What users are saying about
298 Ratings
<a href='https://www.trustradius.com/static/about-trustradius-scoring' target='_blank' rel='nofollow noopener'>trScore algorithm: Learn more.</a>Score 8.3 out of 100
Based on 298 reviews and ratings
VMware ESXi
<a href='https://www.trustradius.com/static/about-trustradius-scoring#question3' target='_blank' rel='nofollow noopener'>Customer Verified: Read more.</a>
Top Rated
739 Ratings
<a href='https://www.trustradius.com/static/about-trustradius-scoring' target='_blank' rel='nofollow noopener'>trScore algorithm: Learn more.</a>Score 9.2 out of 100
Based on 739 reviews and ratings
Feature Set Ratings
Infrastructure-as-a-Service (IaaS)
8.9
Amazon Elastic Compute Cloud (EC2)
89%
VMware ESXi
Feature Set Not Supported
N/A
Amazon Elastic Compute Cloud (EC2) ranks higher in 9/9 features
Amazon Elastic Compute Cloud (EC2) ranks higher in 9/9 features
Service-level Agreement (SLA) uptime
9.0
90%
15 Ratings
N/A
0 Ratings
Dynamic scaling
8.7
87%
16 Ratings
N/A
0 Ratings
Elastic load balancing
9.0
90%
15 Ratings
N/A
0 Ratings
Pre-configured templates
8.9
89%
16 Ratings
N/A
0 Ratings
Monitoring tools
8.9
89%
16 Ratings
N/A
0 Ratings
Pre-defined machine images
8.8
88%
16 Ratings
N/A
0 Ratings
Operating system support
8.9
89%
16 Ratings
N/A
0 Ratings
Security controls
9.0
90%
16 Ratings
N/A
0 Ratings
Automation
9.0
90%
5 Ratings
N/A
0 Ratings
Server Virtualization
Amazon Elastic Compute Cloud (EC2)
Feature Set Not Supported
N/A
8.8
VMware ESXi
88%
VMware ESXi ranks higher in 5/5 features
VMware ESXi ranks higher in 5/5 features
Virtual machine automated provisioning
N/A
0 Ratings
8.7
87%
117 Ratings
Management console
N/A
0 Ratings
8.8
88%
129 Ratings
Live virtual machine backup
N/A
0 Ratings
8.4
84%
111 Ratings
Live virtual machine migration
N/A
0 Ratings
9.3
93%
117 Ratings
Hypervisor-level security
N/A
0 Ratings
8.6
86%
118 Ratings
Attribute Ratings
- VMware ESXi is rated higher in 3 areas: Likelihood to Recommend, Usability, Support Rating
Likelihood to Recommend
8.5
Amazon Elastic Compute Cloud (EC2)
85%
65 Ratings
9.3
VMware ESXi
93%
130 Ratings
Likelihood to Renew
Amazon Elastic Compute Cloud (EC2)
N/A
0 Ratings
10.0
VMware ESXi
100%
5 Ratings
Usability
8.9
Amazon Elastic Compute Cloud (EC2)
89%
3 Ratings
9.3
VMware ESXi
93%
4 Ratings
Availability
Amazon Elastic Compute Cloud (EC2)
N/A
0 Ratings
10.0
VMware ESXi
100%
1 Rating
Performance
Amazon Elastic Compute Cloud (EC2)
N/A
0 Ratings
10.0
VMware ESXi
100%
1 Rating
Support Rating
8.9
Amazon Elastic Compute Cloud (EC2)
89%
22 Ratings
9.2
VMware ESXi
92%
114 Ratings
Implementation Rating
Amazon Elastic Compute Cloud (EC2)
N/A
0 Ratings
10.0
VMware ESXi
100%
2 Ratings
Contract Terms and Pricing Model
Amazon Elastic Compute Cloud (EC2)
N/A
0 Ratings
10.0
VMware ESXi
100%
1 Rating
Product Scalability
Amazon Elastic Compute Cloud (EC2)
N/A
0 Ratings
10.0
VMware ESXi
100%
1 Rating
Likelihood to Recommend
Amazon Elastic Compute Cloud (EC2)
I think nowadays, Amazon EC2 is best-suited for most app development and deployment use cases, especially if your resource requirements are not fixed over a long period of time. The flexibility provided by the on-demand pricing and rescaling option makes Amazon EC2 a great service, especially if your tech stack already runs on AWS. On the other hand, I think Amazon EC2 is not the best option if your tech infrastructure runs on another public cloud.

