# Page 5 | VirtualBox Reviews 2026. Verified Reviews, Pros & Cons | Capterra > Page 5 - Is VirtualBox the right Virtual Machine solution for you? Explore 885 verified user reviews from people in industries like yours to make a confident choice. Source: https://www.capterra.com/p/169939/VirtualBox/reviews --- VirtualBox 4.6 (885) [View alternatives](https://www.capterra.com/p/169939/VirtualBox/alternatives/) Provider data verified by our Software Research team, and reviews moderated by our Reviews Verification team. [Learn more](https://www.capterra.com/our-story/) * * * Last updated March 13th, 2026 # Page 5 - Reviews of VirtualBox ## Showing most helpful reviews Showing 101-125 of 885 Reviews Sort by: Most Helpful Rating Company Size Reviewer's Role Length of Use Frequency of Use Nicolas R. COO Computer Software Used the software for: 2+ years ### "Great choice for VMs in Mac" September 24, 2019 5.0 I use Virtualbox to setup environments. I'm Mac user and I use daily vm to configure and deploy mainly linux distributions. Pros When I started using Mac it was a problem for me, but when I started using VirtualBoxVM everything became easier. Easy Setup, Easy VM setup and administration, Easy everything. Runs fast. Even if I keep some VMs open. Cons I don't find any cons at all. Maybe the resource consumption, but that's really not on VirtualBoxVM, is cause of VMs assigned resources. Switched from [Virtuozzo Containers](https://www.capterra.com/p/92970/Parallels-Mac-Management/) Tryed parallels, but princing and performance made me decide for VirtualBoxVM Review Source Dennis M. Head of Software Engineering Food Production Used the software for: 2+ years ### "Virtual machines for testing." July 7, 2022 5.0 VirtualBox is a tool that allows us to create multiple virtual machines to test applications and security protocols without risking physical devices. It allows us to optimize the security of our servers and verify the correct functioning of the software we develop. Pros It is an easy to use platform that allows you to assign features to VMs according to the features you need. It allows you to create several VMs on a single device and manage them at the same time. Cons There is nothing I dislike about this virtualization tool. Review Source Kasun M. Civil Engineer Civil Engineering Used the software for: 1-2 years ### "Vertual pc engine" August 9, 2023 4.0 Pros Very useful tool to make a virtual PC. At once I used windows and ubuntu on a same computer using this application. Nic software with user-friendly interface. Cons Since this application runs on top of a existing operating system, it uses higher portion your CPU and RAM. Therefore, you will need at least a machine i3 processor and 8GB RAM in order to run this software without lagging. Review Source Divyang S. Web Developer Information Technology and Services Used the software for: 1-2 years ### "Better Way Towards Hosting Multiple OS" July 20, 2020 4.0 As an IT organisation, we continuously get client to develop softwares on different OS either to develop from scratch or test applications for their security issues. With VirtualBox it secures environment and let one use any compatible OS for development. Installing on other drive restricts you to have mere 1-2 OS simultaneously but VirtualBox expands that limit to satisfy more than that. If your device is capable it can support more than 5-10 at a time. Pros Unlike installing new OS on other drive that takes long boot time and many files may not be available, installing OS in VirtualBox lets you have as many OS in virtual environment. An impressive feature is it can save and shut down the guest so next time you can continue working from that saved state. Easy files trade off with simple configuration allows to transfer files between host and guest OS. Many great feature allows easy installation and maintaince of guest OS so one can ensure and test their software in secure environment. Cons Installing guest OS needs some technical knowledge and some options are vague that does not give insights of what will they do if selected although solutions are available easily on the internet. Sometimes suspending a process does not allow VirtualBox to save state and only option you would have is forced shut down of guest OS. Review Source Rafael L. Soporte de Redes y Sistemas Used the software for: 2+ years ### "The perfect tool to setup and run multiple and fully functional virtual machines in a single PC" April 9, 2018 5.0 Test Network Architectures and Servers to see if they meet the requirements or if the architecture or software installed has the desired behavior before build the setup physically. this was very handy during my grade internship in the teleinformatics delegation at my local university, where we were driven to test the setups using this software before build the systems using physical devices. Pros \- The several amount of operating systems that the software support for the virtual machines (from