StackShareStackShare
Follow on
StackShare

Discover and share technology stacks from companies around the world.

Follow on

© 2025 StackShare. All rights reserved.

Product

  • Stacks
  • Tools
  • Feed

Company

  • About
  • Contact

Legal

  • Privacy Policy
  • Terms of Service
  1. Stackups
  2. Application & Data
  3. Infrastructure as a Service
  4. Virtualization Platform
  5. VMware vSAN vs VirtualBox

VMware vSAN vs VirtualBox

OverviewComparisonAlternatives

Overview

VirtualBox
VirtualBox
Stacks31.1K
Followers25.6K
Votes1.1K
VMware vSAN
VMware vSAN
Stacks16
Followers12
Votes0

VMware vSAN vs VirtualBox: What are the differences?

  1. Pricing Model: VMware vSAN is a licensed software with a cost associated with it, while VirtualBox is an open-source software that is available for free. This difference in pricing models can significantly affect the total cost of ownership for organizations looking to implement virtualization solutions.

  2. Hypervisor Type: VMware vSAN functions as a hyper-converged storage solution that is tightly integrated with VMware vSphere, offering software-defined storage capabilities. On the other hand, VirtualBox is a type-2 hypervisor that runs on top of an existing operating system, providing a more lightweight virtualization solution.

  3. Scalability: VMware vSAN is designed for enterprise-level scalability, offering features like distributed storage architecture and the ability to scale out by adding more nodes to the cluster. VirtualBox, while capable of running multiple virtual machines on a single host, may not have the same level of scalability and performance as VMware vSAN for large-scale deployments.

  4. Management Interface: VMware vSAN has a robust management interface integrated into the VMware vSphere client, providing administrators with advanced tools for managing storage resources and monitoring performance. VirtualBox, on the other hand, has a simpler and more user-friendly interface suited for individual users and small-scale deployments.

  5. Support and Community: VMware vSAN is backed by VMware's extensive support network, with access to technical support, documentation, and training resources. VirtualBox, being an open-source project, relies on community forums and user-generated content for support, which may not always offer the same level of reliability and expertise as vendor-backed support services.

  6. Performance and Compatibility: VMware vSAN is optimized for performance and interoperability with VMware's ecosystem of products, ensuring seamless integration with other VMware solutions. VirtualBox, while versatile and widely compatible with different operating systems, may not offer the same level of performance optimization for specific use cases.

In Summary, VMware vSAN is a licensed, hyper-converged storage solution with enterprise-level scalability and advanced management tools, while VirtualBox is an open-source, type-2 hypervisor with a user-friendly interface and community-based support.

Share your Stack

Help developers discover the tools you use. Get visibility for your team's tech choices and contribute to the community's knowledge.

View Docs
CLI (Node.js)
or
Manual

Detailed Comparison

VirtualBox
VirtualBox
VMware vSAN
VMware vSAN

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.

It is enterprise-class, storage virtualization software that, when combined with vSphere, allows you to manage compute and storage with a single platform. You can reduce the cost and complexity of traditional storage and take the easiest path to hyperconverged infrastructure and hybrid cloud. Evolve to an integrated hyperconverged infrastructure (HCI) solution with vSAN to improve business agility, all while speeding operations and lowering costs.

Portability;No hardware virtualization required;Guest Additions: shared folders, seamless windows, 3D virtualization;Great hardware support;Multigeneration branched snapshots;VM groups;Clean architecture; unprecedented modularity;Remote machine display
Integrated with Your Hypervisor; Lower Costs; Power Traditional and Cloud-Native Applications; Private Cloud and Hybrid Cloud Ready
Statistics
Stacks
31.1K
Stacks
16
Followers
25.6K
Followers
12
Votes
1.1K
Votes
0
Pros & Cons
Pros
  • 358
    Free
  • 231
    Easy
  • 169
    Default for vagrant
  • 110
    Fast
  • 73
    Starts quickly
No community feedback yet
Integrations
No integrations available
VMware vSphere
VMware vSphere
Kubernetes
Kubernetes
Aliyun
Aliyun

What are some alternatives to VirtualBox, VMware vSAN?

Proxmox VE

Proxmox VE

It is a complete open-source platform for all-inclusive enterprise virtualization that tightly integrates KVM hypervisor and LXC containers, software-defined storage and networking functionality on a single platform, and easily manages high availability clusters and disaster recovery tools with the built-in web management interface.

VMware vSphere

VMware vSphere

vSphere is the world’s leading server virtualization platform. Run fewer servers and reduce capital and operating costs using VMware vSphere to build a cloud computing infrastructure.

KVM

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).

Qemu

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.

Parallels Desktop

Parallels Desktop

Parallels Desktop for Mac allows you to seamlessly run both Windows and MacOS applications side-by-side with speed, control and confidence.

Parallels

Parallels

It is an application and desktop virtualization software vendor that offers management and delivery platforms for Apple macOS and Microsoft Windows desktop deployments.

VMware Fusion

VMware Fusion

It gives Mac users the power to run Windows on Mac along with hundreds of other operating systems side by side with Mac applications, without rebooting. It is simple enough for home users and powerful enough for IT professionals, developers and businesses.

Xen

Xen

It is a hypervisor using a microkernel design, providing services that allow multiple computer operating systems to execute on the same computer hardware concurrently. It was developed by the Linux Foundation and is supported by Intel.

Oracle VM Server

Oracle VM Server

It is a zero license cost server virtualization and management solution that makes enterprise applications easier to deploy, manage, and support. Backed worldwide by affordable enterprise-quality support for both Oracle and non-Oracle environments, it reduces operations and support costs while increasing IT efficiency and agility.

Virtuozzo

Virtuozzo

It is an operating system-level server virtualization solution designed to centralize server management and consolidate workloads, which reduces overhead by reducing the number of physical servers required. Organizations use it for server consolidation, disaster recovery, and server workload agility.

Related Comparisons

GitHub
Bitbucket

Bitbucket vs GitHub vs GitLab

GitHub
Bitbucket

AWS CodeCommit vs Bitbucket vs GitHub

Kubernetes
Rancher

Docker Swarm vs Kubernetes vs Rancher

gulp
Grunt

Grunt vs Webpack vs gulp

Graphite
Kibana

Grafana vs Graphite vs Kibana