VMware ESXi Professional, Scientific, and Technical Services Reviews & Insights

Score7.9 out of 10

810 Reviews and Ratings

Community insights

TrustRadius Insights for VMware ESXi are summaries of user sentiment data from TrustRadius reviews and, when necessary, third party data sources.

Pros

Powerful Tool for Managing VMs: Users consistently praise VMware ESXi as a powerful tool for managing a large number of virtual machines, with easy management of individual VM settings and configurations. Several reviewers have highlighted this aspect, emphasizing how it simplifies their virtualization workflows and enhances overall efficiency.

Cost Reduction Benefits: Many users appreciate the cost reduction benefits offered by VMware ESXi. It minimizes the need for physical servers and reduces storage footprint, resulting in electricity savings. This advantage has been mentioned by a significant number of reviewers, highlighting the financial value that VMware ESXi brings to their organizations.

Support for Various Operating Systems: The support for various operating systems, including Windows and Unix, is considered a significant advantage by users. This feature enables them to host a wide range of applications on VMware ESXi. Multiple reviewers have specifically mentioned this pro, appreciating the flexibility it provides in terms of application deployment and compatibility.

Reviews

24 Reviews

Professional, Scientific, and Technical Services

VMware ESXi is a great hypervisor for those who can afford it

Rating: 9 out of 10

Incentivized

December 31, 2024

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

We have dozens of virtual servers in the office and use VMware ESXi as a hypervisor to consolidate them in a few physical servers, getting performance and reliability while using less energy and hardware parts in our operation.
VMware ESXi has different versions for various kinds of company profiles and we ended up choosing the one that best fitted our needs.

Pros

Virtual Machine creation and management
Access to network drives (NAS, SAN, etc)
Load balancing

Cons

Pricing is stratospheric
Support needs improvement
Relationship with client needs improvement

Likelihood to Recommend

VMware ESXi has different 'flavors' for different company profiles. In my opinion, there is a flavor to every client style. The only problem is that it has been disclosed that Broadcom, the new VMware ESXi's owner, said it will focus just on its biggest clients. Then, after that new approach, I believe that VMware ESXi is now not as attractive as before to medium and small business. Technically speaking, though, I still believe it is a great virtualization solution if you can afford it.

Carlos Coque

System Administrator in Information Technology at IBEX Payroll Services (Information Technology & Services, 11-50 employees)

Vetted Review

9 years of experience

VMware ESXi - The Best for Virtualization

Rating: 10 out of 10

Incentivized

April 4, 2022

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

We are using the VMware ESXi to create the multiple virtual machines over single physical server. Easily we can migrate the VMs to another physical servers without any issue. Easily we can scale up and scale down the resource of VMs as per demands. VMware ESXi provides the lots easy and advanced feature like snapshot, backup & restore, resource allocation which help make project work smoothly.

Pros

Resource scalability
Operate much faster
Easy to take VMs backup and restore
Easily we can migrate the VMs between the physical servers.
Reliability and flexibility

Cons

Remove the API Limitation in free version
Hardware monitoring

Likelihood to Recommend

VMware ESXi is leading name in the world for virtualization and its very user friendly administrator tool. Easily we can migrate the VMs between physical servers online. Management of VMs are much easy like Virtual machines creation, backup & restore, reboot, snapshot, resource scaling etc. We had great experience to work on VMware ESXi. VMware ESXi provide the load balance between physical servers.

Verified User

Administrator in Information Technology (Information Technology & Services company, 10,001+ employees)

Vetted Review

4 years of experience

VMware ESXi Best for Virtualization

Rating: 10 out of 10

Incentivized

April 4, 2022

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

We are using the VMware ESXi in our different projects for different clients to manage the more than 1000 servers (Linux & Window).
We address the our problems like resource scaling and physical server load balancing. VMware ESXi provide the easy way to create the VMs and easily migrate the from one physical server to another physical online.

