TrustRadius Insights for Hyper-V are summaries of user sentiment data from TrustRadius reviews and, when necessary, third party data sources.
Pros
Cost-effectiveness: Users consistently praise the cost-effectiveness of Hyper-V in comparison to VMware ESXi, making it a budget-friendly virtualization option that meets their financial needs. The lower upfront costs and potential savings on licensing fees are key factors driving user satisfaction with Hyper-V's affordability.
Efficient resource utilization: Many users have highlighted Hyper-V's efficiency in terms of speed of deployment and resource utilization. The automation and PowerShell accessibility contribute to streamlined operations and optimal resource allocation, resulting in improved productivity for IT teams managing virtual environments.
Disaster recovery features: The ability of Hyper-V to create backup copies of virtual machines for disaster recovery purposes has been well-received by users. This feature provides an added layer of security and peace of mind for maintaining business continuity during unforeseen events, demonstrating the reliability and robustness of Hyper-V as a virtualization solution.
Our company use Hyper-V virtualization software for production servers and replication of virtual machines between multiple physical hosts. It allows to isolate our VMs from hardware level and run multiple VMs on one host. For example, production software servers plus Domain controllers plus File shares all in one host computer.
Pros
virtualization of multiple machines
Replication
vhdd management
Cons
Tracking and alerts for replication status
Likelihood to Recommend
Hyper-V does the job well but minor improvements can be made such as replication alerts and status, for example email alerts.
VU
Verified User
Account Manager in Information Technology (Computer Networking company, 11-50 employees)
Excellent technology that lets us easily create virtual machines environment and helps manage multiple operating systems on a single physical server. It enables me to quickly dedicate different groups' access to different systems because of its incredible capabilities. It effectively helps test software on multiple operating systems using multiple virtual machines and is highly reliable when running software that requires an older version.
Pros
Easy to create multiple virtual machines and manage multiple OS on a single physical hardware.
Easy to run software that require an older version.
Easy to test software on multiple OS.
Cons
Applications that requires GPUs for processing, does not work well.
High-precision applications have issues running on VM.
Likelihood to Recommend
Great technology by Microsoft that enables one to easily create virtual machines and manage multiple operating systems on a single physical hardware. It is highly flexible and helps save time and money when in need of computing resources. Live migration capabilities with windows server and Hyper-V replication for efficient backups and disaster recovery possibilities.
In our organization, Hyper-V is mostly used to create a separate test environment. These are labs that consist of one or more machines, mostly Microsoft Windows operating systems, where software is installed to reproduce issues. In our business as a software vendor, I as a technical support engineer, often need to create new environments for testing purposes. This is where Hyper-V comes in handy.
Pros
Ability to create new machines.
Change the configuration of machines, like memory or CPU.
Export import virtual machines from/to another Hyper-V environment.
Cons
The network configuration for the machines is not that easy to set up. E.g. to have them contact the internet, for example, create VLANs.
Snapshot management can be a bit more user-friendly. A good overview of snapshots is missing.
The efficiency of resource usage can be better.
Likelihood to Recommend
At first, I only used Microsoft Hyper-V on my own computer. This virtualization software, Hyper-V, is very good to use for creating local labs with one or more virtual machines to do reproductions. Or to perform tests without affecting any production environment. Since this is only used on a local computer, I can't tell how it performs or how manageable it is when used in production environments.
VU
Verified User
Engineer in Customer Service (Computer Software company, 1001-5000 employees)
We use Hyper-V to test malware and security analysis over binary research at the lab. Hyper-V pretty much provides a virtualization layer from the host machine to securely test vulnerability exploits on a different version of operation systems safely and securely. We're able to automate our testing suite with help of Hyper-V commands enabled in windows 10.
Pros
Virtualization
Executing different operating system versions.
Secure access to files & resource with limits.
Cons
Hyper-V public API commands can be improved to automate security analysis.
Only available on windows 10 pro version.
Likelihood to Recommend
It's well suited for automation, testing, and research purposes in security labs. Hyper-V really provides performance compared to other virtualization products.
VU
Verified User
Engineer in Engineering (Computer Software company, 1001-5000 employees)
I am a consultant in the telecommunications industry. While we do not personally utilize Hyper-V on premise, I routinely support clients that have it deployed in their organization. All instances of Hyper-V that I have supported were organization-wide, or used in a development sandbox. Hyper-V is used to facilitate consolidation of server roles, or when Windows is the main operating system being deployed.
