RHEV vs VMware ESXi comparison

Red Hat and Broadcom are both solutions in the Server Virtualization Software category. Red Hat is ranked #13 with an average rating of 8.3, while Broadcom is ranked #7 with an average rating of 8.3. Red Hat holds a 2.4% mindshare in SVS, compared to Broadcom’s 2.2% mindshare. Additionally, 80% of Red Hat users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 96% of Broadcom users who would recommend it.

RHEV

Read 37 RHEV reviews

3,668 Views
3,631 Comparison Views

80% willing to recommend

VMware ESXi

Read 33 VMware ESXi reviews

1,508 Views
1,508 Comparison Views

96% willing to recommend

RHEV

VMware ESXi

Comparison Buyer's Guide

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Executive SummaryUpdated on Nov 6, 2024

RHEV and VMware ESXi compete in the virtualization market. VMware ESXi has an edge due to its rich feature set, offsetting its higher costs.

Features: RHEV is known for strong integration with Red Hat products, efficient cloud management, and significant cost savings. VMware ESXi shines with advanced management capabilities, high scalability, and robust security features.

Room for Improvement: RHEV could enhance its scalability, diversify its management tools, and improve integration with non-Red Hat environments. VMware ESXi could benefit from a simpler deployment process, streamlined documentation, and more supportive open-source integrations.

Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: RHEV offers streamlined deployment, especially within Red Hat ecosystems, along with responsive customer service. VMware ESXi presents a more complex deployment process but benefits from extensive documentation and community support, making it suitable for integration at scale.

Pricing and ROI: RHEV is competitively priced with a focus on reducing initial setup costs, appealing to budget-conscious businesses. VMware ESXi, although pricier, offers excellent ROI through superior scalability and comprehensive management tools, making it a valuable long-term investment for organizations prioritizing functionality.

To learn more, read our detailed RHEV vs. VMware ESXi Report (Updated: February 2026).

Buyer's Guide

RHEV vs. VMware ESXi

February 2026

Download the complete report

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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

RHEV

Ranking in Server Virtualization Software

13th

Average Rating

7.8

Reviews Sentiment

6.3

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

No ranking in other categories

VMware ESXi

Ranking in Server Virtualization Software

7th

Average Rating

8.4

Reviews Sentiment

6.9

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

No ranking in other categories

Mindshare comparison

As of February 2026, in the Server Virtualization Software category, the mindshare of RHEV is 2.4%, down from 3.7% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of VMware ESXi is 2.2%, up from 0.3% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

Server Virtualization Software Market Share Distribution
Product	Market Share (%)
VMware ESXi	2.2%
RHEV	2.4%
Other	95.4%

Server Virtualization Software

Featured Reviews

Mike Neuliep

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.

Read full review

Ion Boni

Managing Partner at evercloud

Has improved daily operations and provides solid performance but recent licensing changes have created challenges

Licensing has become a major issue. The new subscription-based licensing model is problematic. They have dropped all the support services for small partners and cut all small partners. The last two years have been challenging - after building stability, we received an email announcing they dropped the current model. It used to be cost-efficient. Now, when compared with Red Hat OpenStack, it is more expensive, but our knowledge and client awareness is with VMware ESXi. At this moment, we still prefer VMware ESXi.

Read full review

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"Red Hat is the most stable system."

"The most valuable feature of Red Hat Enterprise Virtualization is its pricing."

"The biggest aspect for me is the disk usage, the virtual manager, and the deployment of machines."

"When you purchase RHEV, you are essentially buying a subscription license. This license can be integrated with various client types, including these integrations with the subscription."

"The initial setup is fairly straightforward and well-documented. The process is very similar to its competitors. The success of your setup depends on how well you plan."

"I advise keeping an open mind. It's an excellent solution."

"One of the most valuable features of this solution is the popularity of the OS."

"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."

More RHEV pros

"We are using VMware ESXi for virtualization, with vCenter being the core product—these are building blocks for having efficiency and stability in daily operations, and we cannot operate without them."

"ESXi stands out for its simplicity in setup, management, and monitoring."

"I rate the stability of the solution as either nine or ten out of ten."

"The initial setup is not complex at all. It is actually very good and straightforward."

"The ease of use would be the first feature I like, then reliability."

"ESXi is stable, and our business operations depend on it year after year."

"The product is very reliable."

"The platform's most valuable features include its role within the vSphere suite, requiring a vCenter Server for management."

More VMware ESXi pros

Cons

"RHEV is not improving because it has been discontinued. It has been discontinued for years."

"It lags behind in that you need to go to something like Fedora to get all the extra bells and whistles."

"The solution has a very small lifecycle."

"In comparison to VMware, this solution isn't as stable. We're testing it right now, and we're not trusting the stability of the product."

"With RHEV, the cyberattacks should be fewer. I want RHEV to be better protected."

"While everything needs improvement in some way, I have no specifics."

"I would love to see better documentation and ease of use."

"RHEV is not improving because it has been discontinued. It has been discontinued for years."

More RHEV cons

"The cost of VMware ESXi is very high, especially after the acquisition by Broadcom, which led to price increases."

"We often face issues with ESXi that require us to change resources by shutting down the VMs."