nearly all version of windows, multiple linux distributions like ubuntu, fedora, debian and even android linux , to FreeBSD systems like pfSense. -Full control over the resources each machine can get from the host PC - Optimized to take advantage of your pc specs to run vm's without generate a high impact on your system performance (of course this depends of the host pc specs) - Allows to setup complex builds including multiple vm's and physical with great accuracy for testing. Cons \- Network configuration for complex builds using multiple vm's can be tricky. - Some systems doesn't have full support to mount and recognize external usb devices Review Source Austin M. Software Analyst Pharmaceuticals Used the software for: I used a free trial ### "VirtualBox, your non-physical buddy." July 6, 2023 5.0 I'm creating virtual machines to test clients interfaces and performance. Pros I like the most about VirtualBox the capacity that you have whenever you need to create a virtual machine on-the-go and all the save-states when you're doing changes, this helps tremendously whenever you need to test critical steps when installing an application, for example. Cons I think the copy-paste functionality could be improved, drag & drop can be sometimes a nuisance and it could be reworked to be more easy-to-use. Review Source VR Verified Reviewer the boss Broadcast Media Used the software for: 2+ years ### "virtualbox very powerfull" September 9, 2022 5.0 i am very satified because i just put in a usb stik and i can emulate in any pc my os Pros is the most simple virtual machine emulator i find in the internet you just download in 5 minute you can installa any os in the world very quick Cons i can't finf no issus with this is sos simple that even old os work like a charm Review Source Kevin M. Data Consultant/Lecturer Information Technology and Services Used the software for: 2+ years ### "Virtualization is awesome. " February 18, 2020 5.0 I use Virtual Box to provide multiple services while retaining a single server. For the classroom VirutalBox provides students with an environment where they can experiment while keeping the base operating system secure and locked. The ability to preserve aging software is critical to many companies I deal with. Inability to upgrade or lack of migration options often means that they need to keep these programs running while replacing broken or old hardware. Snapshots help me to keep perfect copies of system content and provide 100% restores. Pros The ability to quick install and work inside a virtual operating system with having to build an entirely new system. No messing around with hard disks and bios. Its great when you want to test out Operating System alternatives or when testing current systems via hard disk imaging. Cons No "out of the box" compatibility with Apple IOS operating system. This is obviously no fault of its creators as Apple has made use of its Operating System near impossible with its hardware but from a teaching perspective its a wasted opportunity especially for those learning helpdesk skills. Alternatives considered [vSphere](https://www.capterra.com/p/93512/VMware-Horizon/) Reason for choosing VirtualBox Virtual Box is quick and very easy to install and configure and its survive the test of time while others are either become outdated or become not as simple to use. Review Source Gioacchino T. Studente universitario Information Technology and Services Used the software for: 2+ years ### "Greatest Virtual Machine" July 5, 2023 5.0 Decisamente la migliore macchina virtuale in circolazione e per di più gratuita. In quanto studente di Ingegneria informatica mi è stata di vitale importanza per utilizzare Ubuntu Linux come sistema operativo. Anche utile per fare degli esperimenti per i più smanettoni. Molte possibilità di emulazione di sistemi operativi anche personalizzabili e sicuramente consigliatissimo per chi vuole operare con un altro sistema operativo senza bisogno di installarlo come partizione. Pros Possibilità di emulare una quantità enorme di sistemi operativi. Possibilità di avere più macchine virtuali Cons A volte molto pesante ma potrebbe essere un problema di ottimizzazione su alcuni pc Review Source Esther R. Self-Employed Information Services Used the software for: 2+ years ### "Excellent Virtual Machine Software for Individual Users" December 22, 2019 5.0 VirtualBox excels at its primary purpose, which is to help individual users set up virtual machines on their computers quickly and easily. The interface is one of the best I've seen in almost any product category, and its ability to hide advanced options while still making them available as needed is top notch. Almost every modern operating system can be installed on VirtualBox, including the always-popular Windows and most Linux distributions. When it comes to negatives, some operating systems (especially Linux distributions) require additional programs or drivers to be installed before they will support