Pros
Hyper-V does not need to be installed as its own entity, it can be added as a server role.
Windows 10 virtualization is much more fluid than other competitors.
Cons
Management with System Center should be more fluid and intuitive.
There is significant overhead with Hyper-V compared to other alternatives.
Likelihood to Recommend
In my opinion, if you are purely virtualizing and managing Windows VMs, Hyper-V is the clear winner. If you require a vastly diverse virtual infrastructure, other alternatives would be better suited for the lower overhead, and less frequent required host reboots. Hyper-V is also competitively priced, so if budget is the main concern Hyper-V is a solid choice.
VU
Verified User
Consultant in Information Technology (Telecommunications company, 201-500 employees)
We are currently using Hyper-V for the deployment of all of our servers. Our main servers house Hyper-V and we deploy 9-10 VM's off of each server and those servers host data for our cloud customers. I would consider Hyper-V to be the backbone of our company. I also personally use Hyper-V here for development and testing purposes. We are a software company so I often create a bunch of VM's for myself and other users to test new software or if we happen to find broken/bugs in our software. We are able to make a replica of the environment that is not running correctly and it will allow us to troubleshoot the issues without further messing up the production environment.
Pros
Virtualization - Hyper-V does this well and I feel like it might be the best and easiest software out there to use. I am able to spin up virtual environments very quickly. Hyper-V also has a "quick" add feature where you don't even need to have the OS ISO on your computer and you can choose between Windows 10, Server or Ubuntu.
Setup and Management - Hyper-V is pretty straight forward. When I first started using this it seemed a bit confusing, but after a couple of days of playing with it you end up finding out everything is pretty straight forward and really not that complicated.
Just turn off the VM and go into the settings and you can manage the Storage, Memory, and CPU's.
Setting a VM up on a Domain is super easy and you can create a static mac address for the machine so in Windows DHCP you can use that static mac address to give that VM an IP it can use every time it boots up.
I think the best feature is the ability to create "Checkpoints" - If you are going to be doing something over and over and you need to start from the same point with each test you can setup your VM the way you need it prior to testing. Create a Checkpoint. Do your tests and then revert back to the Checkpoint so the system will be exactly how you had it setup prior to testing. Then you can go on and do your second set of tests and so on.
Another great thing is the ability to just backup the vhdx file.
As I mentioned at the beginning of this review we run most everything from Hyper-V. I make weekly backup of the vhdx files which are the Virtual Environment files.
This is an extreme example, but if the building ever caught on fire I could go out and buy like 15 PCs at Best Buy and load up Hyper-V on them and just import the vhdx files and be back up and running fairly quickly.
Cons
The only issue I have with Hyper-V is I am unable to use Veeam on my Windows 2016 Server to backup my FreeBSD HAProxy VM.
There is some sort of checkpoint issue that I have been unable to figure out, but it works just fine on my Windows 2012 Servers. I do believe this is a Microsoft issue and not a Veeam issue though.
Another thing that could be useful that Hyper-V does not have would be some sort of GUI that shows the status of all the VM's on a given server to help us manage them easier and know what is going on. However, I do have Zabbix for this and that does a good job at monitoring all my servers.
Likelihood to Recommend
A specific scenario where Hyper-V is well suited would be for environment testing purposes. Let's say you want to learn or test a new OS for a product or just for learning purposes. You are able to boot up this OS in just a few mins on Hyper-V and then begin working, testing and learning with no money out of your pocket. You don't have to go out and build or buy a new PC (assuming your current PC has enough memory and CPU usage for a single VM.).
I do not think there is a scenario where this would not be appropriate. This is not really a piece of software that you need to install to do other things. If you are enabling Hyper-V you are using it to create a virtual environment. The only time you really wouldn't use this is if your application would be better off running in a docker/container setup.
Hyper-V is being used by consultants like myself in our organization. Consultants often work for multiple different clients, each of which has different parameters for connecting to their systems. Some use VPNs or VMware, but others have their own VMs that we can manage locally with Hyper-V. This way we can conform to whatever standards the client requires with an image that they provide.
Pros
Switch Manager. Once you get your Hyper-V Manager set up, it is pretty easy to use the Virtual Switch Manager to toggle between different connection types for different VMs. It even allows you to change that switch configuration on a running instance without rebooting.