"The solution’s licensing model could be improved."

"The licensing model currently presents challenges. It's not cost-effective for small users and creates a gap for alternatives, while favoring larger clients."

"What I feel is that FT (Fault Tolerance) is not used much. So maybe more focus on that feature is needed."

"For horizontal scalability, VMware ESXi is not the right product, and we have been evaluating alternative options."

"The main disadvantage is that the tool requires a significant, expensive initial investment. VMware ESXi requires a large upfront investment that depreciates over three to four years compared to cloud solutions with pay-as-you-go models. You should only choose it if you plan to use it for at least three years. Its deployment process is complex and requires an experienced team."

"The license model has recently changed, which is a bit worrying for customers."

More VMware ESXi cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Its price depends on the use cases."

"I would say the price is acceptable."

"We have to pay extra for vulnerability and fault tolerance."

"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."

"RHEV offers pricing based on a per-physical-machine licensing model."

"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 is an open-source solution."

"We are using the free version of Red Hat."

More RHEV pricing and cost advice

"The pricing is expensive, with the cost for customers ranging from $10,000 to $20,000 yearly."

"Broadcom recently purchased VMware, and the pricing scheme has changed. If I need any more features in the tool, I can actually purchase them."

"The solution is expensive."

"If one is cheap, and ten is expensive, I rate the tool's price as an eight."

"VMware ESXi is a costly solution in Africa and other developing countries."

"I rate the solution's pricing a five out of ten."

"I rate the product price as one on a scale of one to ten, where one is high price and ten is low price."

"The tool has become expensive."

More VMware ESXi pricing and cost advice

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Comparison Review

Thang Le Toan (Victory Lee)

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…

Read full review

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Financial Services Firm

12%

Computer Software Company

12%

Manufacturing Company

Comms Service Provider

Manufacturing Company

15%

Financial Services Firm

10%

Computer Software Company

Government

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	21
Midsize Enterprise	5
Large Enterprise	12

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	12
Midsize Enterprise	5
Large Enterprise	14

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about RHEV?

The initial setup is fairly straightforward and well-documented. The process is very similar to its competitors. The success of your setup depends on how well you plan.

See all answers

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.

See all answers

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...

See all answers

What do you like most about VMware ESXi?

My customers are satisfied with the solution’s performance.

See all answers

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...

See all answers

What needs improvement with VMware ESXi?

See all answers

Comparisons

Proxmox VE vs RHEV

Compared 27% of the time

VMware vSphere vs RHEV

Compared 26% of the time

Hyper-V vs RHEV

Compared 15% of the time

KVM vs RHEV

Compared 8% of the time

Oracle VM VirtualBox vs RHEV

Compared 2% of the time

More RHEV Competitors

Red Hat OpenShift vs VMware ESXi

Compared 25% of the time

Hyper-V vs VMware ESXi

Compared 14% of the time

KVM vs VMware ESXi

Compared 12% of the time

Proxmox VE vs VMware ESXi

Compared 8% of the time

VMware vSphere Foundation vs VMware ESXi

Compared 3% of the time

More VMware ESXi Competitors

Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

RHEV

January 2026

Download RHEV product report

Buyer's Guide

VMware ESXi

January 2026

Download VMware ESXi product report

Also Known As

Red Hat Enterprise Virtualization

No data available

Overview

Red Hat Enterprise Virtualization, or RHEV, is a leading open standard enterprise virtualization management solution. This solution supports virtualization of servers and desktops using the same infrastructure and a single easy-to-use interface.

Because RHEV is based on open standards, it is vendor-independent and a lot more cost effective and flexible than proprietary solutions.

Red Hat

VMware ESXi serves as a hypervisor enabling virtualization by transforming physical servers into virtual infrastructures, supporting efficient server management, development, and production environments.

Organizations utilize VMware ESXi for its high availability and ability to host diverse workloads effectively. Known for stability and maturity, it efficiently handles server, networking, and storage demands, with integral features like vMotion and memory compression. ESXi integrates well with data center operations, allowing seamless resource allocation and virtual machine migration. Despite impressive capabilities, users encounter challenges with setup complexity, licensing costs, and technical support delays, leading some to explore different solutions.

What are the main features of VMware ESXi?

High Availability: Ensures continuous operation of virtual machines.
vMotion Capabilities: Facilitates easy virtual machine migration.
Clustering: Enhances resource management and efficiency.
Server Management: Offers efficient management with third-party integration.
Resource Optimization: Utilizes memory compression technologies.

What benefits and ROI do organizations see with VMware ESXi?

Cost Savings: Reduces expenses by consolidating servers.
User-friendliness: Offers a stable and manageable interface.
Multi-OS Support: Enables running Linux and Windows environments.
High Performance: Recognized for speed and efficiency.

Industries deploying VMware ESXi benefit in sectors requiring robust IT infrastructure, including finance, healthcare, and education. Its capability to support high availability and diverse workloads proves essential for critical applications, enhancing productivity and agility in dynamic environments.

Broadcom

Sample Customers

Qualcomm and Bonham's Auction House.

Information Not Available

Buyer's Guide

RHEV vs. VMware ESXi

February 2026

Free Report: RHEV vs. VMware ESXi

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