7 Best VirtualBox Alternatives You Can Use

1

VirtualBox

I’m sure you can appreciate the irony in the name of this program, but this is also a very apt description of what Portable-VirtualBox is. In essence, this free and open source program is VirtualBox that you don’t need to essentially install, thereby making it useful even if it’s contained in a USB drive. Portable-VirtualBox works by downloading and virtually installing VirtualBox on the go, enabling you to run a virtual machine on a host that either didn’t have VB in the first place, or doesn’t allow installation of software. It also doesn’t matter where your virtual machines are stored, since Portable-VirtualBox is capable of running them no matter where you are.

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2

VMware Workstation

Workstation Player is also capable of running restricted virtual machines, i.e., machines that are created using VMware Workstation Pro. This makes it the ideal solution for deploying in an educational environment without making exorbitant expenses in hardware and software. Workstation Player’s virtual machines are also portable, so you can transfer the whole VM file on a flash drive or other storage media and use it on a completely different machine as long as it can run the Player itself.

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3

Workstation Player

So, there you have it – seven good VirtualBox alternatives. As you can see for yourself, in this instance, free isn’t really the best, and if you have serious hypervisor and virtualization needs, you’d be better off using a reputable commercial solution. All paid tools on this list offer a free trial, so you can check beforehand if any one of them suits your needs best. And if nothing else, take advantage of the fact that the very capable VMware Workstation Player is free for non-commercial use. Also, if you have any other recommendations that you think should have been included in our list, drop us a comment and let us know.

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4

VMware Fusion

No virtualization software discussion can be complete without the mention of Parallels Desktop. Parallels Desktop is a direct competitor for VMware Fusion and Fusion Pro, and even offers two versions: one for personal use and the other geared for businesses. Parallels Desktop does everything that VMware Fusion does with some subtle differences. It also allows for simultaneous running of Mac and Windows and even comes with a “Coherence” mode that is the exact equivalent of Fusion’s Unity. Parallels, however, isn’t restricted to Windows, and can run Linux and Chrome OS on your Mac as well. It is also Windows 10 ready, supports Cortana integration and can even make a virtual machine out of your Boot Camp Windows installation for convenience.

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5

QEMU

Short for Quick Emulator, QEMU is yet another open source and free virtualization solution for a variety of operating systems. While being immensely powerful, it’s also one of the least user-friendly out there. QEMU offers a number of possibilities and advanced features that others in the same genre fall short in, including a wide variety of architectures instead of just the traditional x86 used by traditional PCs. It can also be bundled with KVM to run virtual machines as fast as they would run in a native hardware environment. QEMU also doesn’t rely on host’s graphical output for virtual machine display, instead deploying an integrated VNC server to show the guest operating system’s screen.

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6

Parallels Desktop

No virtualization software discussion can be complete without the mention of Parallels Desktop. Parallels Desktop is a direct competitor for VMware Fusion and Fusion Pro, and even offers two versions: one for personal use and the other geared for businesses. Parallels Desktop does everything that VMware Fusion does with some subtle differences. It also allows for simultaneous running of Mac and Windows and even comes with a “Coherence” mode that is the exact equivalent of Fusion’s Unity. Parallels, however, isn’t restricted to Windows, and can run Linux and Chrome OS on your Mac as well. It is also Windows 10 ready, supports Cortana integration and can even make a virtual machine out of your Boot Camp Windows installation for convenience.

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7

Portable Virtualbox

I’m sure you can appreciate the irony in the name of this program, but this is also a very apt description of what Portable-VirtualBox is. In essence, this free and open source program is VirtualBox that you don’t need to essentially install, thereby making it useful even if it’s contained in a USB drive. Portable-VirtualBox works by downloading and virtually installing VirtualBox on the go, enabling you to run a virtual machine on a host that either didn’t have VB in the first place, or doesn’t allow installation of software. It also doesn’t matter where your virtual machines are stored, since Portable-VirtualBox is capable of running them no matter where you are.

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8

MobaLiveCD

Our final entrant on this list is one freeware specific to running Linux virtual machine on a Windows environment without the shackles of installation. As the name suggests, MobaLiveCD allows running a Linux LiveCD for testing and emulation purposes on any Windows machine. It utilizes QEMU as the engine for emulation of the virtual environment, and frees you up from having to burn a CD to run Linux on Windows. Since MobaLiveCD serves a very specific purpose, it doesn’t come with any bells and whistles, and does the job its meant to do well.

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