all of the virtual machine features, and these drivers can occasionally break when updating the operating system until a fix is developed. Nonetheless, these are minor concerns, and VirtualBox is almost always my top recommendation for virtual machine creation, not to mention my own personal favorite. Pros Setup wizards make it extremely easy to set up your virtual machine, supports most popular operating systems, has advanced options available for those who need them, interface is excellent to work with Cons Some operating systems require additional configuration after installation, some limited driver support depending on operating system Review Source peter A. IT Asset and Configuration Analyst , Service Catalog and Knowledge base Manager Information Technology and Services Used the software for: 2+ years ### "VirtualBox For Virtual Machine" December 12, 2022 5.0 VirtualBox is cool to use. Pros VirtualBox is an ease to use virtual machine. You can easily setup following the tips guide. You can easily create machines as long as you have enough DiskSpace on your physical server or laptop. I like the network feature that allows internet sharing from your local machine and even file sharing. You can actually have any type of Operating System you wish to setup on the VirtualBox. Cons It takes a lot of memory space and can hang sometimes. Review Source Dylan E. Software Programmer and Security Officer Information Services Used the software for: 2+ years ### "Great for setting up free virtual machines." September 29, 2018 4.0 We use this in our organization to create development environments comparable to our production environment, where we can create and develop without fear of breaking things. Pros The tool is free to use and has unlimited use. It can be used for any type of OS and you can provide your own .iso files if you have a special need for it. It is also very easy to manage a virtual machine and in the interface you can configure alot in regards to hard disk, network, etc. Cons The only downside to this is that the software is regularly updated (which is a good thing of course). The problem is that it is common to encounter virtual machine-breaking incompatibilities, leading to having to destroy and recreate my machines more than once. Review Source DR Darren R. Director Computer Networking Used the software for: 2+ years ### "Brilliant small efficient sandbox testing environment for your virtual needs" October 10, 2023 4.0 For a low cost, fast and easy solution to run virtual test environments you cant really go wrong Pros Having multiply options to tweak the settings as required including mounting VHD. It is very easy to configure and get an test environment up and running with low resources. Does not have all the complicated unnecessary requirements I have seen in other products Cons Occasionally have had the virtual box machine blue screen rather than just the environment crash or freeze. Which is not ideal if running more than one environment at a time Reason for choosing VirtualBox Ease of use and simplicity of deployment. Review Source PV Pankaj V. IT Recruiter Staffing and Recruiting Used the software for: 2+ years ### "VirtualBox is the best platform which allow me to use multiple operating system in same device." May 5, 2022 4.0 My overall experience with VirtualBox is excellent and knowledgeable. Pros VirtualBox is very helpful for me because it's allow me to use my both operating systems Linux and Windows OS on same device and it's work perfectly, it's fast and secure. Cons It's difficult to find solutions online related to some technical issues about VirtualBox, new users need more technical information about VirtualBox on their official page. Review Source VR Verified Reviewer Main editor Computer Software Used the software for: 2+ years ### "Great option for development testing" March 30, 2019 5.0 Pros You can create a virtual machine of almost any OS. This means that you can replicate a production environment. This will save you time because you can find incompatibility issues with production servers early. Cons It’s not an specific problem of VirtualBox itself, but of any Virtual Machine tool. The guest machine may/will run slower than the host one, and you will need to put an eye on the resources use (not only CPU and RAM, but the HDD space that every VM uses; this can be critical now that lots of developers use laptops with small SDD disks). Docker environments can be an alternative (although they do not have the exact same benefits, they have some other advantages). Review Source Charith K. Undergraduate Higher Education Used the software for: 2+ years ### "Create a Virtual Machine inside your PC" November 22, 2019 5.0 The experience I had with VirtualBox is simply amazing. This is a lightweight yet a powerful software that enables the user to emulate a PC with an OS in your computer and test-out its functionality. As a programmer, I found this really helpful in learning different