Pros

Cluster Failover
VMs Migration online
Resource allocation like Disk, CPU & Memory

Cons

Does not support for all Unix system like AIX
Better and more descriptive error logging in Vcenter

Likelihood to Recommend

VMware ESXi is well suited for all type organization like large, medium and small setup. It can be prove really cost effective as it eliminates additional hardware every time we want new machines. VMware ESXi can be an ideal solution for large scale virtual environments.

Kaushal Rawat

AIX Adminsitrator in Information Technology at DXC Technology Pvt Ltd (Information Technology & Services, 10,001+ employees)

Vetted Review

8 years of experience

faster, scalable, overall perform better

Rating: 10 out of 10

Incentivized

March 29, 2022

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

Using VMware ESXI for multiple instances of virtual machines on one physical host. It does not require an underlying operating system to function. It is scalable operates faster and overall perform better. Being a system integrator offering support service to our customers and for our lab, we need virtual machines for operating various OS and testing purposes.

Pros

Operate faster.
Scalable.
Smallest hypervisors.
Installation process quick.

Cons

Don't know.

Likelihood to Recommend

Personally, I like VMware ESXi because of its great features on top of user-friendly administration tools, the possibility of live migration of virtual machines, and the cloning of VM. Management of virtual machines like rebooting backup and restore are easy, great scalability, smallest hypervisors, installation process fast, can boot up the VMware ESXI server from the USB drive.

Rizwan Rafiq

Manager in Professional Services at Innovative Integration (Pvt.) Ltd. (Information Technology & Services, 11-50 employees)

Vetted Review

Reseller

4 years of experience

A Second to None Virtual Hosting Platform for Businesses of All Sizes

Rating: 10 out of 10

Incentivized

March 27, 2022

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

We use it to host our on-premise environment. So, it is critical in order for all of our systems to operate. It is also utilized for the disaster recovery environment. It has worked extremely well since it's been in use, and we know we can count on it to keep everything running. It's also able to load balance so our resources are used efficiently and not wasted.

Pros

Resource management. The automatic load balancing works very well to ensure no host is taxed disproportionately compared to the others.
Templates and cloning. It is very easy to set up a template and spin up new servers based on a specific setup. This makes server management very streamlined.
VM management. The vSphere interface is very easy to use and navigate. Everything is responsive and it works when you need it to. The options are also robust while also being arranged in a straightforward manner.

Cons

We are not on the latest version yet (pre-7.0), so this might be related to our current version. Sometimes when VMs are rebooted, the virtual NIC will be in a bad state and will have no network connectivity. Disconnecting and reconnecting the vNIC will fix this quickly. It's easy to fix, but definitely an annoyance. We'll be upgrading in the near future, so we are optimistic this will be fixed.
Due to the complexity of the environment, it can be difficult to figure out when some odd issues are related to storage or something else. For instance, there was a time when refreshing the storage connections for all hosts fixed an issue, but there was no direct indication that anything was going on with the storage connections. I don't know if this is clearer to see in newer versions, but having a way to indicate that in some way can make certain troubleshooting easier to do.
Access to some resources requires a VMware account, while others do not. I can understand this is the case due to licenses being required for certain product support. We have never been in a situation where we couldn't access anything, plus we have all of the accounts and licenses we need. However, it can be confusing for someone new to managing a VMware environment why they can't access something they need to manage the environment.

Likelihood to Recommend

I have seen and managed VMware environments of various sizes from a larger company down to small and medium businesses. I feel it is an excellent solution for all business sizes. For anyone looking for a virtual environment for their infrastructure, it works well and can scale easily as a business grows. The tools provided make management simple, and VMware support is one of the best experiences I have ever had out of all of the companies I have dealt with. They are a benchmark in that regard.

Adam Friedli

System Administrator in Information Technology at Mary Free Bed Rehabilitation Hospital (Information Technology & Services, 1001-5000 employees)

Vetted Review

10 years of experience

View profile

VMware ESXi is still the greatest virtualization platform

Rating: 9 out of 10

Incentivized

March 27, 2022

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

The majority of our servers have been virtualized, with the exception of our databases. We save money on hardware, energy, and cooling expenditures by virtualizing 25 servers. And it spares us the price and complication of doubling the gear to achieve redundancy. Using virtualization, we can swiftly increase our capacity without increasing the footprint of our infrastructure.

