# 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

| 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 | Windows, Linux, DOS, BSD, OS/2, Haiku | GPL version 3 |
| bhyve | FreeBSD | x86-64 | x86, x86-64 | FreeBSD, Illumos | FreeBSD, FreeNAS, pfSense, OpenBSD, Linux, Windows, Illumos | BSD |
| Bochs | Kevin J. Lawton | Any | x86, x86-64 | Windows, Linux, FreeBSD, Unix/X11, Mac OS 9, macOS, BeOS, MorphOS, OS/2 | Windows, Linux, DOS, BSD, OS/2, Haiku | LGPL |
| Containers, or Zones | Sun Microsystems | x86, x86-64, SPARC (portable: not tied to hardware) | Same as host | Solaris 10, Solaris 11, OpenSolaris 2009.06, illumos distributions | Solaris (8, 9, 10, 11), illumos, Linux (BrandZ) | CDDL |
| Cooperative Linux (coLinux) | Dan Aloni, other developers | x86 | Same as host | Windows 2000, XP, 2003, Vista | Linux | GPL version 2 |
| CHARON | Stromasys | x86, x86-64 | PDP-11, VAX, Alpha, HP3000, Sparc | Windows, Linux | VMS, OpenVMS, Tru64 UNIX, MPE/iX, RSX-11, RT11, RSTS, Solaris, SunOS | Proprietary |
| Denali | University of Washington | x86 | x86 | Denali | Ilwaco, NetBSD | Not distributed |
| DOSBox | Peter Veenstra, Sjoerd with community | Any | x86 | Linux, Windows, classic Mac OS, macOS, BeOS, FreeBSD, NetBSD, OpenBSD, Solaris, QNX, IRIX, MorphOS, AmigaOS, Maemo, Symbian | Internally emulated MS-DOS shell; self-booting disks, unofficially Windows 1.0 to 98 | GPL |
| DOSEMU | Community project | x86, x86-64 | x86 | Linux | DOS | GPL version 2 |
| FreeBSD Jail | Poul-Henning Kamp / FreeBSD | Any running FreeBSD or DragonFly BSD | Same as host | FreeBSD, DragonFly BSD | same as host (shared *BSD kernel), plus Linux ABI through compat layer | BSD |
| GXemul | Anders Gavare | Any | ARM, MIPS, Motorola 88000, PowerPC, SuperH | Unix-like | NetBSD, OpenBSD, Linux, Ultrix, Sprite | BSD |
| Hercules | Roger Bowler | Any | z/Architecture | Windows, FreeBSD, NetBSD, Linux, macOS | Linux on IBM Z, z/OS, z/VM, z/VSE, OS/360, DOS/360, DOS/VS, MVS, VM/370, TSS/370 | QPL |
| Hyper-V (2008) | Microsoft | x86-64 with Intel VT-x or AMD-V | x86-64, x86 (up to 8 physical CPUs) | Windows Server 2008 (R2) w/Hyper-V role, Microsoft Hyper-V Server | Supported drivers for Windows 2000, Windows 2003, Windows 2008, Windows XP, Windows Vista, FreeBSD, Linux (SUSE 10 released, more announced) | Proprietary |
| Hyper-V (2012+) | Microsoft | x86-64 with Intel VT-x or AMD-V, ARMv8 | 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) | Proprietary. Component of various Windows editions. |
| INTEGRITY | Green Hills Software | ARM, x86, PowerPC | Same as host | Linux, Windows | INTEGRITY native, Linux, Android, AUTOSAR, Windows (on some platforms) | Proprietary |
| Integrity Virtual Machines | Hewlett-Packard | IA-64 | IA-64 | HP-UX | HP-UX, Windows, Linux (OpenVMS announced) | Proprietary |
| JPC (Virtual Machine) | University of Oxford | Any running the Java Virtual Machine | x86 | Java Virtual Machine | DOS, Linux, Windows up to 3.0 | GPL version 2 |
| KVM | Qumranet, now Red Hat | x86, x86-64, IA-64, with x86 virtualization, s390, PowerPC, ARM | Same as host | Linux, illumos | FreeBSD, Linux, Solaris, Windows, Plan 9 | GPL version 2 |
| Linux-VServer | Community project | x86, x86-64, IA-64, Alpha, PowerPC 64, PA-RISC 64, SPARC64, ARM, S/390, SH/66, MIPS | Compatible | Linux | Linux variants | GPL version 2 |
| LynxSecure | LynuxWorks | x86 | x86 | No host OS | LynxOS, Linux, Windows | Proprietary |
| LXC | Community project, Canonical Ltd. | x86, x86-64, IA-64, PowerPC 64, SPARC64, Itanium, ARM | Same as host | Linux | Linux variants | GPL version 2 |
| OKL4 Microvisor | Open Kernel Labs, acquired by General Dynamics Corporation | ARM, x86, MIPS | ARM (v5, v6, v7, v8; paravirtualization), ARMv7VE (hardware virtualization) | No Host OS | Various OSes and RTOSes including Linux, Android, QNX | Proprietary |
| OpenVZ | Community project, supported by SWsoft, now Parallels, Inc. | x86, x86-64, IA-64, PowerPC 64, SPARC64 | Same as host | Linux | same as host (shared Linux kernel), choice of userland distribution | GPL |
| Oracle VM Server for x86 | Oracle Corporation | x86, x86-64 | x86, x86-64 | No host OS | Microsoft Windows, Oracle Linux, Red Hat Enterprise Linux, Solaris | GPLv2, Oracle VM Server; Manager is proprietary |
