Kernel-based Virtual Machine (KVM) vs. Linux Containers LXD

Kernel-based Virtual Machine (KVM)

Linux Containers LXD

Overview
Product	Rating	Most Used By	Product Summary	Starting Price
KVM	Score 2.1 out of 10	N/A	Kernel-based Virtual Machine (KVM) is a virtualization solution developed by small Israeli software company Qumranet and supported by Red Hat since that company's acquisition in 2008.	N/A
LXD	Score 9.9 out of 10	N/A	LXD is a system container and virtual machine manager. It offers a unified user experience around full Linux systems running inside containers or virtual machines. LXD is image based and provides images for a wide number of Linux distributions. It supports various use cases, with support for different storage backends and network types and the option to install on hardware ranging from an individual laptop or cloud instance to a full server rack. LXD is written in Go. It is free software…	N/A

Pricing

Kernel-based Virtual Machine (KVM)

Linux Containers LXD

Editions & Modules

No answers on this topic

Offerings

Pricing Offerings
KVM	LXD
Free Trial
No	No
Free/Freemium Version
No	Yes
Premium Consulting/Integration Services
No	No

Entry-level Setup Fee

No setup fee

Additional Details

—

More Pricing Information

Community Pulse
	Kernel-based Virtual Machine (KVM)	Linux Containers LXD
Considered Both Products	KVM Verified User Anonymous Chose KVM Kernel-based Virtual Machine is an open-source and free solution, compared to Virtualbox which is a product from Oracle. Incentivized Helpful? Verified User Anonymous Chose KVM The key points why I made my decision for KVM in comparison with VMWare are: Freeware software (I am using an Ubuntu server OS), Fewer resources usage, vSwitch using that provides the ability to configure dot1q trunks to/between VMs, Stability, and simplicity of … Incentivized Helpful? RM Robert Munteanu Software Engineer Chose KVM Compared to VirtualBox, KVM has simpler licensing terms and is supported by the operating system vendor. KVM also has more mature integrations with other open-source projects. Automating provisioning is simple with KVM since it is available in the package repositories of … Incentivized Helpful? Valentin Höbel Senior Consultant IT Infrastructure Chose KVM KVM is free and provides environments where guests can run their own Kernel while still performing very well. It is also very native to work with KVM since it is integrated within the Linux Kernel. Incentivized Helpful? Stenio Pereira Filho IT Group manager Chose KVM It is a very reliable solution that can be used for x86 architecture virtualization with low overhead. It is a free and open source software. Easy to use withOpenStack. Incentivized Helpful? Verified User Anonymous Chose KVM We've found KVM to be less problematic, both from a stabilty standpoint, but also in a flexibility and licensing standpoint. We love being able to deploy the hardware we want, as we want it, without needing the blessing of a specific vendor. Incentivized Helpful?	LXD Verified User Anonymous Chose LXD Linux Containers LXD feels like a more primitive version of docker, docker-compose and similar projects from the docker ecosystem. The Dockerfile and docker-compose.yml methods of specifying a container setup, as well as the network and file configurations afforded by Docker … Incentivized Helpful?

Features

Kernel-based Virtual Machine (KVM)

Linux Containers LXD

Server Virtualization

Comparison of Server Virtualization features of Product A and Product B
	Kernel-based Virtual Machine (KVM) 9.2 Ratings 12% above category average	Linux Containers LXD - Ratings
Virtual machine automated provisioning	9.00 Ratings	00 Ratings
Management console	9.00 Ratings	00 Ratings
Live virtual machine backup	9.70 Ratings	00 Ratings
Live virtual machine migration	9.00 Ratings	00 Ratings
Hypervisor-level security	9.50 Ratings	00 Ratings

Best Alternatives
	Kernel-based Virtual Machine (KVM)	Linux Containers LXD
Small Businesses	DigitalOcean Droplets Score 8.7 out of 10	Portainer Score 9.6 out of 10
Medium-sized Companies	VMware vSOM (discontinued) Score 10.0 out of 10	Red Hat OpenShift Score 9.3 out of 10
Enterprises	VMware vSOM (discontinued) Score 10.0 out of 10	Red Hat OpenShift Score 9.3 out of 10
All Alternatives	View all alternatives	View all alternatives

User Ratings
	Kernel-based Virtual Machine (KVM)	Linux Containers LXD
Likelihood to Recommend	9.3 (0 ratings)	6.4 (0 ratings)

User Testimonials
	Kernel-based Virtual Machine (KVM)	Linux Containers LXD
Likelihood to Recommend	Kernel-based Virtual Machine is very well suited when one needs a single-node virtualization host or needs to build a complex demo setting on their own notebook (e.g. when demonstrating solutions to a customer). Incentivized Valentin Höbel Senior Consultant IT Infrastructure Read full review	Scenarios where you need an authentication server, a GIT repository the system works very well 'cause you don't need any scalability and the ease to configure and share the same Linux system image across the containers and the rollback process is quick. I didn't put any critical applications there not because of the limitations but due to a company policy. Incentivized Verified User Anonymous Read full review
Pros	Lightweight built-in implementation for all *nix based OS. Easy to deploy and manage VMs. Freeware (is you are using a free OS). Incentivized Verified User Anonymous Read full review	GIT repositories. Authentication servers. Application instances. Incentivized Verified User Anonymous Read full review
Cons	KVM itself doesn't ship with a management interface KVM itself is a bit complicated to handle KVM needs Qemu to virtualize Windows guests Incentivized Valentin Höbel Senior Consultant IT Infrastructure Read full review	Ease of use. Copying containers from one machine to another. Creation of containers with config files similar to Docker. Incentivized Verified User Anonymous Read full review
Usability	It does the job and stays out of the way. The specifics of usability relies on the implementation, but with things like Icarus and libvirt, things are standardizing nicely. Incentivized Verified User Anonymous Read full review	No answers on this topic
Alternatives Considered	The key points why I made my decision for KVM in comparison with VMWare are: Freeware software (I am using an Ubuntu server OS), Fewer resources usage, vSwitch using that provides the ability to configure dot1q trunks to/between VMs, Stability, and simplicity of using/troubleshooting, Well-known interface (for Linux geeks). Incentivized Verified User Anonymous Read full review	Linux Containers LXD feels like a more primitive version of docker, docker-compose and similar projects from the docker ecosystem. The Dockerfile and docker-compose.yml methods of specifying a container setup, as well as the network and file configurations afforded by Docker make working with containers much easier and more reproducible than with Linux Containers LXD. Incentivized Verified User Anonymous Read full review
Return on Investment	Capital expenditure costs are low, because is open-source and free Operational expenditure costs are medium because it's necessary [to have] an IT team with experience in Linux First step to the virtualization world. Wake up, we are in the 21st century Incentivized Stenio Pereira Filho IT Group manager Read full review	Quicker development cycles. Reduced need for different physical machines or servers. Standardized development environment. Incentivized Verified User Anonymous Read full review
ScreenShots