Pros

VMware ESXi is a dependable platform that provides excellent performance.
VMware ESXi is compatible with a wide range of operating systems, too.

Cons

Third-party backup programs cannot be integrated.
Third-party programs may be able to simplify processes and minimize the number of applications that are needed.

Likelihood to Recommend

As long as the DB needs aren't too severe. It is highly recommended that all environments, regardless of size, use VMware ESXi wherever feasible. Regardless of the scale of the environment, it may be managed with a minimal footprint. From 5 servers to hundreds of virtual machines, it has served me well.

Verified User

Engineer in Information Technology (Information Technology & Services company, 10,001+ employees)

Vetted Review

4 years of experience

Desired solution for IT administrative requirements is a VMware ESXi

Rating: 10 out of 10

Incentivized

March 24, 2022

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

I implemented VMware ESXi host with 2 x 6 core CPUs, 72GB RAM and 500GB local storage. To run three Windows virtual machines with different configurations such as 1) 4 vCPU, 12GB RAM and 80GB storage 2) 3 vCPU, 8GB RAM and 60GB storage 3) 2 vCPU 4GB RAM and 50GB storage. As VMware ESXi is the type 1 hypervisor, we can reduce data centre space, power and IT administrative requirements. In our use case, it was better for IT administrative requirements.

Pros

High-speed performance.
Memory occupation is less than 150 MB.
Itself allows for the basic creation and management of virtual machine.

Cons

Remove API limitations in the free version.
Allows more than 8 vCPUs per VM.
Support from VMware and documentation.

Likelihood to Recommend

Extended page table support comes in handy if you're trying to attach a GPU to a virtual machine or if you're trying to do some sort of nested virtualization which is a good way to test hyper-v. If you require a single virtual machine or similar needs for the machine, it is not recommended to use. But when you have fewer hardware facilities, it is highly recommended to use them.

Verified User

Engineer in Research & Development (Information Technology & Services company, 201-500 employees)

Vetted Review

1 year of experience

One of the best VMware Products, ESXi!

Rating: 10 out of 10

Incentivized

March 24, 2022

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

Currently, we use VMware ESXi to host our virtual environment of servers and workstations in our organization. The business problem that we address by using VMware ESXi is that it gives us a product that we can use to easily set up a virtual environment which saves us time and money. We don't have to use physical servers and workstations to set up servers and other appliances. When other functional departments in our company require servers to be stood up we can deploy it in our VMware ESXi environment seamlessly.

Pros

VMware ESXi provides a wizard for the hypervisor to be installed making it very easy to configure on almost any bare metal box.
It provides an easy interface to see information about the Virtual Machines you have set on the VMware ESXi hypervisor.
VMware ESXi is also very easily upgradable. The hypervisor takes care of all the necessary tasks prior to a hypervisor upgrade, allowing for peace of mind when upgrading and no effect on the virtual machines you have running.

Cons

VMware ESXi can improve on the UI that is installed on the bare metal machine. The menus can be hard to navigate when looking for simple configuration items.
VMware ESXi can improve on the stability of their overall hypervisor. There have been a few times we had to reinstall due to corruption of VMware ESXi.
I would like to see VMware ESXi do better at adding more standard free features in their consumer version of VMware ESXi. For example, having the ability to back up virtual machines is good practice and something that would be very nice if offered in their free version.

Likelihood to Recommend

VMware ESXi is best suited for organizations looking to create or expand their virtual environment. If an organization is continuing to deploy physical workstations or servers, they can save lots of time, money, and space investing in VMware ESXi to build a virtual environment. This will also prevent further headaches in having the recover corrupt servers or workstations as ESXi makes it very easy to take snapshots and integrate 3rd party backup solutions. Where VMware ESXi is less appropriate would be for small "mom/pop" outfits that aren't requiring too many servers or virtual workstations. There is a standard equipment set and technical environment required for VMware ESXi which small business may not need to invest in if they aren't looking for virtual environment solutions.