| OVPsim | OVP | x86 | OR1K, MIPS32, ARC600/700, ARM; and public API which enables users to write custom processor models, RISC, CISC, DSP, VLIW all possible | Microsoft Windows, Linux | Depends on target machine, for example includes MIPS Malta that runs Linux or SMP-Linux; and includes public API which enables users to write custom peripheral and system models | Proprietary, Apache 2.0 for models |
| Parallels Desktop for Mac | Parallels, Inc. | x86 | x86, x86-64, aarch64 | macOS | DOS, Windows, Linux, macOS, FreeBSD, OS/2, eComStation, Solaris, Haiku | Proprietary |
| Parallels Workstation (discontinued 2013) | Parallels, Inc. | x86 | x86 | Windows, Linux | Windows, Linux, FreeBSD, OS/2, eComStation, DOS, Solaris, Haiku | Proprietary |
| PearPC | Sebastian Biallas | x86, x86-64, PowerPC | PowerPC | Windows, Linux, OS X, FreeBSD, NetBSD | Mac OS X, Darwin, Linux | GPL |
| PikeOS | SYSGO | PowerPC, x86, ARM, MIPS, SPARC, RISC-V | Same as host | No host OS, Linux or Windows as dev. hosts | PikeOS native, Linux, ELinOS, Windows, POSIX, AUTOSAR, Android, RTEMS, OSEK, ARINC 653 APEX, ITRON | Proprietary |
| Proxmox VE | Proxmox | x86-64 | x86, x86-64 | Debian Based | Windows, Linux, Linux variants, Solaris, FreeBSD, OSx86 (as FreeBSD), virtual appliances, Netware, OS/2, SCO, BeOS, Haiku, Darwin | AGPLv3 |
| Oracle VM Server for SPARC (LDoms) | Oracle Corporation | UltraSPARC T1, UltraSPARC T2, UltraSPARC T2+, SPARC T3, SPARC T4 | Compatible | Solaris 10, Solaris 11 | Oracle support: Solaris; unsupported: Linux, FreeBSD | Proprietary |
| PowerVM | IBM | POWER4, POWER5, POWER6, POWER7, POWER8, POWER9, Power10 | POWER4/5/6/7/8/9/Power10, x86 (PowerVM-Lx86) | PowerVM Firmware | Linux PowerPC, x86; AIX, IBM i | Proprietary |
| QEMU | Fabrice Bellard, other developers | x86, x86-64, IA-64, PowerPC, SPARC 32/64, ARM, S/390, MIPS | x86, x86-64, Alpha, ARM, CRIS, LM32, M68k, MicroBlaze, MIPS, OpenRisc32, PowerPC, S/390, SH4, SPARC 32/64, Unicore32, Xtensa | Windows, Linux, macOS, Solaris, FreeBSD, OpenBSD, BeOS | Changes regularly | GPL/LGPL |
| QEMU w/ kqemu module | Fabrice Bellard | x86, x86-64 | Same as host | Linux, FreeBSD, OpenBSD, Solaris, Windows | Changes regularly | GPL/LGPL |
| QEMU w/ qvm86 module | Paul Brook | x86 | x86 | Linux, NetBSD, Windows | Changes regularly | GPL |
| QuickTransit | Transitive Corp. | x86, x86-64, IA-64, POWER | MIPS, PowerPC, SPARC, x86 | Linux, OS X, Solaris | Linux, OS X, Irix, Solaris | Proprietary |
| RTS Hypervisor | Real-Time Systems GmbH | x86, x86-64 | x86, x86-64 | No host OS | Windows, Linux, Windows Embedded, QNX, RTOS-32, VxWorks, OS-9, T-Kernel | Proprietary |
| SIMH | Bob Supnik, The Computer History Simulation Project | Alpha, ARM, HPPA, x86, IA-64, x86-64, M68K, MIPS, MIPSel, POWER, s390, SPARC | Data General Nova, Eclipse; Digital Equipment Corporation PDP-1, PDP-4, PDP-7, PDP-8, PDP-9, PDP-10, PDP-11, PDP-15, VAX; GRI Corporation GRI-909; IBM 1401, 1620, 1130, 7090/7094, System/3; Interdata (Perkin-Elmer) 16b/32b systems; Hewlett-Packard 2114, 2115, 2116, 2100, 21MX; Honeywell H316/H516; MITS Altair 8800 with 8080 and Z80; Royal McBee LGP-30, LGP-21; Scientific Data Systems SDS 940 | BSD, Linux, Solaris, VMS, Windows | Depends on target machine, includes NetBSD/VAX, OpenBSD/VAX, VAX/VMS, Unix v6, Unix v7, TOPS-10, TOPS-20, ITS | BSD-like, unique |
| Simics | Virtutech, acquired by Intel | x86, x86-64 | 8051, 68000, ARM (v4, v5, v6, v7), MIPS32, MIPS64, Cavium cnMIPS, Broadcom XLR MIPS, Freescale (e300, e500, e600, e5500, e6500), IBM (POWER, PPC44x, PPC46x, 47x), SPARC v8 (LEON), SPARC v9 (UltraSparc), x86 (from 80286 to Sandy Bridge), x86-64 (from Pentium4 to Sandy Bridge), TI TMS320C64xx, Renesas H8, Renesas SH | Windows 32-bit and 64-bit, Linux 32-bit and 64-bit | Depends on target machine, typically runs unmodified software stacks from the corresponding real target, including VxWorks, VxWorks 653, OSE, QNX, Linux, Solaris, Windows, FreeBSD, RTEMS, TinyOS, Wind River Hypervisor, VMware ESX, and others | Proprietary |
| Sun xVM Server | Sun Microsystems | x86-64, SPARC | Same as host | No host OS | Windows XP, 2003 Server (x86-64 only), Linux, Solaris | GPL version 3 |
| SVISTA 2004 | Serenity Systems International | x86 | x86 | Windows, OS/2, Linux | Windows, Linux, OS/2, BSD | Proprietary |
| TRANGO | TRANGO Virtual Processors, Grenoble, France | ARM, XScale, MIPS, PowerPC | Paravirtualized ARM, MIPS, PowerPC | No host OS, Linux or Windows as dev. hosts | Linux, eCos, μC/OS-II, WindowsCE, Nucleus, VxWorks | Proprietary |
