Proxmox Virtual Environment is an open source server virtualization management solution based on QEMU/KVM and LXC. Users can manage virtual machines, containers, highly available clusters, storage and networks via a web interface or CLI. Proxmox VE code is licensed under the GNU Affero General Public License, version 3. The project is developed and maintained by Proxmox Server Solutions GmbH.
$90
year & CPU socket
XenServer
Score 7.0 out of 10
N/A
XenServer (formerly Citrix Hypervisor) is a virtualization management platform optimized for application, desktop and server virtualization infrastructures.
N/A
Pricing
Proxmox VE
XenServer
Editions & Modules
Community
€ 90
year & CPU socket
Basic
€ 280
year & CPU socket
Standard
€ 420
year & CPU socket
Premium
€ 840
year & CPU socket
No answers on this topic
Offerings
Pricing Offerings
Proxmox VE
XenServer
Free Trial
No
No
Free/Freemium Version
Yes
No
Premium Consulting/Integration Services
No
No
Entry-level Setup Fee
No setup fee
No setup fee
Additional Details
Proxmox Virtual Environment's source code is published under the free software license GNU AGPL, v3 and thus is freely available for download, use and share. A Proxmox VE Subscription is an additional service program that helps IT professionals and businesses keep Proxmox VE deployments up-to-date. A subscription provides access to the stable Proxmox VE Enterprise Repository delivering software updates and security enhancements, technical help and support.
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More Pricing Information
Community Pulse
Proxmox VE
XenServer
Considered Both Products
Proxmox VE
Verified User
Anonymous
Chose Proxmox VE
Proxmox is somewhat more flexible (for being a Linux distro) than VMware. VMWare's network configuration is more robust and well implemented, but it lacks lots of resources that Proxmox has, like ZFS for example. Overall I think both solutions offer good tools and the best …
Based on my experience , I selected Proxmox VE because it offers a range of powerful features and functionalities at a lower cost than proprietary platforms such as VMware ESXi and Citrix Hypervisor. Additionally, Proxmox VE is an open-source platform, which means that users …
Proxmox VE is cheaper than VMware, especially upscaling an HA architecture. Compared with other free or less expensive solutions, Proxmox VE is high compatible with more types of hardware solutions and more VM types. From my point of view, Proxmox VE has no competitor at the …
Proxmox emulates hardware exceptionally well. This makes migration easier between systems. Additionally, the licensing model is friendly and the system is quite featureful. On top of that, by having a common base (Debian Linux) we have access to tools without needing to jump …
well previously we try to find the fast and lite virtualization platform, we try VMware, we try Citrix, but finally we decided to use Proxmox because it suitable for the development software team, fast provision and delete VM, save a lot of time for DevOps Team.
Director Of Information Technology and HIPAA Privacy Officer
Chose Proxmox VE
With an incredibly easy to use interface, quick setup, and wide support for different hardware we found it was the perfect lab tool for our department to build, stage, and eventually move VMs into production with.
We've used VirtualBox on desktop systems. It's great for what it is, but it's a whole different ballgame to Proxmox VE. Proxmox provides the virtualisation, like VirtualBox, but on top of that you get a very well oiled management layer, storage integration, clustering, etc.
VMWare pricing is steep when compared to the Proxmox VE licensing model. You can use Proxmox VE GPL for free to fully evaluate every aspect of it. VMWare also requires you to install software on your virtual machine instances to which you wouldn't normally need. Proxmox VE just …
In the scheme of the real world, Citrix Hypervisor is used much less than the other two main competing products; MS Hyper-V and VMWare VSphere. So, choosing Citrix Hypervisor for your organization comes down to whether you are comfortable going with a lesser-used product. All …
VMware seems to be the standard and is more widely accepted. However, Citrix Hypervisor, is easily learned and cheaper. We have also used VirtualBox to offer up ideas for other free products. VirtualBox seems to be easier for end users who just want simple VMs and not …
The price is very good. Also, the support from the vendor in the process of implementation and maintenance is very important. Citrix offers this support. The implementation was easy, and gave us the ability to manage a large virtual infrastructure while reducing costs. The …
Because we utilize Citrix for our VDI this solution made the most sense moving forward. Citrix Hypervisor was designed to work with Citrix VDI solutions out of the box.
