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libvirt

45
64
+ 1
17
Qemu

91
119
+ 1
3
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libvirt vs Qemu: What are the differences?

What is libvirt? An open-source virtualization API. It is an open-source API, daemon and management tool for managing platform virtualization. It can be used to manage KVM, Xen, VMware ESXi, QEMU and other virtualization technologies.

What is Qemu? A generic and open source machine emulator and virtualizer. When used as a machine emulator, it can run OSes and programs made for one machine (e.g. an ARM board) on a different machine (e.g. your own PC). By using dynamic translation, it achieves very good performance When used as a virtualizer, it achieves near native performance by executing the guest code directly on the host CPU. it supports virtualization when executing under the Xen hypervisor or using the KVM kernel module in Linux. When using KVM, it can virtualize x86, server and embedded PowerPC, 64-bit POWER, S390, 32-bit and 64-bit ARM, and MIPS guests..

libvirt belongs to "Virtual Machine Management" category of the tech stack, while Qemu can be primarily classified under "Virtualization Platform".

Some of the features offered by libvirt are:

  • manage virtualization platforms
  • accessible from C, Python, Perl, Java and more
  • supports KVM, QEMU, Xen, Virtuozzo, VMWare ESX, LXC, BHyve and more

On the other hand, Qemu provides the following key features:

  • machine emulator and virtualizer

- dynamic translation

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Pros of libvirt
Pros of Qemu
  • 2
    Low overhead
  • 2
    Free
  • 2
    Built into most Linux distros
  • 2
    Fast
  • 2
    Native KVM and QEMU
  • 2
    Native hypervisor
  • 2
    Can fully manage via CLI or VirtManager
  • 2
    VirtIO direct hardware access
  • 1
    VirtIO direct hardware support
  • 1
    Performance
  • 1
    Easy to use
  • 1
    Free

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What is libvirt?

It is an open-source API, daemon and management tool for managing platform virtualization. It can be used to manage KVM, Xen, VMware ESXi, QEMU and other virtualization technologies.

What is Qemu?

When used as a machine emulator, it can run OSes and programs made for one machine (e.g. an ARM board) on a different machine (e.g. your own PC). By using dynamic translation, it achieves very good performance. When used as a virtualizer, it achieves near native performance by executing the guest code directly on the host CPU. it supports virtualization when executing under the Xen hypervisor or using the KVM kernel module in Linux. When using KVM, it can virtualize x86, server and embedded PowerPC, 64-bit POWER, S390, 32-bit and 64-bit ARM, and MIPS guests.

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What companies use libvirt?
What companies use Qemu?
See which teams inside your own company are using libvirt or Qemu.
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What tools integrate with libvirt?
What tools integrate with Qemu?

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What are some alternatives to libvirt and Qemu?
KVM
KVM (for Kernel-based Virtual Machine) is a full virtualization solution for Linux on x86 hardware containing virtualization extensions (Intel VT or AMD-V).
VirtualBox
VirtualBox is a powerful x86 and AMD64/Intel64 virtualization product for enterprise as well as home use. Not only is VirtualBox an extremely feature rich, high performance product for enterprise customers, it is also the only professional solution that is freely available as Open Source Software under the terms of the GNU General Public License (GPL) version 2.
OpenStack
OpenStack is a cloud operating system that controls large pools of compute, storage, and networking resources throughout a datacenter, all managed through a dashboard that gives administrators control while empowering their users to provision resources through a web interface.
Docker
The Docker Platform is the industry-leading container platform for continuous, high-velocity innovation, enabling organizations to seamlessly build and share any application — from legacy to what comes next — and securely run them anywhere
Vagrant
Vagrant provides the framework and configuration format to create and manage complete portable development environments. These development environments can live on your computer or in the cloud, and are portable between Windows, Mac OS X, and Linux.
See all alternatives