Docker vs. Oracle VirtualBox

Overview
ProductRatingMost Used ByProduct SummaryStarting Price
Docker
Score 8.8 out of 10
N/A
Docker Enterprise was sold to Mirantis in 2019; that product is now sold as Mirantis Kubernetes Engine. But Docker now offers a 2-product suite that includes Docker Desktop, which they present as a fast way to containerize applications on a desktop; and, Docker Hub, a service for finding and sharing container images with a team and the Docker community, a repository of container images with an array of…
$0
unlimited public repositories
Oracle VirtualBox
Score 8.4 out of 10
N/A
Oracle VirtualBox is an open source, cross-platform, virtualization software, enables developers to deliver code faster by running multiple operating systems on a single device.N/A
Pricing
DockerOracle VirtualBox
Editions & Modules
Free
$0
unlimited public repositories
Pro
$5.00
per month per user
Team
$7.00
per month per user
Business
$21
per month per user
No answers on this topic
Offerings
Pricing Offerings
DockerOracle VirtualBox
Free Trial
NoNo
Free/Freemium Version
YesYes
Premium Consulting/Integration Services
NoNo
Entry-level Setup FeeNo setup feeNo setup fee
Additional Details
More Pricing Information
Community Pulse
DockerOracle VirtualBox
Considered Both Products
Docker
Chose Docker
Our team uses Lando which is built on top of Docker. This makes using Docker even easier.
Chose Docker
It is easy to use. we can manage multiple images in docker hub. Docker desktop is for accessing images in our desktop. It is very much user friendly as compare to podman.
Chose Docker
Docker is by far the industry leader and mainstay when it comes to virtual machines, its really hard to justify using another service like Vagrant. The upcoming monetization of Docker desktop should make things interesting though.
Chose Docker
We need a solution where initially we can use an OS to trigger our pipeline to be used by terraform and then later in ansible. After doing all work it automatically get exited and we can reclaim the space of our VM. So we created a gitlab pipeline and at the initial stage we …
Chose Docker
The features and capabilities provided by Docker are incomparable and much vast in nature. Docker is much light weight and easy to onboard into the tech stack. It is also well supported by Container orchestration systems like Kubernetes which will be critical when applications …
Chose Docker
Did use containerd or LXC for brief evaluation in the past, but settled on Docker and only see Docker as the mainstay for most organizations I worked in, as the container tool of choice so far. Docker is matured, feature-rich, and reliable enough to be the main choice all …
Chose Docker
The reason why we are still using Docker right now is due to that is the best among its peers and suits our needs the best. However, the trend we foresee for the future might indicate Amazon lambda could potentially fit our needs to code enviornmentless in the near future.
Chose Docker
Podman has been used within our Red Hat environment, and although it supports deployments outside of RHEL, it's not as easy as Docker.
Chose Docker
Docker provides is effective container management and orchestration platform. It is highly suitable for Linux environments and allows the easy and quick deployment of production applications Other alternatives use replication and management of the virtual machines. Docker …
Oracle VirtualBox
Chose Oracle VirtualBox
Oracle VirtualBox is the better choice due to its cost-effectiveness, ease of use and feature set. However VMware Workstation is more suitable due to its superior performance, better features and better integration with enterprise tools. VMware Workstation also provides a …
Chose Oracle VirtualBox
It always depends on the usecase which product is better suited. But generally, Oracle VM VirtualBox is very easy to set up on every operating system and is intuitive in the usage. Compared to VMware Workstation it offers less features but for a basic setup, I prefer Oracle VM …
Chose Oracle VirtualBox
Oracle's solution is entirely free, although a bit clumsy and visually outdated. Hyper-V can and will be a better match due to having more resources, offering full Microsoft Support, and being focused mainly on corporative uses, but for a small environment, it can be like …
Chose Oracle VirtualBox
VirutalBox is very similar to using Vmware with the slight difference in appearance and what might be considered a less polished look. However, what it lacks in polish and looks it makes up for in functionality, easy of use and the wide range of operating systems and features …
Chose Oracle VirtualBox
While Parallels Desktop has always positioned itself better than VirtualBox, it will never be able to compete against free and open-source software. Yes, it is true that it has some extra seasonings that can make the scale move towards Parallels at the time of the election, …
Chose Oracle VirtualBox
VMWare Workstation required VMWare Workstation Pro to create the system before we could use it. The license requirements for the latter was the issue as we needed this for dev/test environments as well as to show POC on virtualization without necessarily incurring a cost at the …
Chose Oracle VirtualBox
Docker, and automated machine provisioning in DevOps often uses the metaphor "treat your machines like cattle, not pets." VirtualBox's intended use is definitely in the creation, management and use of "pet" machines, whereas many similar products are more in the "cattle" …
Chose Oracle VirtualBox
The main benefits of Oracle VM VirtualBox are its licensing terms (it is free), its open-source nature, and its active community. However, its various competitors do a much better job when it comes to both ease of use and, most importantly, speed. For example, Parallels Desktop …
Chose Oracle VirtualBox
We've used VMware, and continue to use it for some projects. But, in my experience, the latest updates to VMware run very slowly, particularly on macOS. Many blog posts offer tweaks to help speed up VMware, but none of these tweaks make a significant difference.