| User Mode Linux | Jeff Dike, other developers | x86, x86-64, PowerPC | Same as host | Linux | Linux | GPL version 2 |
| VirtualBox | Innotek, acquired by Oracle Corporation | x86, x86-64 | x86, x86-64 (with Intel VT-x or AMD-V, and VirtualBox 2 or later) | Windows, Linux, macOS, Solaris, FreeBSD, eComStation | DOS, Linux, macOS, FreeBSD, Haiku, OS/2, Solaris, Syllable, Windows, and OpenBSD (with Intel VT-x or AMD-V, due to otherwise tolerated incompatibilities in the emulated memory management). | GPL version 2; full version with extra enterprise features is proprietary |
| 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 | Proprietary, some components GPLv2 |
| Virtual Machine Manager | Red Hat | x86, x86-64 | x86, x86-64 | Linux | Linux, Windows | GPL version 2 |
| Virtual PC 2007 (discontinued) | Connectix and Microsoft | x86, x86-64 | x86 | Windows Vista (Business, Enterprise, Ultimate), XP Pro, XP Tablet PC Edition | DOS, Windows, OS/2, Linux (SUSE, Xubuntu), OpenSolaris (Belenix) | Proprietary |
| Windows Virtual PC (discontinued) | Connectix and Microsoft | x86, x86-64 with Intel VT-x or AMD-V | x86 | Windows 7 | Windows XP, Windows Vista, Windows 7, Windows Server 2003, Windows Server 2008 | Proprietary |
| Virtual PC 7 for Mac | Connectix and Microsoft | PowerPC | x86 | Mac OS X | Windows, OS/2, Linux | Proprietary |
| VirtualLogix VLX | VirtualLogix | ARM, TI DSP C6000, x86, PowerPC | Same as host | No host OS | Linux, Windows XP, C5, VxWorks, Nucleus, DSP/BIOS, proprietary | Proprietary |
| Virtual Server 2005 R2 | Connectix and Microsoft | x86, x86-64 | x86, x86-64 | Windows Server 2003, 2008, XP (Requires IIS) | Windows NT, 2000, 2003, 2008, Linux (Red Hat, SUSE, Ubuntu) | Proprietary |
| Synopsys (CoWare) Virtual Platform | CoWare | x86, x86-64, SPARC v9 | Devices including (multi) cores from ARM, MIPS, PowerPC, Toshiba MeP, Renesas SH, Texas Instruments, Tensilica, ZSP | Windows, Linux, Solaris | Depends on guest CPU; includes: Linux (various flavors), μITRON (various flavors), Windows CE, Symbian, more | Proprietary |
| Virtuozzo | SWsoft, now Virtuozzo Inc | x86, IA-64, x86-64 | same as host | Linux | same as host (shared Linux kernel) | Proprietary |
| vkernel | Matthew Dillon / DragonFly BSD | x86-64 | same as host | DragonFly BSD | any compatible vkernel binary of DragonFly | BSD |
| VMM | OpenBSD | x86, x86-64 | same as host | OpenBSD | OpenBSD and Linux guests | BSD |
| VMware ESX Server | VMware | x86, x86-64 | x86, x86-64 | No host OS | Windows, Linux, Solaris, FreeBSD, OSx86 (as FreeBSD), virtual appliances, Netware, OS/2, SCO, BeOS, Haiku, Darwin, others: runs arbitrary OS | Proprietary |
| VMware ESXi | VMware | x86, x86-64 | x86, x86-64 | No host OS | Same as VMware ESX Server | Proprietary |
| VMware Fusion | VMware | x86, x86-64 | x86, x86-64 | macOS | Same as VMware ESX Server | Proprietary |
| VMware Server | VMware | x86, x86-64 | x86, x86-64 | Windows, Linux | Same as VMware ESX Server | Proprietary |
| VMware Workstation | VMware | x86-64 | x86, x86-64 | Windows, Linux | Same as VMware ESX Server | Proprietary |
| VMware Player, later VMware Workstation Player | VMware | x86-64 | x86, x86-64 | Windows, Linux | Same as VMware ESX Server | Proprietary, free for personal non-commercial use |
| 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 | Proprietary |
| 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 | GNU GPLv2 + |
| 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 | GNU GPLv2 + |
| 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 | GNU GPLv2 + |
| XtratuM | fentISS | SPARC v8 LEON2/3/4, ARM v7 | Same as host | No host OS | GPOS: Linux, RTOS: LithOS, RTEMS | Proprietary, 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 | Proprietary |
| z LPARs | IBM | z/Architecture | z/Architecture | Integrated in firmware of System z mainframes | Linux on IBM Z, z/OS, z/VSE, z/TPF, z/VM, MUSIC/SP, and predecessors | Proprietary |
| Name | Creator | Host CPU | Guest CPU | Host OS(s) | Guest OS(s) | License |

## Features

| 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 | Yes, over 500-way on current systems | No | Uses native device drivers | Operating system-level virtualization | Server consolidation with workload isolation, single workload containment, hosting, dev/test/prod | Near native | Yes |