Feature for feature they are neck and neck. I have used Hyper-V 2012 and 2016, VMWare ESXi and XenServer evenly. XenServer is a fast install, good documentation, with enterprise features out the box that compare or exceed what VMWare offered with a higher cost of entry.
There are other hypervisors that are more eficient than Xenserver, but it is necessary to spend some money to buy them. If your demand is to compute processing, Xenserver permits you to create good environments to do this. If you need to integrate the hypervisor with other …
XenServer is easier to use and cheaper than VMWare, but there is a bit less industry support. If your aren't afraid to use products from someone besides the market leader, XenServer is a great alternative to VMWare.
I used vSphere (and vCenter server), Hyper-V, and XenServer to teach a virtualization class. vSphere is certainly the leader among these three, and Hyper-V is second (but not far behind). XenServer is third, which lacks many advanced features provided by vSphere and Hyper-V.
XenServer like the similar product I've used in the hypervisor market stacks up well in regards to compatibility with virtual machine [operating systems]. It is also capable of allowing for large, powerful VMs to be run upon it. The main selection of XenServer in environments …
Proxmox VE is a virtualization platform that provides a range of features and functionalities suitable for various scenarios. Here are some specific scenarios where Proxmox VE is well suited and some scenarios where it might not be the best choice:Well-suited scenarios:Virtualization of server workloads: Proxmox VE is well suited for virtualizing server workloads such as web servers, mail servers, database servers, and other similar applications. Its high-performance virtualization capabilities allow these workloads to run smoothly and efficiently.Hosting multiple virtual machines (VMs): Proxmox VE is ideal for hosting multiple VMs on a single server. It provides efficient resource management, allowing users to easily allocate resources to each VM.Clustered environments: Proxmox VE is a great choice for clustered environments. It supports clustering and can easily manage multiple servers, providing high availability and load balancing for mission-critical applications. Less appropriate scenarios: Limited hardware resources: Proxmox VE requires significant hardware resources to run efficiently. If you have limited hardware resources, it might not be the best choice. Simple applications: If you only need to run a single, simple application, Proxmox VE might be overkill. Other virtualization platforms or even a basic web hosting service might be more appropriate.
It can be really helpful & useful if we are using Citrix Hypervisor with other provisioning tools. Here are some specific scenarios where Citrix Hypervisor (formerly Citrix XenServer) is well-suited: Server Consolidation, Virtual Desktops, Disaster Recovery, Development & Testing Environments. On the other hand, there are some scenarios where Citrix Hypervisor may be less appropriate: Small-scale Deployments, Highly Heterogeneous Environments, and Limited Virtualization Requirements.
ZFS storage out of the box. The integration with ZFS is fantastic. You can easily create pools to store your VM images and data on, and the Proxmox web UI provides an easy way to check drive health, ZFS scrub status, etc.
Great web UI. Practically everything configurable is available to do so from the web user interface. You'll rarely need to drop to the command line for administrative tasks, unless you want to, in which case you can do that too. The UI also provides graphs and visualisations to help you keep check of how everything is performing.
Easy to setup a high availability cluster. Although Proxmox VE works perfectly well on a single server, you can also install it on multiple hosts and setup a cluster.
Uses a Debian core system with an Ubuntu based kernel. This means everything to do with the base operating system is tried and trusted. We use a lot of Debian and Ubuntu installs, so having this run underneath Proxmox VE was an added bonus for us.
The web UI does not work as well on mobile devices. It is useable, but a mobile optimised / responsive UI would be nice to have. There is a mobile app, so that may alleviate this issue, but I have not yet tried it.
Support in the community forums could be better. There are paid support plans, but new users trying out the software will not have access to this. Answers to questions can sometimes be terse, and I can imagine this may put some people off.
The wiki is a bit hit and miss with certain topics. I've often seen outdated or missing information, and the whole thing looks like it could do with some polish. I'd love to see it opened up for the community to add to.
Although part of this is free the free solution has limitations that make the purchase of the paid version a requirement for most medium and large enterprises.
Support for USB devices is lacking vs. its competitors.
Technical support is somewhat limited especially the free "Google browsing" type since the product is used much less vs. Hyper-V or VMWARE.
