Alternatives to QEMU
The machine emulator and virtualiser that most of the Linux virtualisation stack is built on. The listings below can replace it for an important use case. Each note says what changes if you switch.
The original
QEMU
The machine emulator and virtualiser that most of the Linux virtualisation stack is built on.
Replacements
Listings that take over the same core job as QEMU.
VirtualBox
The free desktop hypervisor most people start with: run Windows, Linux or BSD in a window on the machine you already have.
VirtualBox offers a graphical interface with snapshots and shared folders on Windows, macOS and Linux, but it does not emulate other processor architectures.
VMware Workstation Pro
Type-2 hypervisor for running virtual machines on Windows and Linux desktops.
VMware Workstation Pro is a closed-source desktop hypervisor for Windows and Linux with mature snapshots and virtual networking, free only for personal use.
UTM
Runs Windows, Linux and other systems in a virtual machine on a Mac, iPhone or iPad.
UTM is built on QEMU and wraps it in a native interface for macOS and iOS, keeping cross-architecture emulation, but it does not run on Windows or Linux.
Hyper-V
Microsoft's type-1 hypervisor built into Windows and Windows Server for running Windows and Linux virtual machines.
Hyper-V is a closed-source type-1 hypervisor built into Windows Pro, Enterprise and Server, with no cross-architecture emulation and no Home edition support.
Parallels Desktop
Runs Windows and other operating systems in a virtual machine on a Mac.
Parallels Desktop is a paid, closed-source Mac hypervisor with Coherence mode and guided Windows 11 setup on Apple silicon, but it is macOS only.
Firecracker
Run isolated workloads inside lightweight Linux microVMs.
Firecracker runs lightweight Linux microVMs for container and function workloads on Linux, a narrower scope than QEMU's full machine emulation.
Similar software
Related functionality, not a direct replacement.
Proxmox VE
A bare-metal server platform that runs KVM virtual machines and LXC containers from one web interface.
KVM
The Linux kernel's built-in hypervisor for hardware-accelerated virtual machines.
Virtual Machine Manager
The standard desktop front end for KVM on Linux, plus the command line tools that go with it.
Quickemu
Downloads an operating system and builds a properly configured QEMU virtual machine from one short config file.
Lima
Launches Linux virtual machines from the command line on macOS, Linux and Windows, with file sharing and port forwarding set up automatically.
Incus
Manage Linux system containers and virtual machines through one interface.
