Parallels Desktop comparisons
Parallels Desktop is compared head-to-head with Proxmox VE, Oracle VirtualBox and VMware Workstation Pro and more: 7 head-to-heads in Virtual Machine Software, each with the specs and prices we checked.
Parallels Desktop head-to-head
- Parallels Desktop vs Proxmox VE
- Parallels Desktop vs Oracle VirtualBox
- Parallels Desktop vs VMware Workstation Pro
- Parallels Desktop vs QEMU
- Parallels Desktop vs KVM
- Parallels Desktop vs Xen Project Hypervisor
- Parallels Desktop vs Citrix XenServer
Parallels Desktop vs each of them
| # | Tool | Free plan | Paid from | Host platforms | Guest architecture | VM snapshots | Nested virtualization | GPU acceleration | Score |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 8 | Parallels Desktop | No | macOS | Both | Yes | Yes | Yes | 7.9 | |
| 1 | Proxmox VE | Yes | €120/unit/yr | 9.3 | |||||
| 2 | Oracle VirtualBox | Yes | Windows, macOS, Linux, Oracle Solaris | Both | Yes | Yes | Yes | 8.9 | |
| 3 | VMware Workstation Pro | Yes | Free | Windows, Linux | X86_64 | Yes | Yes | Yes | 8.8 |
| 4 | QEMU | Yes | Free | 8.7 | |||||
| 5 | KVM | Yes | Free | Linux | Both | Yes | Yes | Yes | 8.6 |
| 6 | Xen Project Hypervisor | Yes | Free | Linux, NetBSD, FreeBSD | Both | Yes | Yes | Yes | 8.5 |
| 7 | Citrix XenServer | No | XenServer OS on 64-bit x86 bare-metal servers | X86_64 | Yes | Yes | 8.4 |
Compare Parallels Desktop with any virtual machine software
These are the matchups our editors wrote up. The compare tool pairs Parallels Desktop with any other product in Virtual Machine Software — and up to four at once — from the same checked specs.
Compare Parallels Desktop with any tool side by side →
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Our full Parallels Desktop verdict, pricing and fact sheet →
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Compared by iTechGuides Editors · Editorial team · Updated Oct 2026
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