Operating systems like Linux and Ubuntu. In the second semester of my University we used this tool to learn Linux shell commands and related functionality efficiently without directly installing Linux in our computers . Pros VirtualBox is an open-source/free hosted hypervisor developed by Oracle. Using VirtualBox we can allocate some RAM and Secondary Storage to create a Virtual Machine (emulation of another PC) inside of our PC. This helps a lot when you want to try out the functionality of different Operating Systems. I used VirtualBox to create a Virtual Machine with Linux Installed (I use Microsoft Windows 10 as my primary OS) to learn about the functionality of Linux Shell and its commands. It is efficient and easy to create such a Virtual Machine and install a OS to it rather than installing a second OS to your own PC. You can create such a virtual machine even if you don't have a large RAM or a secondary storage. Cons There were no major cons of this software in my experience. However, I believe that the user-interface of the app looks a bit outdated and it can be improved. Also, the procedure of creating a virtual machine and installing an OS can be a bit confusing and complicated for a beginner. Review Source NJ Nikodem J. R&D Control Engineer Automotive Used the software for: 2+ years ### "Easy virtual machine for everyone" June 5, 2022 4.0 I'm using VirtualBox since many years. It is very good software, provides easy and fast way to create virtual machines. Software provides all necessary features for this kind of software: automatic guest screen resolution adjusting (by using Guest Additions installation), bi-directional clipboard, shared folders. It is open source software and as many open-source program have some flaws. As an example I have issues to set up bi-direction drag and drop of files. I also had some issues with connecting USB devices directly to guest OS, which made me swith to VMWare for projects related to USB devices support. Despite those issues I would highly recommend VirtualBox to anyone looking for this kind of software. I'm using it privately to check new OSes before installing them natively or to work on some Windows project using my Linux machine. At work I was using it to virtualize Ubuntu OS, but eventually switched to dualboot setup with native Linux, due to performance drop while using VM (which is normal case for this kind of software). Pros VirtualBox is very easy to use and provides great set of features for its price (which is none). I find it to work fast, even on older machines and quite reliable. Cons Sometimes I encounter issues with screen resizing (might be caused by guest OS) or shared folders (need to disable and re-enable them to make them work). Resizing of previously created virtual drive is a little bit complicated and requires command line use, so it's better to assign more space while adding the machine. Review Source Angus M. Company Director Logistics and Supply Chain Used the software for: 2+ years ### "Great For Testing New Software and Virtualisation" August 5, 2022 4.0 VirtualBox is great, it was the first piece of virtualisation software that I started using, mainly to improve my companies security. We now open all unknown files within a VirtualBox machine, keeping our main environment secure. It's a great piece of software. Pros My favourite feature about VirtualBox is that it's a completely separate environment from your main Desktop, so if you were to run an infected piece of software, your main machine would be protected. Cons The software is pretty memory and processor hungry, it can often use a lot more resources than anticipated. Alternatives considered [VMware Workstation Pro](https://www.capterra.com/p/212916/VMware-Workstation-Player/) Review Source Octavi P. System and Network Administrator and HPC Engineering Research Used the software for: 2+ years ### "Virtualize everything" November 28, 2018 5.0 I use Virtualbox mainly to have a virtual Windows on the machines where I work with ubuntu. Often use it to test new versions of operating systems before putting them into production Pros With VirtualBox you can virtualize any operating system with a Windows, Linux or Mac host. The integration between the virtual system and the host is perfect, you can configure the network, the USBs, the audio, etc. In addition it should be noted that it is free despite being maintained by Oracle. Cons The negative part of VirtualBox is basically the management of virtual disks, it is very difficult to resize them or assign them to other virtual machines, since all the actions must be done with terminal commands. Review Source Angelo J. Game Developer Computer Games Used the software for: 6-12 months ### "A good free alternative software for machine virtualization" April 23, 2020 5.0 My overall experience with VirtualBox is satisfying, it solves my problems more than enough. I mainly use it to run Windows on a Mac, because of some softwares specifically