH

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! Simics

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! Sun xVM Server

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! SVISTA 2004

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! TRANGO

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! User Mode Linux

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! VirtualBox

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! DosBox

! Oracle VirtualBox (formerly OSE, GPLv2), with Guest Additions (GPLv2) Linux only

| No limit

| 16

| 4 GB (32-bit); 64 GB (64-bit)

| ?

| 8 TB

! VMware vSphere Hypervisor (ESXi 4.1)

| 16 NUMA Nodes / 320 logical CPUs

| 4 TB

| Depending on filesystem

| 512

| 8

| 1 TB

| 4 IDE; 60 SCSI; 120 SATA

| 62 TB

! VMware vSphere Hypervisor (ESXi 5.5)

| 4 TB

| No limit

| 1024

| 64

| 1 TB

| 4 IDE; 256 SCSI

| 64 TB

! Microsoft Hyper-V Server 2016

| 512 cores / 320 CPUs

| 24 TB

| No limit

| 1024

| 240

| 12 TB

| 4 IDE; 256 SCSI

| 64 TB

! Xen XCP-ng XenServer

| 16383 CPUsx86 8 CPUsARM32 128 CPUsARM64

| 16 TBx86 16 GBARM32 5 TBARM64

| No limit

| 512 PVx86 / 128 HVMx86 8ARM32 128ARM64

| >1 TB PVx86 / 1 TB HVMx86 16 GBARM32 1 TBARM64

| ?

! Name

! Maximum host cores / CPUs

! Maximum host memory

! Maximum host disk volume size

! Maximum number of guest VM running

! Maximum number of logical CPU per VM guest

! Maximum amount of memory per VM guest

! Maximum number of SCSI + IDE disks per VM guest

! Maximum disk size per VM guest

Note: No limit means no enforced limit. For example, a VM with 1 TB of memory cannot fit in a host with only 8 GB memory and no memory swap disk, so it will have a limit of 8 GB physically.

Comparison of platform virtualization software

General

Features

See also

Notes

References