Ubuntu vs. VMware vSphere

Overview
ProductRatingMost Used ByProduct SummaryStarting Price
Ubuntu
Score 8.5 out of 10
N/A
Ubuntu Linux is a Linux-based operating system for personal computers, tablets and smartphones. There is also a Server version which is used on physical or virtual servers in the data center.N/A
VMware vSphere
Score 8.0 out of 10
N/A
An enterprise workload platform, vSphere is used to improve the performance for a data center. It is used to boost operational efficiency, supercharge workload performance, and accelerate innovation.
$995
per year
Pricing
UbuntuVMware vSphere
Editions & Modules
No answers on this topic
Standard
$995.00
per year
Enterprise
$3,995.00
per year
Offerings
Pricing Offerings
UbuntuVMware vSphere
Free Trial
NoNo
Free/Freemium Version
NoNo
Premium Consulting/Integration Services
NoNo
Entry-level Setup FeeNo setup feeNo setup fee
Additional Details
More Pricing Information
Community Pulse
UbuntuVMware vSphere
Considered Both Products
Ubuntu
Chose Ubuntu
I've used other Linux distributions like Debian, Mint, Suse, Slackware, and others. I also ran OpenBSD as my primary OS for more than 3 years. We maintain FreeBSD based servers as well. Other than Debian, the supported hardware and packages doesn't seem as good as with Ubuntu …
VMware vSphere