Chose Oracle VirtualBox
We primarily use Oracle VM VirtualBox because it's free, and it is the default provider for Vagrant, which we use for our development VMs. The user interface of VirtualBox looks a little clunky in macOS, but I actually almost never see the main VirtualBox interface because I …
Chose Oracle VirtualBox
With regards to how some of the other virtualization software packages stack up again VirtualBox, I would say VirtualBox is ahead of the game especially when it comes to cost savings, as there is no ongoing cost for running the software. A big disadvantage to one of the other …
Chose Oracle VirtualBox
I would prefer Oracle as it is much more user-friendly, easier to set up, and good for large communities.
Chose Oracle VirtualBox
As I mentioned earlier, Oracle VM VirtualBox and VMWare Workstation offer roughly the same type of features. One of the main differences is that VMWare Workstation is a commercial product while Oracle VM VirtualBox is open-source. Resource utilization and graphics support is …
Chose Oracle VirtualBox
VirtualBox is just as robust and as functional as the VMware desktop product. It actually has more features and in some ways is easier to work with. I've also found that VirtualBox supports newer operating systems better than VMware Workstation. There's also the cost advantage …
Chose Oracle VirtualBox
I have used Parallels as well as VMware Workstation and have always returned to VirtualBox. VirtualBox is free which makes it easy to try. Compared to the others, it does everything I need. In +7 years I have not been able to justify the cost of a Parallels Desktop or VMware …
Chose Oracle VirtualBox
It's free, fast, and really well built. Obviously, VMware is the key competitor, but I consider that more of an enterprise app for building and managing entire networks of virtual systems, whereas VirtualBox is fantastic as a personal VM tool. What it lacks in enterprise-grade …
Chose Oracle VirtualBox
In a Windows environment, Docker would not even be possible, to begin with. Also, on the way around, having a Linux based Machine, without Oracle VM VirtualBox, one would have to create a partitioned disk and enable it at boot time in order to be able to run Windows in such a …
Chose Oracle VirtualBox
It's much more useful than VMware workstation player because you can't edit anything at all with that free version of vmWare. This is just about as capable as VMware fusion and Workstation until you pay even more to use vSphere, and then you start having enterprise features.
Chose Oracle VirtualBox
We feel like we made a good decision going with Oracle VM VirtualBox because it was more enterprise ready. They had great customer success team and proper API compatibility which allowed for great integration into our legacy tools. The support we got from the development …
Chose Oracle VirtualBox
I have used a couple of other hypervisors but those softwares are no longer operational and have became obsolete.
Chose Oracle VirtualBox
We chose Oracle because they have various amounts of products to integrate with.
Features
DockerOracle VirtualBox
Server Virtualization
Comparison of Server Virtualization features of Product A and Product B
Docker
-
Ratings
Oracle VirtualBox
8.2
Ratings
2% above category average
Virtual machine automated provisioning00 Ratings8.00 Ratings
Management console00 Ratings8.80 Ratings
Live virtual machine backup00 Ratings8.20 Ratings
Live virtual machine migration00 Ratings7.00 Ratings
Hypervisor-level security00 Ratings9.00 Ratings
Best Alternatives
DockerOracle VirtualBox
Small Businesses
Git
Git
Score 10.0 out of 10
DigitalOcean Droplets
DigitalOcean Droplets
Score 9.6 out of 10
Medium-sized Companies
Git
Git
Score 10.0 out of 10
VMware vSOM (discontinued)
VMware vSOM (discontinued)
Score 10.0 out of 10
Enterprises
Git
Git
Score 10.0 out of 10
VMware vSOM (discontinued)
VMware vSOM (discontinued)
Score 10.0 out of 10
All AlternativesView all alternativesView all alternatives
User Ratings
DockerOracle VirtualBox
Likelihood to Recommend
10.0
(0 ratings)
7.7
(0 ratings)
Likelihood to Renew
9.1
(0 ratings)
10.0
(0 ratings)
Usability
10.0
(0 ratings)
10.0
(0 ratings)
Availability
10.0
(0 ratings)
8.0
(0 ratings)
Performance
8.0
(0 ratings)
10.0
(0 ratings)
Support Rating
-
(0 ratings)
10.0
(0 ratings)
Implementation Rating
-
(0 ratings)
10.0
(0 ratings)
Configurability
-
(0 ratings)
9.0
(0 ratings)
Product Scalability
10.0
(0 ratings)
8.0
(0 ratings)
User Testimonials
DockerOracle VirtualBox
Likelihood to Recommend
You are going to be able to find the most resources and examples using Docker whenever you are working with a container orchestration software like Kubernetes. There will always some entropy when you run in a container, a containerized application will never be as purely performant as an app running directly on the OS. However, in most scenarios this loss will be negligible to the time saved in deployment, monitoring, etc.