Verified User
Manager in Engineering
Logistics & Supply Chain Company, 201-500 employeesVMware ESXi
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.
System Administrator
Mary Free Bed Rehabilitation HospitalInformation Technology & Services, 1001-5000 employees
Pros
Amazon Elastic Compute Cloud (EC2)
- A great variety of choices in Amazon Machine Image (AMI) types. Users can select a more basic type to run generic workloads, but also have the choice to pick an AMI pre-installed with specific services in the AWS Marketplace.
- The range of instance types can support the usage from a student's exploration (inexpensive general-purpose nano instances) to an enterprise's most intense workloads (memory or storage-optimized instances with terabytes of memory and ultra-fast network connection).
- The pricing options, from regular instances, reserved instances to spot instances allow users to get the job done and make smart choices about how much they want to pay and when they want to pay.

Verified User
Engineer in Engineering
Internet Company, 501-1000 employeesVMware ESXi
- 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.
System Administrator
CNM LLPAccounting, 51-200 employees
Cons
Amazon Elastic Compute Cloud (EC2)
- This service is a bit difficult to consume. New users need a big learning curve to use this service effectively.
- UI for EC2 service is a little complex and at many places, it misses detailed explanation.
- Sometimes it takes too long to create images of EC2 instances. This keeps your EC2 up for that extra time. When instances are heavy, it penalizes a lot of money.
Senior Solutions Architect
InfostretchInformation Technology and Services, 1001-5000 employees
VMware ESXi
- It would be nice if it was easier to upgrade between versions/releases
- Trying to find some of their software downloads can be difficult, as their website is not the greatest - also requires you to be logged in to view any of their software downloads (which is difficult if you're working with a reseller)
- When you click on "Virtual Network Cards" as a hotlink - it generally breaks your session. So that small bug could also be patched.

Verified User
Administrator in Information Technology
Education Management Company, 201-500 employeesPricing Details
Amazon Elastic Compute Cloud (EC2)
General
Free Trial
—Free/Freemium Version
—Premium Consulting/Integration Services
—Entry-level set up fee?
No
Starting Price
$0 per Hour
Amazon Elastic Compute Cloud (EC2) Editions & Modules
Edition
On-Demand | $0.0042 - $6.5281 |
---|---|
Data Transfer | $0.00 - $0.092 |
EBS-Optimized Instances | $0.0053 |
Carrier IP Addresses | $0.005 - $0.10 |
T2, T3 Instances | $0.05 ($0.096)5 |
T4g Instances | $0.046 |
- per Hour
- per GB
- per IP address with a running instance per hour on a pro rata basis
- none
- per vCPU-Hour Linux, RHEL, & SLES (Windows)
- per vCPU-Hour Linux, RHEL, & SLES
Additional Pricing Details
—VMware ESXi
General
Free Trial
—Free/Freemium Version
Yes
Premium Consulting/Integration Services
—Entry-level set up fee?
No
Starting Price
—VMware ESXi Editions & Modules
—
Additional Pricing Details
—Likelihood to Renew
Amazon Elastic Compute Cloud (EC2)
No score
No answers yet
No answers on this topic
VMware ESXi
VMware ESXi 10.0
Based on 5 answers
It is critical to our business, what started out as a way to do certain functions, it has now become core to ensuring our product is available to our customers and reducing our costs to operate and reduce our recovery time and provisioning servers. Their support is great and the costs to renew is reasonable.
IT Consultant
Makiska MediaInternet, 1-10 employees
Usability
Amazon Elastic Compute Cloud (EC2)
Amazon Elastic Compute Cloud (EC2) 8.9
Based on 3 answers
Amazon Elastic Compute Cloud (EC2) allows various ways of gaining incidents, such as slow growth, money, and the reserved ones, mostly depend entirely on the necessity, because it makes highly intelligent choices possible at these times, which enable considerable cost savings whilst addressing the situation as best I like.
Senior Software Engineer
Kforce IncInformation Services, 10,001+ employees
VMware ESXi
VMware ESXi 9.3
Based on 4 answers
The interface is fairly intuitive for most things, and the areas that are a little less obvious usually have fantastic documentation in the online knowledgebase. In 3-4 years of managing our ESXi hosts, I think that I have only opened 4-5 support cases for things that I could not figure out myself or find answers to on the website.