Michael Sen

System Administrator in Information Technology at CNM LLP (Accounting, 51-200 employees)

Vetted Review

4 years of experience

Easy to manage

Rating: 9 out of 10

Incentivized

March 24, 2022

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

We use VMware ESXi on all our virtual appliances and is great for managing the virtual servers on them. Makes the installation easy and straight forward and can easily remove or deploy new servers plus have all the appliances setup the same way and deploy it over and over. Would recommend it for anyone building a lot of virtual servers.

Pros

Easy to install.
Easy to manage.
Troubleshooting is easy.

Cons

Upgrading is sometimes difficult.
Cost

Likelihood to Recommend

It's well suited if you are deploying an appliance with servers and you want an easy way to manage and maintain them. It's also nice if you are deploying many virtual appliances and want them set up the same way so you can easily recreate the setup. Works well on many different hardware vendors.

Verified User

Manager in Information Technology (Information Technology & Services company, 1001-5000 employees)

Vetted Review

10 years of experience

One of the best hypervisors available in market!!

Rating: 9 out of 10

Incentivized

March 24, 2022

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

VMware ESXi is being used as an important part of our virtual infrastructure. We are running VMware ESXi as our core hypervisor to host virtual machines and run the entire on-prem infrastructure on it. It provides us with a range of features that are more than enough for keeping the infra stable and available at most. I am a VMware Consultant in the organization and responsible for the implementation and management of VMware products.

Pros

Hardware Virtualization.
Supports multiple OEMs.
Can be aligned with other important infrastructure tools.

Cons

Single host management should be improved.
One-click SSL certificate renewal from custom location cannot be done.
Host isolation management can be improved.

Likelihood to Recommend

One of the best hypervisors available among other competitors. Compared to others, resource pools of VMware ESXi are much more stable. It is saving a lot of hardware costs as we don't have to use multiple server hardware for different applications. Sometimes less appropriate when we require auditing of logs and integration with AD audit tools.

Arvind Kumar

Senior Consultant - VMware & Infrastructure in Information Technology at Versetal Information Systems (Information Technology & Services, 10,001+ employees)

Vetted Review

9 years of experience

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A Second to None Virtual Hosting Platform for Businesses of All Sizes

Rating: 10 out of 10

Incentivized

March 27, 2022

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

Pros

Resource management. The automatic load balancing works very well to ensure no host is taxed disproportionately compared to the others.
Templates and cloning. It is very easy to set up a template and spin up new servers based on a specific setup. This makes server management very streamlined.
VM management. The vSphere interface is very easy to use and navigate. Everything is responsive and it works when you need it to. The options are also robust while also being arranged in a straightforward manner.

Cons

We are not on the latest version yet (pre-7.0), so this might be related to our current version. Sometimes when VMs are rebooted, the virtual NIC will be in a bad state and will have no network connectivity. Disconnecting and reconnecting the vNIC will fix this quickly. It's easy to fix, but definitely an annoyance. We'll be upgrading in the near future, so we are optimistic this will be fixed.
Due to the complexity of the environment, it can be difficult to figure out when some odd issues are related to storage or something else. For instance, there was a time when refreshing the storage connections for all hosts fixed an issue, but there was no direct indication that anything was going on with the storage connections. I don't know if this is clearer to see in newer versions, but having a way to indicate that in some way can make certain troubleshooting easier to do.
Access to some resources requires a VMware account, while others do not. I can understand this is the case due to licenses being required for certain product support. We have never been in a situation where we couldn't access anything, plus we have all of the accounts and licenses we need. However, it can be confusing for someone new to managing a VMware environment why they can't access something they need to manage the environment.

Likelihood to Recommend

Adam Friedli

System Administrator in Information Technology at Mary Free Bed Rehabilitation Hospital (Information Technology & Services, 1001-5000 employees)

Vetted Review

10 years of experience

View profile