No answer on this topic

Features
UbuntuVMware vSphere
Server Virtualization
Comparison of Server Virtualization features of Product A and Product B
Ubuntu
-
Ratings
VMware vSphere
7.2
67 Ratings
11% below category average
Virtual machine automated provisioning00 Ratings7.062 Ratings
Management console00 Ratings7.067 Ratings
Live virtual machine backup00 Ratings6.160 Ratings
Live virtual machine migration00 Ratings8.065 Ratings
Hypervisor-level security00 Ratings8.062 Ratings
Best Alternatives
UbuntuVMware vSphere
Small Businesses
Android
Android
Score 8.9 out of 10
DigitalOcean Droplets
DigitalOcean Droplets
Score 9.4 out of 10
Medium-sized Companies
Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL)
Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL)
Score 9.0 out of 10
VMware vSOM (discontinued)
VMware vSOM (discontinued)
Score 10.0 out of 10
Enterprises
Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL)
Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL)
Score 9.0 out of 10
VMware vSOM (discontinued)
VMware vSOM (discontinued)
Score 10.0 out of 10
All AlternativesView all alternativesView all alternatives
User Ratings
UbuntuVMware vSphere
Likelihood to Recommend
9.4
(47 ratings)
7.0
(70 ratings)
Likelihood to Renew
6.0
(2 ratings)
7.0
(7 ratings)
Usability
9.5
(2 ratings)
8.0
(11 ratings)
Support Rating
8.6
(6 ratings)
8.0
(25 ratings)
Implementation Rating
9.0
(1 ratings)
9.0
(2 ratings)
Contract Terms and Pricing Model
-
(0 ratings)
8.4
(5 ratings)
Professional Services
-
(0 ratings)
9.7
(3 ratings)
User Testimonials
UbuntuVMware vSphere
Likelihood to Recommend
Canonical Ltd
If somebody whishes to be an IT professional, learning the basics of Linux is amust. Ubuntu [Linux] is one of the most beginner-friendly, widely supported, easy-to-use-relative-to-the-fact-that-its-still-linux OS on the market. As somebody who learned the basics of UNIX/LINUX on Ubuntu, it was a very good experience. It is customizable, has a lot of improvements over the years, and live up to be a viable alternative to any modern OS in 2021 as well.
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VMware by Broadcom
vSphere is well suited for multiple VMWare hosts and can be very useful in larger enterprises where vMotion is used to load balance and failover running virtual machines. In smaller businesses with one or two hosts then the features can be overkill. The addition of virtual TPM support is a very nice addition to provide vm security in a more Microsoft supported methodology.
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Pros
Canonical Ltd
  • PACKAGE MANAGEMENT. You can update everything - OS installed software, you name it with either a few clicks in a GUI or a single command.
  • No bloatware.
  • No need for antivirus software.
  • Certainly the price is right.
  • My 83 year old grandmother has been using it - and because of this I rarely need to provide tech support. But I still visit my grandmother.
  • You can choose from a variety of user interfaces or rock it in the terminal.
  • Generally speaking, Ubuntu is as polished an OS as any you might pay for.
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VMware by Broadcom
  • vMotion that provides seamless movement of Virtual Machines between physical hosts and datastores.
  • Ease of Manage: vCenter provides very good management experience to the users.
  • It provides hassle free upgrade of versions, which requires good planning.
  • Easy to manage datastore, networks, CPU and memory resources.
  • It also allows to convert the physical machine and bring it to vSphere Environment with minimum effort.
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Cons
Canonical Ltd
  • The repository system could be a little better, as some of the software needed is not easily available there.
  • Ubuntu sometimes does not play nicely or easily with some modern firmwares.
  • Some people report slow responses with newer versions of Ubuntu, although we have not experienced any.
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VMware by Broadcom
  • Allow enable EVC without requiring host shutdown
  • More detail in recent tasks. Instead of just showing a task called "Reconfigure virtual machine" also have a link to more detailed information as to what was reconfigured, changed or removed.
  • Allow searching tasks or events
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Likelihood to Renew
Canonical Ltd
While it works, we're finding that SNAP is getting more and more annoying, so we're probably going to migrate to Debian.
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VMware by Broadcom
We are constantly looking for change that will benefit our company. We are not ones to stick with a product simply because it is what we know, but rather looking for what fits us best. We can't imagine another product on the market today doing a better job of handling our infrastructure than vSphere.
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Usability
Canonical Ltd
I gave it 10 out of 10 because it allows me to do the work I need on a server, such as running a website and database, and making developments. In addition, thanks to its easy and useful interface during installation, it can be easily installed. In addition, thanks to its easily accessible documents, when a problem occurs, it can be solved easily and quickly.
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VMware by Broadcom
Very useful for environments where space and energy consumption are issues and management is not very keen on upfront spending on hardware every time whenever requirement comes from any dept for provisioning a machine for their occasional use, easily can be done in case of VMware vSphere in few clicks. Backup, security, monitoring and management everything is covered but at additional cost.
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Support Rating
Canonical Ltd
We did not use the managed commercial support, but instead relied on community forums and official documentation. Ubuntu is very well documented across both instructional documentation from the developers themselves as well as informal support forums [ServerFault, YCombinator, Reddit]. It's easy enough to find an answer to any question you may have
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VMware by Broadcom
I rarely ever have to contact support and when I do need to resolve an issue, there is always an abundance of kb articles and research information available that can help quickly resolve the issue. Depending on the type of support contract you have, you may get support from some offshore group in another country and this could be a little challenging because of the language barrier.
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Implementation Rating
Canonical Ltd
It was all pretty much automatic for our use cases. It integrates nicely with Laravel Forge, which is our primary use case.
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VMware by Broadcom
Just make sure that when you implement, that the person implementing truly knows what they are doing and has a plan of action coming in. Since our initial implementation using a consulting service, I have implemented a few vSphere just from what I learned at the initial implementation and use over time, and the person implementing really needs to know what they are doing or you will miss out on features that may help you down the line
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Alternatives Considered
Canonical Ltd
Windows 10: Expensive, with more security problems, more difficult to keep updated and less variety of free / open source applications. Its use encourages bad information security practices. OpenSuse Linux: A different distribution at source (Suse Linux), use of rpm packages (with fewer repositories and incompatible with Ubuntu Linux dpkg packages), and whose main objective is to be a "testing ground" for its paid version / professional, SUSE enterprise Linux.
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VMware by Broadcom
vSphere has a lot more feature sets than Hyper-V but at a much higher cost of entry versus MS Hyper-V. I have not been able to play with Hyper-V as much as I would have liked, but the setup and ongoing maintenance seems to be easier in vSphere than with Hyper-V
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Contract Terms and Pricing Model
Canonical Ltd
No answers on this topic
VMware by Broadcom
The contract terms are very clear and can be updated as per the project requirement. Customer support is also included in the contract which help us to troubleshoot critical issues very easily. Training included in contract will really help the client team to empower and hands-on on the latest updates and enhancements
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Professional Services
Canonical Ltd
No answers on this topic
VMware by Broadcom
As I said earlier, they're always ready to understand our issues and propose the best and most appropriate solution for issues all the time. The security patches solution is accordingly to the business needs. Another scenario is their Knowledge Base where
they're many articles that help you in order to solve something which
is wrong.
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Return on Investment
Canonical Ltd
  • Systems administration with Ubuntu is easy with little deep knowledge about it. Docs and community publications are great resources for any task you need to perform on any Ubuntu server and the organization can save several salaries of specialized sys admins in favor of more active roles.
  • Having been an Ubuntu user for many years personally, setting up new Ubuntu servers on my organization came with zero cost for me. I just deployed one instance from my hosting/cloud provider and started working right after it was running, no need to ask support or hire new staff for these tasks.
  • Replacing paid options with Ubuntu have also saved thousands of dollars on Windows Server licenses. I've migrated Windows/SQL Server based systems to Ubuntu/MySQL/PostgreSQL several times during my career and saved about USD 5000/year in licenses to many of them.
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VMware by Broadcom
  • Having vSphere helped my business quickly recover from a ransomware attack which would have crippled us for weeks if we were not virtualized. I think the ROI on something like that is immeasurable.
  • vSphere has allowed my company to purchase bigger server hardware to host 3 or 4 virtual servers, which was at a cost much lower than buying 3 or 4 server hardware boxes, saving us thousands each time we need to upgrade hardware.
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ScreenShots