| Hyper-V Server 2008 R2 | Yes, up to 4 VCPUs per VM | Yes | Yes | Virtualization | Server consolidation, service continuity, dev/test, desktop virtualization, cloud computing | Up to near native | Yes |
| OpenVZ | Yes | No | Compatible | Operating system-level virtualization | Virtualized server isolation | Up to near native | Yes |
| KVM | Yes | Yes | Yes | AMD-V and Intel-VT-x | Virtualized server isolation, server/desktop consolidation, software development, cloud computing, other purposes | Up to near native | Yes |
| Linux-VServer | Yes | No | Compatible | Operating system-level virtualization | Virtualized server isolation and security, server consolidation, cloud computing | Up to near native | Yes |
| Oracle VM Server for x86 | Yes | Yes | Yes | Paravirtualization and hardware virtualization | Server consolidation and security, enterprise and business deployment | Up to near native | Yes |
| Oracle VM Server for SPARC (LDoms) | Yes | Yes, but needs porting | Yes | Paravirtualization and hardware virtualization | Server consolidation and security, enterprise and business deployment | Up to near native | Yes |
| OVPsim | Yes | Yes | ? | Full system simulation with optional component virtualization | Software development (early, embedded), advanced debug for single and multicore software, compiler and other tool development, computer architecture research, hobbyist | Depends on target architecture (full and slow hardware emulation for guests incompatible with host) | Yes, with commercial license from Imperas |
| PikeOS | Yes | Yes, but modifications required as paravirtualization is used | Yes | Paravirtualization | Safety and security critical embedded systems. | Up to near native | Yes |
| Simics | Yes | Yes | Yes | Full system simulation of processors, MMUs, devices, disks, memories, networks, etc. | Software development, advanced debug for single and multicore software, compiler and other tool development, computer architecture research, bug transportation, automated testing, system architecture, long-term support of safety-critical systems, early hardware availability, virtual prototyping | Depends on host machine and target architecture. Runs at near-native speeds for x86-on-x86 using VT-x, cross-simulation of other architectures can be faster or slower than real-time depending on how fast the target is and how big the target is (number of processors, number of target machines, and how much the simulation can be parallelized) | Yes |
| Sun xVM Server | Yes | Yes | Yes | Paravirtualization and porting or hardware virtualization | Servers, Development | Up to near native | Yes |
| SVISTA 2004 | No | ? | ? | ? | Hobbyist, Developer, Business workstation | ? | ? |
| TRANGO | Yes | Yes | Yes | Paravirtualization and porting or hardware virtualization | Mob. phone, STB, routers, etc. | Near native | ? |
| User Mode Linux | ? | No | special guest kernel+modules required | Porting | Developer (as a separate machine for a server or with X11 networking) | Non-significantly slower than native (all calls to kernel are proxied) | ? |
| OKL4 Microvisor | Yes | Yes, (either with para-virtualization or HW virtualization) | Yes | Paravirtualization, Hardware assisted virtualization | Mobile, embedded, security, safety critical, networking, legacy OS, etc. | Near native | Yes |
| Oracle VirtualBox | Yes | Yes | Yes | Virtualization | Business workstation, server consolidation, service continuity, developer, hobbyist | Up to near native | Yes (with commercial license) |
| Virtual Iron 3.1 | Yes, up to 8 way | Yes | Yes | Native virtualization | Server consolidation, service continuity, dev/test | ? | Yes |
| Virtual PC 2007 | No | Yes | Yes | Virtualization, guest calls trapping where supported | Hobbyist, Developer, Business workstation | Up to near native with virtual machine additions | ? |
| Windows Virtual PC | Yes | Yes | Yes | Hardware virtualization | Developer, Business workstation, support for Compatibility with Windows XP applications | Up to near native with virtual machine additions | No |
| Virtual PC 7 for Mac | No | Yes | Yes | dynamic recompilation (guest calls trapping where supported) | Hobbyist, Developer, Business workstation | Slow | ? |