designed for Windows. It required a few tweaks until I was satisfied with performance, and although sometimes it gets really laggy, I can do what I need to do. Pros Despite being a free software, it is very powerful tool with lots of customizations and can do pretty much the same as the other competitors. It is also open-source which is really cool, democratizing knowledge and technology for all. It gets regular updates and is very well documented, and you can find a very helpful and engaged community. Cons Despite the installation being simple enough, it demands a little patience to configure your virtual machine. There's a lot of customizations and if you are not a heavy user it can be quite a challenge. Thankfully, there is a lot of tutorials to follow, but, in order to set the best optimal configuration you need'll some computer systems knowledge. Review Source VR Verified Reviewer IT Consultant Information Technology and Services Used the software for: 2+ years ### "An Easy to Use Simple Hypervisor" February 1, 2019 4.0 Pros One of the best things about Virtualbox is that its free. This makes it an excellent choice for students or anyone needing a homebrew setup. It has all the virtualization options for anyone but enterprise users would want. Along those same lines, Virtualbox is probably the most user friendly Hypervisor amongst available solutions so its a great way to jump into virtualization for testing and tinkering, or to provide another operating system. Cons At one point I did a Hypervisor performance test as a term project, and Virtualbox generally had the worst performance compared to other solutions. If performance is what you are looking for this probably isn't the product for you, VMware or a bare metal hypervisor would suit you better. However I still think that Virtualbox is amongst the best for home users and students due to its simplicity and that its free. Additionally, I have struggled immensly with Virtualboxs drag and drop feature. I cannot seem to get it to work reliably. Review Source JQ Jason Q. Artist Arts and Crafts Used the software for: 2+ years ### "System within a system" May 25, 2023 5.0 Easy to use step by step tutorials great interface Pros It has been a great asset to test programs like Linex or any other programs on it without affecting the native system Cons There are no cons it is a solid and easy to use program with many features and tools. Being able to try software on it first without affecting your main pc Review Source Jimmy L. Network Administrator Supermarkets Used the software for: 2+ years ### "Good virtualization software for personal use" August 3, 2018 4.0 I use it to run a Linux VM on my Windows host OS, which provides me with many useful utilities for network administration. Pros It's free, or at least there's a free version, and there are many resources for getting a Linux or other virtual machine running on Windows. It plays fairly well with Windows as a host OS, especially if you add the guest additions. Cons It can be a bit hard to set up, although that's probably true with most virtualization platforms. It doesn't play super well with a laptop that moves from a docking station with multiple monitors to just the built in screen frequently if you try to tell the virtual machine it has multiple monitors. Review Source Charles Boampong K. Web/App Developer E-Learning Used the software for: 2+ years ### "Great Virtual Machine to run different operating systems on your computer." March 28, 2022 5.0 My overall experience was awesome. With this software, I've been able to acquire great experience in using Linux, which happened to be one of the requirements for my work as a software engineer. Pros I installed Xubuntu operating system on my Windows machine, and the experience was great. It allowed me to use the full features of Linux operating system and that was cool. Cons Without a high processor and RAM, your computer can be a bit slow, but this is common to all virtual machines. Reason for choosing VirtualBox Our engineering team recommended it because of its effectiveness. Review Source RS Rasheed S. Network Administrative Computer & Network Security Used the software for: Less than 6 months ### "Virtual Box Reviews" December 6, 2023 4.0 Orcale Virtual Box is a powerful and versatile virtualization platform, its allows users to create and run virtual machines on their desktop or server systems smoothly . It is a very good type-2 hypervisor to use. Pros VirtualBox is compatible with various operating systems,The ability to take snapshots of virtual machines and clone entire VMs are highly regarded features,and its provides various networking options, such as NAT, bridged networking, and host-only networking. Cons VirtualBox supports 3D acceleration, but the performance may not match that of some dedicated virtualization solutions and there is obvious issue with audio support in it, including issues with sound quality. Review Source Similar Products Featured