Nutanix AHV vs. VMware vSphere

Overview
ProductRatingMost Used ByProduct SummaryStarting Price
Nutanix AHV
Score 9.0 out of 10
N/A
Nutanix AHV is presented as a modern and secure virtualization platform that powers VMs and containers for applications and cloud-native workloads on-premises and in public clouds. Its tools and automated workflows simplify the day-to-day administration of VMs and containers.N/A
VMware vSphere
Score 8.4 out of 10
N/A
An enterprise workload platform, vSphere is used to improve the performance for a data center. It is used to boost operational efficiency, supercharge workload performance, and accelerate innovation.
$995
per year
Pricing
Nutanix AHVVMware vSphere
Editions & Modules
No answers on this topic
Standard
$995.00
per year
Enterprise
$3,995.00
per year
Offerings
Pricing Offerings
Nutanix AHVVMware vSphere
Free Trial
NoNo
Free/Freemium Version
NoNo
Premium Consulting/Integration Services
NoNo
Entry-level Setup FeeNo setup feeNo setup fee
Additional Details
More Pricing Information
Community Pulse
Nutanix AHVVMware vSphere
Considered Both Products
Nutanix AHV
Chose Nutanix AHV
Easy to understand and friendly
Chose Nutanix AHV
Overall market share, reputation and innovation drove us to Nutanix AHV over the other options.
Chose Nutanix AHV
We left VMware due to the price alone, and we have no regrets. Nutanix has been a reliable and efficient platform.
Chose Nutanix AHV
Nutanix AOS makes the basic operations (adding recourses and performing updates) a lot easier.
Chose Nutanix AHV
50/50, not much in it, to be honest. Nutanix AOS wins on the support, training, and certification ease but Dell / EMC has the name and integration support with its other products (e.g., Nutanix not supporting Networkers hot add mode).
Chose Nutanix AHV
By far, in my opinion, Nutanix AOS is heads above VMware. From the creation of a VM to updating the nodes themselves, Nutanix AOS is so much easier, faster, and just an overall better product. I would choose Nutanix AOS over VMware any day.
Chose Nutanix AHV
VMware ESXi has been around much longer and because of this is much more fully featured. However, on the flip side, it then makes Nutanix AOS much less complicated to operate. Nutanix AOS online support (and knowledge base articles) are very well written and comprehensive. …
Chose Nutanix AHV
Nutanix [AOS] is a hyper-converged solution, and in the vSphere it was originally designed for the use of SAN, although they also have a hyper-converged solution. But the architecture and load testing showed the inconsistency of the hyper-converged solution from VMware.
Chose Nutanix AHV
Nutanix [AOS] is the preference as it has good management tools but may be a bit more costly.
Chose Nutanix AHV
The simplicity of the license means no need for a new storage array and hardware. Gartner report.
Chose Nutanix AHV
Nutanix is faster and easier, and more reliable than HPE SimpliVity.
Chose Nutanix AHV
As mentioned before I feel that Nutanix meets or exceeds the capabilities of the competition, where that is in ease of use, how well they support their platform, upgrading software, migrating VM's from another hypervisor to Nutanix or simply moving VM's between one Nutanix …
Chose Nutanix AHV
VMWare is too complex to run in compare to Nutanix
Chose Nutanix AHV
Ease of use and better support to the business.
Chose Nutanix AHV
Nutanix AOS is far superior to VMware. Both in cost and performance.
Chose Nutanix AHV
Citrix Hypervisor (formerly XenServer), VMware Horizon (formerly VMware View) and VMware ESXi
Chose Nutanix AHV
Our experience was good with VMware, but much more and on another level with Nutanix.

Chose Nutanix AHV
There are other clustering solutions, to be sure. And there are significantly less expensive solutions for preventing downtime, such as Hyper-V replication, which is what I was using before Nutanix. But Nutanix is in the upper-right of the Gartner magic quadrant for …
Chose Nutanix AHV
VxRail was more expensive and used a different storage algorithm that we didn't find to be most efficient .
Chose Nutanix AHV
We looked at both Simplivity and Cisco Hyperflex. Both are pretty good in their own right. Simplivity was very 'efficient' in the way they handled data, but we didn't like the idea of a propitiatory hardware card. Cisco's Hyperflex was our second choice, but we were so …
VMware vSphere
Chose VMware vSphere
VMware vSphere is leader in virtualization segment and ease of use and manageability is very easy and integrated with more vendors in ecosystem like Redhat openshift, VMware vSphere is directly integrated whereas for Nutanix you require third party tools. VMware vSphere is …
Chose VMware vSphere
Hyperv is great for limited vm build out, low cost companies, and limited in size organizations. Microsoft has a great product but its just not a robust and scalable as vsphere is. Citrix's platform is great for simple virtualization needs and for special 3D graphics …
Chose VMware vSphere
vSphere is superior to any other on-premises hypervisor that I've personally used or heard about. vSphere is the de facto industry standard, receives substantially more partner support and investment, and benefits from a significantly longer maturation period than other …
Chose VMware vSphere
vSphere provides more control over the Virtualization environment.