| Virtual Server 2005 R2 | No | Yes | Yes | Virtualization (guest calls trapping where supported) | Server, server farm | Up to near native with virtual machine additions but slower than with hypervisor due to proxied calls | ? |
| CoWare Virtual Platform | Yes | Yes | Yes ( Same compiled Software image as for the real device) | Full-system virtualization (Processor Core ISA + Hardware + External connections) | Early embedded software development and integration (from driver to application), Multi-core software debugging and optimization | Depending on the system characteristics and the software itself, ranges from faster than real time to slow. | Yes |
| Virtuozzo | Yes | No | Compatible | Operating system-level virtualization | Server consolidation, service continuity, disaster recovery, service providers | Up to near native | Yes |
| VMware ESXi Server 5.5 (vSphere) | Yes, add-on, up to 64 way | No | Yes | Virtualization | Server consolidation, service continuity, dev/test, cloud computing, business critical applications, Infrastructure as a Service IaaS | Up to near native | Yes |
| VMware ESX Server 4.0 (vSphere) | Yes, add-on, up to 8 way | Yes | Yes | Virtualization | Server consolidation, service continuity, dev/test, cloud computing | Up to near native | Yes |
| VMware ESX Server 3.0 | Yes, add-on, up to 4 way | Yes | Yes | Virtualization | Server consolidation, service continuity, dev/test | Up to near native | Yes |
| VMware ESX Server 2.5.3 | Yes, add-on, 2 way | Yes | Yes | Virtualization | Server consolidation, service continuity, dev/test | Up to near native | Yes |
| VMware Fusion | Yes | Yes | Yes | Virtualization | Hobbyist, Developer, Tester, Business workstation | Up to near native | Yes |
| VMware Server | Yes (2-way) | Yes | Yes | Virtualization | Server/desktop consolidation, dev/test | Up to near native | Yes |
| VMware Workstation | Yes (2-way) | Yes | Yes | Paravirtualization (VMI) and virtualization | Technical professional, advanced dev/test, trainer | Up to near native | Yes |
| VMware Player | Yes | Yes | Yes | Virtualization | Technical professional, advanced dev/test, trainer, end user on prebuilt machines | Up to near native | No |
| Xen | Yes, v4.0.0: up to 128 VCPUs per VM | Yes | Yes | Paravirtualization and porting or hardware virtualization | Virtualized server isolation, server/desktop consolidation, software development, cloud computing, other purposes. Xen powers most public cloud services and many hosting services, such as Amazon Web Services, Rackspace Hosting and Linode. | Up to native | Yes |
| XenServer | Yes | Yes | Yes | Paravirtualization and porting or hardware virtualization | Virtualized server isolation, server/desktop consolidation, software development, cloud computing, other purposes. Xen powers most public cloud services and many hosting services, such as Amazon Web Services, Rackspace Hosting and Linode. | Up to native | Yes |
| XtratuM | Yes | No | Yes | Paravirtualization | Embedded, safety critical, secure | Near to native | Yes |
| z/VM | Yes, both real and virtual (guest perceives more CPUs than installed), incl. dynamic CPU provisioning and reassignment | Yes | Yes, but not required | Virtualization (among first systems to provide hardware assists) | Servers | Near native | Yes |
| z LPARs | Yes, both real and virtual (guest perceives more CPUs than installed), incl. dynamic CPU provisioning and reassignment; up to 64 real cores | Yes | Yes, but not required | Microcode and hardware hypervisor | Servers | Native: System z machines always run with at least one LPAR | Yes |
| 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 |
* ^ Providing any virtual environment usually requires some overhead of some type or another. Native usually means that the virtualization technique does not do any CPU level virtualization (like Bochs), which executes code more slowly than when it is directly executed by a CPU. Some other products such as VMware and Virtual PC use similar approaches to Bochs and QEMU, however they use a number of advanced techniques to shortcut most of the calls directly to the CPU (similar to the process that JIT compiler uses) to bring the speed to near native in most cases. However, some products such as coLinux, Xen, z/VM (in real mode) do not suffer the cost of CPU-level slowdowns as the CPU-level instructions are not proxied or executing against an emulated architecture since the guest OS or hardware is providing the environment for the applications to run under. However access to many of the other resources on the system, such as devices and memory may be proxied or emulated in order to broker those shared services out to all the guests, which may cause some slow downs as compared to running outside of virtualization.