Verified User
Technician in Information Technology
Education Management Company, 501-1000 employeesReliability and Availability
Amazon Elastic Compute Cloud (EC2)
No score
No answers yet
No answers on this topic
VMware ESXi
VMware ESXi 10.0
Based on 1 answer
Without the need to patch the servers with bug fixes and enhancements we whave not experienced any downtime with VMware issues. Even the bug fixes and updates do not cause of downtime as we just migrate the servers to the opposite node and update the one and then move servers back. Very simple and painless.
IT Consultant
Makiska MediaInternet, 1-10 employees
Performance
Amazon Elastic Compute Cloud (EC2)
No score
No answers yet
No answers on this topic
VMware ESXi
VMware ESXi 10.0
Based on 1 answer
We do not notice any difference between a physical and virtual server running the same workload. In fact we can scale quicker with the virtual server than we can with the physical.
IT Consultant
Makiska MediaInternet, 1-10 employees
Support Rating
Amazon Elastic Compute Cloud (EC2)
Amazon Elastic Compute Cloud (EC2) 8.9
Based on 22 answers
AWS's support is good overall. Not outstanding, but better than average. We have had very little reason to engage with AWS support but in our limited experience, the staff has been knowledgeable, timely and helpful. The only negative is actually initiating a service request can be a bit of a pain.
CTO (Chief Technical Officer)
Pachyderm ConsultingInformation Technology and Services, 1-10 employees
VMware ESXi
VMware ESXi 9.2
Based on 114 answers
I can't say enough good about VMware's support team. To an individual they take ownership of the case, provide thorough answers, and follow up regularly. On one occasion, a problem we experienced with NSX Endpoint was escalated to development for a permanent resolution after a workaround was found. In my experience, most companies would have tried to find a way to close a case like that instead of taking it all the way. Most importantly, when production is down and every second counts, they VMware teams understand that urgency and treat your issue as if it were the only one they had to deal with. You can't ask for better.

Verified User
Engineer in Information Technology
Gambling & Casinos Company, 501-1000 employeesImplementation Rating
Amazon Elastic Compute Cloud (EC2)
No score
No answers yet
No answers on this topic
VMware ESXi
VMware ESXi 10.0
Based on 2 answers
Jsut read and follow anything your storage provider may require to allow the integration of VMware with storage operations, outside of that VMware jsut works.
IT Consultant
Makiska MediaInternet, 1-10 employees
Alternatives Considered
Amazon Elastic Compute Cloud (EC2)
AWS EC2 is the mainstay of several AWS tools, with CodeBuild that includes AWS Cloud9, and CodePipeline, which allow us to work quickly, efficiently, for all the work team, regardless of whether it is remotely or locally, always keeping the progress saved in the cloud. With Lambda it can be compiled at any time in a fast way, with AWS WAF we protect the different connections, since it provides a high level of security, without having to configure too much, in general all the tools work perfectly with EC2, speeding up the development time of the different projects
Software Developer
Globalsoft SolutionsComputer Software, 51-200 employees
VMware ESXi
As long as you're using Nutanix AOS on Nutanix hardware and are paying their software support fees, AOS is a valid competitor to VMware and can save money due to not needing a license and having their server management system built into the base host management system. If you aren't using Nutanix hardware, however, VMWare is in most cases the best way to go. I cannot comment on HyperV, but most IT people I know either use it because they have to (most) or they like it better (not many).
IT Director
Clark County Juvenile CourtGovernment Administration, 51-200 employees
Contract Terms and Pricing Model
Amazon Elastic Compute Cloud (EC2)
No score
No answers yet
No answers on this topic
VMware ESXi
VMware ESXi 10.0
Based on 1 answer
it has been fair and easy to understand. I know VMware is looking at wanting to change from CPU to core pricing so we will see what that looks like when it happens.
IT Consultant
Makiska MediaInternet, 1-10 employees
Scalability
Amazon Elastic Compute Cloud (EC2)
No score
No answers yet
No answers on this topic
VMware ESXi
VMware ESXi 10.0
Based on 1 answer
We started out with a two-server cluster and adding a third or fourth is very straightforward and simple with no issues. You just need to be aware of the size of your Vcenter Server to handle the workload, but still the resources needed is very minimal
IT Consultant
Makiska MediaInternet, 1-10 employees
Return on Investment
Amazon Elastic Compute Cloud (EC2)
- Instance procurement time has become negligible with EC2. Any developer can provision an instance very quickly and companies can move towards automation of CI/CD pipelines and auto provisioning of EC2s.
- Companies do not have to spend money in managing infrastructures, data centers, staff to manage these, networking, connectivity etc. All this will be taken care by AWS and EC2 can be used to run your enterprise softwares and custom applications.
- If not correctly monitored EC2 prices can run up very quickly. So proper monitoring has to be in place in your organization. Non-prod and dev EC2 servers should be brought down in evening and night.

Verified User
Team Lead in Engineering
Financial Services Company, 10,001+ employeesVMware ESXi
- Positive for management and support of IT infrastructure.
- Maximising available computing power -IE, Microsoft's hypervisor run's on top of Windows which uses a lot of computing power.
- With vCenter being able to manage everything in one place, less trained users are needed to manage large numbers of ESXi hosts and SAN's etc.

Verified User
Administrator in Information Technology
Telecommunications Company, 5001-10,000 employees