Multiple VMs. It is very easy to maintain multiple VMs, hence the name "Manager" in Hyper-V Manager.
Metrics. It is very easy to see the metrics for any specific instance. For example, the allocated memory, checkpoints, security settings, etc.
Cons
Initial Setup. Adding in new VMs is not an intuitive process. Going through the boot file, the ISO, and figuring out how to get that initial configuration right can be challenging.
Stability. Overall, it's pretty stable, but I have had my VM crash unexpectedly more times than I expected. It's caused me to take certain precautions in how I handle the data that I keep on there.
Connectivity. Although the Switch Manager is easy to use, establishing that initial connectivity within the VM can be tough. In a few instances, I had to do a number of resets and reboots in order to get it to work properly.
Likelihood to Recommend
Well-Suited 1) Multiple VMs to manage. It works well if you have multiple VMs to manage, and don't have external software to connect to them (and would rather maintain them locally). 2) Specific images required. In the consulting world, if a client requires a specific OS image for their work, Hyper-V is perfect for maintaining that image.
Less Appropriate 1) No image required. If the work that you do doesn't require a specific image, but rather just access to propriety data and systems, online portals might be a better option. 2) High levels of security. If you have a setup that requires token authentication, MFA, etc., maintaining all of that through an instance on Hyper-V can be challenging.
VU
Verified User
Consultant in Information Technology (Computer Software company, 201-500 employees)
We use Hyper-V (Windows Server 2016) to host our internal virtual server infrastructure. At the moment we use 4 Servers in a cluster to serve all our internal workloads. In addition, we consult our partners and customers in planning and implementation for Hyper-V as the virtualization platform. With Windows Server 2016 especially in combination with hyper-converged infrastructure with Storage Spaces Direct.
Pros
fast and easy deployment
clustering with live migration
direct integration in the OS
Cons
manageability (Windows Admin Center will solve this in future releases)
monitoring of virtual machines performance
Likelihood to Recommend
Well suited:
Virtualization of internal infrastructure
Virtualizing Windows OS
SQL Server hosting
Less appropriate:
Hosting Linux web server farms
VU
Verified User
Program Manager in Information Technology (Computer Networking company, 11-50 employees)
Hyper-V is used across our whole organization as well as across the organizations of our main big customers. It is obviously used for virtualizing the servers. It makes sure we can easily set up redundancy and fail-over. tI also enables us to easily backup and restore in case of DR, even to different hardware.
Pros
using single jbods attached to several physical servers
fail-over
legacy OS
snapshots
Cons
attach USB devices
Likelihood to Recommend
Any organization big enough to use AD should install it on top of Hyper-V in my opinion to streamline Disaster Recovery scenarios. Also when several server roles are needed it should be used to install then across different (virtual) instances. It is also great for test environments as you can install, or even re-image pre-installed, OSs
VU
Verified User
C-Level Executive in Information Technology (Computer Networking company, 1-10 employees)
We use Hyper-V for production servers and virtualising test environments across the organisation.
Testing For testing it allows us to quickly roll back a machine to a 'clean' environment, enabling us to guarantee testing from a known point. This is something that is done very regularly in our business as we are a software development house and need that guarantee that the test environment is not spoiled by a previous build of our software, or an operating system update.
Servers Almost all of our servers are now virtualised, this helps us manage our physical environment by reducing the hardware requirements. It also allows virtualised machines to be ported with ease if a problem arises on the host server.
Pros
Checkpoints - used on a daily basis many times, we would be lost without this functionality.
Flexibility - Hyper-V manages its hardware demands seamlessly distributing memory across the guest machines without compromising the guests or the host.
Ease of administration - Tied into the Windows OS (Server and 10 now) it is very easy to get a virtual environment running.
Cons
Hyper-V Manager - our main Hyper-v server (for test VMs) has many virtual machines on it, and we find managing more than a handful of machines in the Hyper-V manager can become a little cumbersome.
Likelihood to Recommend
Hyper-V works really well when you have a machine that you want to roll back on a regular basis, for purposes such as testing software. In some situations, such as hosting graphics-intensive applications, Hyper-V (while having RemoteFX available in some environments) can be an unnecessary piece of the puzzle where a 'real' machine would be more appropriate.