* ^ OS-level virtualization is described as "native" speed, however some groups have found overhead as high as 3% for some operations, but generally figures come under 1%, so long as secondary effects do not appear.
* ^ See for a paper comparing performance of paravirtualization approaches (e.g. Xen) with OS-level virtualization
* ^ Requires patches/recompiling.
* ^ Exceptional for lightweight, paravirtualized, single-user VM/CMS interactive shell: largest customers run several thousand users on even single prior models. For multiprogramming OSes like Linux on IBM Z and z/OS that make heavy use of native supervisor state instructions, performance will vary depending on nature of workload but is near native. Hundreds into the low thousands of Linux guests are possible on a single machine for certain workloads.

## Image type compatibility

| Name | floppy | ISO | folders on host | physical disk / device | raw / flat (whole disk) | raw / flat (partition) | hdd (Parallels) | QCOW (QEMU) | QCOW2 (QEMU) | QED (QEMU) | VDI (VirtualBox) | VHD (Connectix Virtual PC) | VHDX (Hyper-V) | VMDK (VMware) |
| 86Box | Yes | Yes | CD-ROM drive only | No | Yes | No | No | No | No | No | No | Yes | No | No |
| Bochs | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | No | No | No | No | Yes | Yes | No | v3, v4 |
| Containers, or Zones | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? |
| Cooperative Linux (coLinux) | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? |
| CHARON | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? |
| Denali | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? |
| DOSBox | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | ? | No | No | DOSBox-X fork | No | No | No | No | No |
| DOSEMU | ? | ? | Yes | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? |
| FreeBSD Jail | No | No | Yes | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No |
| GXemul | ? | Yes | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? |
| Hercules | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? |
| Hyper-V (2008 R2) | Yes | Yes | No | Yes | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | Yes | No | No |
| Hyper-V (2012) | Yes | Yes | No | Yes | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | Yes | Yes | No |
| Hyper-V (2012 R2) | Yes | Yes | No | Yes | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | Yes | Yes | No |
| Integrity Virtual Machines | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? |
| JPC (Virtual Machine) | Yes | Yes | Yes | ? | Yes | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? |
| Linux-VServer | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? |
| LynxSecure | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? |
| LXC | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? |
| OpenVZ | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? |
| Oracle VM Server for x86 | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? |
| Oracle VM Server for SPARC (LDoms) | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? |
| OVPsim | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? |
| Parallels Desktop for Mac | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | Yes | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? |
| Parallels Workstation | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | Yes | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? |
| PearPC | No | Yes | No | Yes | Yes | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No |
| PikeOS | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? |
| PowerVM | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? |
| QEMU | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | read-only | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | except difference type | Yes |
| QEMU w/ kqemu module | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | Yes | No | No | ? | ? | ? | ? |
| QEMU w/ qvm86 module | ? | ? | ? | Yes | Yes | ? | ? | Yes | Yes | ? | ? | ? | ? | Yes |
| QuickTransit | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? |