It allows users to have great management User Interface with lots of dynamic features.
VM creation.
Chose VMware vSphere
We could not migrate to AOS then due to limitation by SAP supportability. A few months after going live, there was a whitepaper saying that AHV will now support it. We continued to use vSphere. It has given us what we need to be agile and extremely efficient with our hardware …
Chose VMware vSphere
I have never used another product like vSphere.
Chose VMware vSphere
vSphere simply is best-in-class for its features and functionality. It does guest OS management, thin provisioning, deployment, management, networking, vMotion, and automation better than all the rest. vSphere is always the first to implement new and advanced features and push …
Chose VMware vSphere
We came from VirtualBox where every user had their own VMs and was responsible for managing them. Turns out that's not a great solution when people leave or when disaster strikes. Further, the performance was abysmal.
Chose VMware vSphere
We have tried a few other virtualization platforms, and even though you do pay for the support, it's worth it for the extra you get. Datastore migration, host migration affinity rules are all tools we use that others don't seem to have. And if they do, they don't work as well.
Chose VMware vSphere
There's no comparison, VMWare is the market leader. It's pricey, but its feature set is years ahead of the competition. In particular, the ability to manage a large fleet of servers across multiple sites through a single pane of glass is great!
Chose VMware vSphere
We have a very small environment of Xenserver.
Chose VMware vSphere
We opted for vSphere because of our IaaS/PaaS provider. Being one of the pioneers in server virtualization, VMware have proven to be quite reliable and robust, and thus widely adopted by virtualization service providers including ours. Also, the price is noticeably lower using …
Chose VMware vSphere
Requires specific set of hardware where VMware works on everything
Chose VMware vSphere
We started testing our virtual infrastructure back 9 years ago we test XenServer but it was too complicated for us. When we tested vSphere from Vmware, It just worked, all we had to do was click. At the time, we were looking to have a virtualized video security server and …
Chose VMware vSphere
I have only used Hyper-V on a workstation. Not to the same standard as VMware. From what I have seen, VMware vSphere console has a whole lot more features but I cannot fully tell you that one is better than the other.
Chose VMware vSphere
I researched on the web and upon stumbling on millions and millions of articles, found that vSphere is a technology that was leading in the magic quadrant at that time. The technology was able to cater to the business needs and requirements for its vision and goals. The …
Chose VMware vSphere
In terms of security, VMware has made important security enhancements, which now provides the same security features and level as Hyper-V. In terms of scalability, VMware improved scalability, which supports up to 64 hosts in the cluster now and it can now accommodate more than …
Chose VMware vSphere
vSphere is much easier to use for a larger enterprise and also is easier to set up than Hyper-V. XenServer is simply not popular so while not a bad choice it is not the best because so little will be available for it. I cannot speak to the latest versions of Citrix since I …
Chose VMware vSphere
vSphere is superior to Hyper-V. I have had several issues in Hyper-V that I have not experienced in vSphere. vSphere just works. It costs more money, but it works. I am curious to see the outcome of the Microsoft licensing model as they try to take on VMWare with Hyper-V. …
Chose VMware vSphere
It is the best for the value and the main other option is Hyper V.
Chose VMware vSphere
vSphere is more robust than VirtualBox and is widely used so VSphere is the product of choice to avoid compatibility issues.
Chose VMware vSphere
vSphere has a lot more feature sets than Hyper-V but at a much higher cost of entry versus MS Hyper-V. I have not been able to play with Hyper-V as much as I would have liked, but the setup and ongoing maintenance seems to be easier in vSphere than with Hyper-V
Chose VMware vSphere
vSphere has more functionality than workstation pro and Hyper-v from Microsoft. It is expensive but for a good reason, the amount of control you have with vSphere is amazing. VMware is constantly adding new features and keeps their software up to date. Hyper-V is great but with …
Features
Nutanix AHVVMware vSphere
Server Virtualization
Comparison of Server Virtualization features of Product A and Product B
Nutanix AHV
8.9
Ratings
9% above category average
VMware vSphere
7.2
Ratings
12% below category average
Virtual machine automated provisioning8.80 Ratings7.00 Ratings
Management console8.80 Ratings7.00 Ratings
Live virtual machine backup9.10 Ratings6.00 Ratings
Live virtual machine migration8.60 Ratings8.00 Ratings
Hypervisor-level security9.10 Ratings8.00 Ratings
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Nutanix AHVVMware vSphere
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Medium-sized Companies
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Enterprises
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User Ratings
Nutanix AHVVMware vSphere
Likelihood to Recommend
9.0
(0 ratings)
7.0
(0 ratings)
Likelihood to Renew
10.0
(0 ratings)
7.0
(0 ratings)
Usability
9.1
(0 ratings)
8.0
(0 ratings)
Performance
8.9
(0 ratings)
-
(0 ratings)
Support Rating
9.1
(0 ratings)
8.0
(0 ratings)
Implementation Rating
-
(0 ratings)
9.0
(0 ratings)
User Testimonials
Nutanix AHVVMware vSphere
Likelihood to Recommend
[Nutanix AOS] is good when you need easy scaling and high reliability. The good architecture of the solution allows to solve the tasks set for the platform. This solution allows to reduce the number of personnel serving the infrastructure due to the ease of management and a good knowledge base. As a disadvantage, I would attribute the complexity of customizing some types of loads to optimal work on DFS, for example, high-load databases.