In a related issue to tech support, finding local IT support who have used the product is also challenging.
Networking/virtual networks are less stable than they should be.
Proxmox VE provides the most capable, yet stable virtualization platform in the market today. Licensing options are also competitive and cost-effective for support, and support is extremely fast and knowledgable of getting issues resolved as quickly and soundly as possible.
With the knowledge and usage of solutions from VMware and Microsoft offering more compelling cloud integrated options it makes it more compelling in many environments which I consult. XenServer is a good product and fits the bill in many smaller environments but as clients look to the cloud or a hybrid cloud it can in some cases make it a bit more difficult.
The interface is easy to use for most of it, but still lacks screens for some configurations. Also, a few of the screens are not as intuitive as they could be. This is specially true with disk and network configuration, where some graphic/visual representations of the configurations would be very useful
XenServer is a good product in its use and probably free if you have the right Citrix licenses already. However, it does require specific knowledge to manage, which makes it harder to manage if you don't have that knowledge in house.
Proxmox VE's ha-cluster functionality is very much improved, though does have a not-very-often occurrence of failure. In a 2-node cluster of Proxmox VE, HA can fail causing an instance that is supposed to migrate between the two nodes stop and fail until manually recovered through the command-line tools provided. Other than this, the HA clustering capability of Proxmox VE has proven to be reliable in 3 or more clustered environments with much less chance of these failures to occur.
It's been a little problematic in the past at larger VDI deployments requiring a bit more care and feeding than other vendors. But the latest releases (6.5.x) have brought about huge improvements in the stability and availability.
Proxmox VE's interfacing is always fast to load, both the Web interface and the command-line tool interfaces. Reporting is practically real time almost all the time, and you can see everything in mere seconds, easily able to identify if something is wrong or it everything is in tip-top shape as always desired
The staff I've worked with are very knowledgeable or able to get a very well articulated and capable support team member on the phone or helping them if necessary and they always want to ensure the best experience possible for you on the platform. The ability for the support team to reach out to hardware vendors for assistance is a nice plus too.
Part of a training for certification to become a trainer for Citrix included an in-person training with a Master CCI. The XenServer training at this time was pretty simplified due to the product primarily being installed however you did have to work with it and mildly configure the system.
Haven't given it a real go with any online training however there are some options out there. I have taught a course following Citrix material for XenDesktop which leverages XenServer and it is pre-built so not the best for XenServer specifically for installation but configuration is mildly touched on
Ensure you review the HCL (hardware compatibility list) and reach out to the hardware vendors to ensure they support the platform and in case they have documentation that can be followed for the implementation. Also ensure the prerequisites are completed prior to implementation so that as few unexpected delays occur as you can control.
In the scheme of the real world, Citrix Hypervisor is used much less than the other two main competing products; MS Hyper-V and VMWare vSphere. So, choosing Citrix Hypervisor for your organization comes down to whether you are comfortable going with a lesser-used product. All 3 products offer hardware layered hypervisor installation which means no OS overhead headaches. That is usually positive but in some cases, with very small shops, the OS layer is needed to host other workloads so Hyper-V running on Windows is the better choice. We run both MS Hyper-V and Citrix Hypervisor and we chose the Citrix product for our testbed environment since any risk of running the less public supported product was lessened by not being in full production.
Proxmox VE provides everything you need to quickly add new storage mediums, network and local, as well as networking interfaces, such as using Linux standard bridges and now Open-vSwitch bridges which can be even more scalable than before. Proxmox VE 4.0 dropped support for OpenVZ in favor of the more well supported and native LXC and made an upgrade path to it very simple.
The servers latest versions have made massive improvements to scalability. But from past experience there have been issues when running workloads for extended periods of time without reboot on the hosts. I would need to run similar workloads on the 6.5 release which has changed much of the bottlenecks or issues so I'd imagine its far more capable now, Perhaps able to stand near the best in the market.
Xenserver is easy to learn. We paid for support only for installation and deployment in the first three years, and now our team has the knowledge to solve most problems.
Low CAPEX if you have a team that uses open source software day by day.
But paid support is necessary to solve critical problems. The open source community is not enough. Actually, we have difficulty solving some bugs without paying for support.
Medium OPEX if you have a team that uses open source software day by day.