| SIMH | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? |
| Simics | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? |
| Sun xVM Server | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? |
| SVISTA 2004 | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? |
| TRANGO | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? |
| User Mode Linux | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? |
| VirtualBox | Yes | Yes | With guest integration installed on guest os. | Yes | Yes | Yes | up to v2 | Yes | read-only | Yes | Yes | Yes | Can read existing disks, but not create new disks. | Yes |
| Virtual Iron 3.1 | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? |
| Virtual PC 2007 | Yes | Yes | ? | ? | ? | ? | No | No | No | No | No | Yes | No | No |
| Windows Virtual PC | Yes | Yes | ? | ? | ? | ? | No | No | No | No | No | Yes | Yes | No |
| Virtual PC 7 for Mac | Yes | Yes | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | Yes | No | No |
| VirtualLogix VLX | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? |
| Virtual Server 2005 R2 | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? |
| Synopsys (CoWare) Virtual Platform | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? |
| Virtuozzo | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? |
| VMware ESX Server | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | Yes | ? | ? |
| VMware ESXi | Yes | Yes | No | Yes | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | No | Yes |
| VMware Fusion | ? | Yes | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | Yes |
| VMware Server | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | Yes |
| VMware Workstation | Yes | Yes | ? | Yes | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | Yes |
| VMware Player | Yes | Yes | ? | Partial | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | Yes |
| Wind River Hypervisor | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? |
| Wind River VxWorks MILS Platform | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? |
| Xen | Yes | Yes | ? | Yes | Yes | ? | ? | Yes | Yes | ? | ? | Yes | ? | ? |
| XenServer | Yes | Yes | ? | Yes | Yes | ? | ? | Yes | Yes | ? | ? | Yes | ? | ? |
| XtratuM | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? |
| z/VM | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? |
| z LPARs | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? |
| Name | floppy | ISO | folders on host | physical disk / device | raw / flat (whole disk) | raw / flat (partition) | hdd (Parallels) | QCOW (QEMU) | QCOW2 (QEMU) | QED (QEMU) | VDI (VirtualBox) | VHD (Connectix Virtual PC) | VHDX (Hyper-V) | VMDK (VMware) |

## Other features

| Name | Can boot an OS on another disk partition as guest | USB support | GUI | Live memory allocation | 3D acceleration | Snapshots per VM | Snapshot of running system | Live migration | Shared folders | Shared clipboard | PCI passthrough |
| KVM | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes (via AIGLX) | Yes | Yes | Yes | | | Yes |
| User Mode Linux | Yes | No | No | No | No | | | No | Yes | N/A | |
| Containers, or Zones | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Not needed | Yes | Yes | No | Yes | Not needed | Not needed |
| DosBox | No | No | SVN builds only | No | Glide (SVN builds only) | No | Yes | No | No | No | No |
| Oracle VirtualBox (formerly OSE, GPLv2), with Guest Additions (GPLv2) | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes branched | Yes | Yes | with Guest Additions | with Guest Additions | No |
| Oracle VirtualBox with Extension Pack (PUEL) and Guest Additions (GPLv2) | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | OpenGL 2.0 and Direct3D 8/9 | Yes branched | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Retired (Until 6.0; Linux only) |
| Oracle VM Server for SPARC (LDoms) | Yes | USB 2.0 | Yes | Yes | No | Yes | No | Yes | Yes | No | Yes |
| OKL4 Microvisor | Yes | Yes | VMs only | Yes | Yes | | | No | | | Static assignment |
| Virtual Iron 4.2 | | | | | | | | Yes | | | |
| Virtual PC 2007 | No | No | Yes | No | No | | | No | Yes | Yes | |
| Windows Virtual PC | No | partially | Yes | No | No | | | No | Yes | Yes | |
| VirtualPC 7 for Mac | No | Yes | Yes | Yes | No | | | No | Yes | Yes | |
| Microsoft Virtual Server 2005 R2 | | No | Yes | No | No | ? | Yes | No | | | |