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vSphere is well suited for multiple VMWare hosts and can be very useful in larger enterprises where vMotion is used to load balance and failover running virtual machines. In smaller businesses with one or two hosts then the features can be overkill. The addition of virtual TPM support is a very nice addition to provide vm security in a more Microsoft supported methodology.
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Pros
  • One component to support both compute and storage needs for virtualization.
  • Easy expandable as business needs arise both at the node level and larger with blocks.
  • Well outlined interface with good historical data.
  • API tools are available to obtain logging information from Nutanix that can be used with other monitoring tools such as Splunk.
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  • Taking Snapshots of VMs and roll back to the previous state when faced with a problem.
  • Template creation - Once you have that perfect template you can easily create new VMs. Very useful feature.
  • VMotion - Being able to perform live migrations of a virtual machine from one physical server to another, without any downtime.
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Cons
  • Management of VMs on AHV take some getting used to. It's just a list of VMs that are displayed, and you search through it. Not the normal folder structure that I'm used to in VMware.
  • Also can't disable a NIC card in a VM in AHV. Very handy feature present in VMware.
  • Larger workloads may have to be tweaked to get the performance you need/want.
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  • Allow enable EVC without requiring host shutdown
  • More detail in recent tasks. Instead of just showing a task called "Reconfigure virtual machine" also have a link to more detailed information as to what was reconfigured, changed or removed.
  • Allow searching tasks or events
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Likelihood to Renew
We made a huge financial investment with this platform (four clusters, all-flash storage array), so we're in it for the long haul. Luckily it's a beast. I've had to use support more than any other platform I've administered, but the help has been very good. Nutanix continues to add features and innovations which increase the ROI
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We are constantly looking for change that will benefit our company. We are not ones to stick with a product simply because it is what we know, but rather looking for what fits us best. We can't imagine another product on the market today doing a better job of handling our infrastructure than vSphere.
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Usability
Nutanix Prism Element and Prism Central are easy-to-use HTML5-based web consoles. The layout makes sense; you're only a few clicks away from getting to where you need to be. The AHV hypervisor is integrated into the platform for a fast and seamless experience. Rich data on VM metrics is also available.
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Very useful for environments where space and energy consumption are issues and management is not very keen on upfront spending on hardware every time whenever requirement comes from any dept for provisioning a machine for their occasional use, easily can be done in case of VMware vSphere in few clicks. Backup, security, monitoring and management everything is covered but at additional cost.
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Performance
The performance is very impressive. I am used to VMware and the snapshots were taking 10 minutes. The first time I had to restore from a snapshot on Nutanix it took 5 seconds and I couldn't believe it. Everything done on the server is fast. Powering on VM is done in seconds compared.to what we were using before.
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No answers on this topic
Support Rating
Our first support ticket to Nutanix was responded to within 10 minutes of submission. That was kind of impressive. They have worldwide support so that when a support request is created, support is acknowledged in a relative short amount of time.
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I rarely ever have to contact support and when I do need to resolve an issue, there is always an abundance of kb articles and research information available that can help quickly resolve the issue. Depending on the type of support contract you have, you may get support from some offshore group in another country and this could be a little challenging because of the language barrier.
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Implementation Rating
No answers on this topic
Just make sure that when you implement, that the person implementing truly knows what they are doing and has a plan of action coming in. Since our initial implementation using a consulting service, I have implemented a few vSphere just from what I learned at the initial implementation and use over time, and the person implementing really needs to know what they are doing or you will miss out on features that may help you down the line
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Alternatives Considered
By far, in my opinion, Nutanix AOS is heads above VMware. From the creation of a VM to updating the nodes themselves, Nutanix AOS is so much easier, faster, and just an overall better product. I would choose Nutanix AOS over VMware any day.
Read full review
vSphere provides more control over the Virtualization environment.
It allows users to have great management User Interface with lots of dynamic features.
VM creation.
Perform vMotion.
Network Management.
Datastore Mangement.
Cluster Management.
Schedule tasks.
Affinity and anti-affinity rules.
Easy to upgrade.
Backup the configuration data which can be restore after a disaster.
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Return on Investment
  • It is a highly redundant solution
  • Nutanix [AOS] provides a simple easy to manage HCI platform with a reduced TCO and an increased ROI
  • Centralized management solution of consolidated sever and storage solution in a virtualized environment which minimizes wastage of valuable resourses
  • Offers businesses the agility and flexibility to run other virtualized platforms on the Nutanix environment
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  • Having vSphere helped my business quickly recover from a ransomware attack which would have crippled us for weeks if we were not virtualized. I think the ROI on something like that is immeasurable.
  • vSphere has allowed my company to purchase bigger server hardware to host 3 or 4 virtual servers, which was at a cost much lower than buying 3 or 4 server hardware boxes, saving us thousands each time we need to upgrade hardware.
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