Read full review
It is best suited when you want to have different operating systems on your laptop or desktop. You can easily switch between operating systems without the need to uninstall one. In another scenario, if you expect some application to damage your device, it would be best to run the application on the VM such that the damage can only be done to the virtual machine. It is less appropriate when time synchronization is very important. At times the VMs run their own times differently from the host time and this may cause some losses if what you doing is critical. Another important thing to take note of is the licensing of the application you want to run your VM. Some licenses do not allow the applications to be run on virtual servers so it is not appropriate to use the VM at this time.
Read full review
Pros
  • Kubernetes context switching - very handy
  • Integrate well and seamless - No complicated setup and or UX
  • Ease of updating images and etc - very important
Read full review
  • Can spin up multiple VMs on a host-only network that speak to each other and allow for interesting test environments spun up at will.
  • Cross-platform functionality allows me to run it on my Linux Desktop and know that tutorials I make with it could be approached by someone on a Windows or Mac OSX system. Hyper-V is limited to Windows, and VMware Workstation requires a license (VMware Player is free, but is not open-source and is more limited in comparison to VirtualBox).
  • If you are testing tools like Vagrant and Test-Kitchen, VirtualBox often seems to have the highest amount of support and documentation when it comes to compatibility (though, many people do use Hyper-V or VMware Workstation without issues).
Read full review
Cons
  • It will be nice to see an admin UI for configuration of images
  • Container networking can be simplified
  • Data storage/volume management can be simplified
Read full review
  • The memory footprint is high, and requires above 8 GB of memory to run an Ubuntu VM smoothly (considering developing inside ubuntu OS inside a MacBook Pro).
  • Some known issues with OVF/OVA images import/export. We had the issue of some sections in OVF being ignored (especially Startup and Install sections).
  • Some intermittent issues when mounting external hard drives and trying to access them from within the running VM.
Read full review
Likelihood to Renew
No answers on this topic
I give this rating because virtual box is inexpensive but there is another product such as vm ware that can also be used
Read full review
Usability
I have been using Docker for more than 3 years and it really simplifies the modern application development and deployment. I like the ability of Docker to improve efficiency, portability and scalability for developers and operations teams. Another reason for giving this rating is because Docker integrates CI/CD pipelines very well
Read full review
I love using the Graphical User Interface. The VirtualBox Manager is very easy to understand and use. You can quickly create, configure and manage all your virtual machines in one window. It makes operating virtual machines easy and simple. When using VBoxManage it gives the user comprehensive control over VirtualBox so that you can use automation and scripting at the command-line interface
Read full review
Reliability and Availability
Haven't seen any outages, fatal/unrecoverable errors in my usage so far. Enough said.
Read full review
Dependency on the Host OS means it is as reliable as it is possible to be. Application errors are beyond the purview of the application.
Read full review
Performance
Docker Desktop. The CPU high usage is a known issue. Needs fixing. Otherwise, it is great overall. Would not use anything else still.
Read full review
No issues, especially with the extensions addons.
Read full review
Support Rating
No answers on this topic
Oracle have a very fast response rate and a strong user community. One can geet help from many sources if they choose to research for themselves.
Read full review
Implementation Rating
No answers on this topic
We really enjoy using virtual box. We do not require to buy expensive hardware but instead we can minimize costs and maximize profits.
Read full review
Alternatives Considered
We need a solution where initially we can use an OS to trigger our pipeline to be used by terraform and then later in ansible. After doing all work it automatically get exited and we can reclaim the space of our VM. So we created a gitlab pipeline and at the initial stage we defined a docker file which will be our base image and we performed all our activities inside that image to build infrastructure using terraform. Integration we have done in our gitlab pipeline and finally we remove the docker image so that the space can be reclaimed immediately.
Read full review
VirutalBox is very similar to using Vmware with the slight difference in appearance and what might be considered a less polished look. However, what it lacks in polish and looks it makes up for in functionality, easy of use and the wide range of operating systems and features it supports without the need of buying the full professional edition
Read full review
Scalability
It is the only tool in our toolset that has not [had] any issues so far. That is really a mark of reliability, and it's a testimony to how well the product is made, and a tool that does its job well is a tool well worth having. It is the base tool that I would say any organisation must have if they do scalable deployment.
Read full review
The only problem I have found is that the deployment is dependent and intrinsically linked to the Host OS. This is different from bare metal solutions which remove that dependency on a Host OS. The latter is more reliable and removes a layer of potential failure.
Read full review
Return on Investment
  • With Docker adoption, were able to reduce 40% of the time taken to complete workspace setup
  • Provided the environment packaging / configurability capability which enabled resource sharing and interoperability across teams
  • Were able to leverage off the shelf images provided by leading product companies which increased reliability and security exponently
Read full review
  • Direct cost savings - it enables me to do the work I need to do without purchasing additional physical computers
  • Time savings - it allows me to perform testing and reversion that would take much longer on a physical computer
  • Increased productivity - it enables me to more easily integrate with customer environments
Read full review
ScreenShots