Is KVM/OLVM Winning Over VMware vSphere

In the past, most IT applications ran on physical servers, which were often underutilized, especially x86 servers. Data centers were becoming overcrowded with servers, and power consumption was a major issue. Blade servers were popular because they helped to reduce space requirements.

Server virtualization became popular after 2000s because it allowed businesses to use their hardware more efficiently and save money. Virtualization allows multiple virtual machines (VMs) to run on a single physical server, even if the VMs are not using all of the server's resources at the same time. This means that businesses can reduce the number of physical servers they need, which saves them money on hardware, power, and cooling costs.

Server virtualization has become the standard practice in the IT industry. According to a 2020 survey by Spiceworks, more than 92% of businesses are already using virtualization, and another 5% plan to start using it within the next two years. Server virtualization has also been essential for the development of public clouds.

VMware vSphere is the market leader for on-premises server virtualization, in all business sizes. This is because it was the first to market with a server virtualization solution for standard x86 servers. Its popularity has grown due to its advanced capabilities, such as application isolation, workload portability, scalability, top-of-rack virtualization, storage virtualization, high availability options, backup integration, and disaster recovery options. These advances have enabled businesses to deploy applications more quickly, improve application availability, and operate and manage their IT infrastructure more efficiently, with lower capital expenditures (CapEx).

So, how can it be said that KVM is winning if VMware is the predominant hypervisor, especially given VMware's clear market leadership?

The cost savings of VMware vSphere have eroded over time. Licensing costs and the proprietary lock-in nature of VMware have become increasingly significant parts of the IT budget, causing anxiety among CIOs and CFOs. IT organizations are under constant pressure to reduce costs without sacrificing capabilities. Hypervisors are not immune to this pressure. The cost of VMware has become a major issue for every IT organization tasked with doing more with less.

Many organizations have evaluated and switched to Microsoft Hyper-V as a lower-cost alternative to VMware vSphere. However, the cost difference has not been significant.

KVM is an increasingly popular open source hypervisor. It is part of the Linux kernel and distributed with Linux. There are no license costs for KVM, just as there are no license costs for Linux. The only direct costs of KVM are distributor support costs, unless the IT organization wants to handle support on its own. KVM also has additional indirect cost savings over VMware vSphere. This combination gives KVM a significant cost advantage over VMware vSphere.

Price is always a factor, but total cost of ownership (TCO) is a much bigger factor. There are several other significant factors as to why KVM is rapidly overtaking the market. and how the additional advantages of the Oracle Linux KVM distribution play a significant role in why KVM is winning over VMware vSphere.

1. KVM Open-Source Advantage:

2. KVM Performance Advantage: KVM runs applications faster than any other hypervisor including VMware vSphere, at near native speeds.(https://www.spec.org/virt_sc2013/results/specvirt_sc2013_perf.html)

3. KVM Scalability Advantage

4. KVM TCO Advantage: KVM has several cost advantages over VMware vSphere. It starts with licensing. There is none. Yes, there are support costs whether from the KVM distributor or internal administrators. Those costs are also less than VMware vSphere. VMware requires the purchase of licenses for add-on products and features such as VSAN (virtualized storage) and NSX (virtualized switching). The licensing generally requires an Enterprise license agreement (ELA). The ELA can save some budget up front while increasing costs over time as capacity and functionality are added. VMware has a free variation of that just has support costs. It is meant for low end users to compete with KVM. However, the free is functional but stripped of the most useful and commonly utilized features. It’s designed to motivate users to the license version. Other cost savings include reduced hardware, supporting infrastructure hardware, power, cooling, management, operations, and troubleshooting time costs.

5. Technical Advantage:

>Hard Partitioning

>Oracle Linux Ksplice Zero-Downtime Patching

>Native Bi-directional Cloud Migration

>Accelerated Application Deployments

>Oracle Clusterware

>Oracle DTrace

>Straightforward Oracle Linux KVM Support Pricing

Happy Reading / Salim Reza