| Microsoft Hyper-V Server 2008 R2 | Yes | Partial support over remote desktop connections | Yes | Yes | DirectX 9.0c (via RemoteFX) | Yes branched | Yes | Yes | | | No |
| Microsoft Hyper-V Server 2012 R2 | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | DirectX 9.0c (via RemoteFX) | Yes branched | Yes | Yes | | | No |
| Virtuozzo | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | No | | | Yes | | | |
| VMware ESX Server 3.0 atp | | | Yes | | No | ? | Yes | Yes | | | No |
| VMware ESX Server 2.5.3 | | | Yes | | No | | | | | | No |
| VMware ESX Server 4.0 – 6.x (vSphere) | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | No | No | Yes |
| VMware Fusion 2.0 | Yes | Yes | Yes | No | DirectX 9 Shader model 2 | | | No | | | No |
| VMware Server | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | No | 1 | Yes | No | Yes | Yes | |
| VMware Workstation 5.5 | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Experimental support for DirectX 8; also supported with VMGL | Yes branched | Yes | No | Yes | Yes | No |
| VMware Workstation 6.0 | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Experimental support for DirectX 8; Also supported with VMGL | Yes branched | Yes | No | Yes | Yes | No |
| VMware Workstation 7.0 and 8.0 | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Support for DirectX 9.0c Shader Model 3 and OpenGL 2.13D. | Yes branched | Yes | No | Yes | Yes | No |
| VMware Player | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | supported with VMGL | No | No | No | Yes | | No |
| Wind River hypervisor | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | | | No | | | |
| Wind River VxWorks MILS Platform | Yes | | | | | | | | | | |
| Xen | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Supported with VMGL | ? | Yes | Yes | | | Yes |
| XenServer | Yes | | Yes | Yes | Supported with VMGL | Yes | Yes | Yes | | | Yes |
| z/VM | Yes | Not applicable | Yes (zURM/HMC) | Yes | Not applicable | | | Yes (2011) | | Not applicable | Not applicable |
| z LPARs | Yes | Not applicable | Yes (HMC) | Yes | Not applicable | | | Yes (2007) | | Not applicable | Not applicable |
| Name | Can boot an OS on another disk partition as guest | USB | GUI | Live memory allocation | 3D acceleration | Snapshots per VM | Snapshot of running system | Live migration | Shared folders | Shared clipboard | PCI passthrough |
* ^ Windows Server 2008 R2 SP1 and Windows 7 SP1 have limited support for redirecting the USB protocol over RDP using RemoteFX.
* ^ Windows Server 2008 R2 SP1 adds accelerated graphics support for certain editions of Windows Server 2008 R2 SP1 and Windows 7 SP1 using RemoteFX.

## Restrictions

This table is meant to outline restrictions in the software dictated by licensing or capabilities.
| 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 |
| Containers, or Zones | No theoretical limit (largest SPARC has 384 physical cores) | 32 TB (largest SPARC) | No limit | 8191 | No limit | No limit | No limit | No limit |
| VMware Player 15.0 | No limit | No limit | No limit | No limit | 16 | 4 GB (32-bit); 64 GB (64-bit) | ? | 8 TB |
| VMware vSphere Hypervisor (ESXi 4.1) | 160 logical cores | 1 TB | 2 TB minus 512 bytes | 320 | 8 | 255 GB | 4 IDE; 60 SCSI | 2 TB minus 512 bytes |
| VMware vSphere Hypervisor (ESXi 5.0) | 160 logical cores | 2 TB | 64 TB | 512 | 32 | 1 TB | 4 IDE; 60 SCSI | 2 TB minus 512 bytes |
| VMware vSphere Hypervisor (ESXi 5.5) (free) | 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) | 16 NUMA Nodes / 320 logical CPUs | 4 TB | Depending on filesystem | 512 | 64 | 1 TB | 4 IDE; 60 SCSI; 120 SATA | 62 TB |
| VMware vSphere Hypervisor (ESXi 6.7) | 16 NUMA Nodes / 768 logical CPUs | 16 TB | Depending on filesystem | 1024 | 256 | 6128 GB | 4 IDE; 256 SCSI; 120 SATA; 60 NVMe | 62 TB |
| VMware vSphere Hypervisor (ESXi 7.0) | 16 NUMA Nodes / 896 logical CPUs | 24 TB | Depending on filesystem | 1024 | 768 | 24 TB | 4 IDE; 256 SCSI; 120 SATA; 60 NVMe | 62 TB |
| VirtualBox | No limit | No limit | No limit | No limit | 32 | No limit | 4 IDE; no limit for SATA, SCSI, SAS | GUI: 2 TB Command line: no limit |
| Microsoft Hyper-V Server 2008 R2 | 64 cores / 8 CPUs | 1 TB | No limit | 384 | 4 | 64 GB | 4 IDE; 256 SCSI | 2 TB |
| Microsoft Hyper-V Server 2012 | 320 cores / 64 CPUs | 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 |
| 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.