Every category where a model named KVM for a mid-market B2B company. Share is first choices across the direct, paraphrase, budget and scale prompts; rank is within every product named in that category.

Category	Function	Share	Rank	Negative rate	Labels	Quadrant	Since September 2026
Server virtualization platforms	Cloud and infrastructure	0%	13 of 78	17%	18	accepted challenger

Movement

This is the first edition on this tier, so no move can be computed for KVM yet. From the next edition this section shows, per buyer segment and per category, whether its share moved by more than the measured noise floor.

By model

How each model treated KVM across every prompt where it was named for a mid-market B2B company. Fourteen models, six prompts per category.

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Model	Alternative	Mention	Negative	Labels
Claude Haiku 4.5	1	1	1	3
GPT-5.4 mini	0	0	0	0
Gemini 3.5 Flash	0	0	0	0
Perplexity Sonar	0	0	1	1
Grok 4.1 Fast	2	1	0	3
Mistral Small	0	2	0	2
DeepSeek V4 Flash	2	0	0	2
Llama 4 Maverick	0	1	0	1
Qwen 3.7 Flash	2	0	0	2
Kimi K2	0	0	0	0
GLM 4.7 FlashX	1	0	0	1
MiniMax M2.5	1	1	0	2
GPT-6 Luna	0	0	1	1
Muse Glimmer 30B	0	0	0	0

By framing

Which of the six questions produced the naming. By model says how often; this says asked what. The first-choice count on the right carries the marks of the models that produced it.

FramingLabels by classFirst choices

Direct5 labelsNone

Paraphrase1 labelNone

Comparative11 labelsNone

Budget-constrained8 labels1

Scale-constrained6 labelsNone

Negative12 labelsNone

First choiceAlternativeMentionNegative43 labels in all, every segment counted; 1 of the 1 first choices count toward share, since the comparative and negative framings do not. The bar is one segment per label class, to scale within the framing.

What the models said for it

Verbatim evidence the judge attached to positive labels.

“A free, open-source hypervisor built into Linux. It's powerful and requires only Linux kernel support, making it very cost-effective.” Claude Haiku 4.5 · Server virtualization · budget prompt · alternative

“Choose KVM (via Proxmox) if you want to cut costs significantly, prefer open-source flexibility” Qwen 3.7 Flash · Server virtualization · comparative prompt · alternative

“Linux‑centric, open‑source, cloud‑native: KVM (often paired with a management stack)” GLM 4.7 FlashX · Server virtualization · comparative prompt · alternative

“Linux/cloud-native, large-scale OpenStack/AWS-like deploys. | Requires Linux expertise” Grok 4.1 Fast · Server virtualization · comparative prompt · alternative

And against it

Verbatim evidence attached to negative labels. A warning on a product with few labels is a warning; on a product with many, it is one voice among them.

“if you lack strong Linux/platform engineering skills: they are flexible, but you own upgrades, tooling, and automation, which raises operational burden.” Perplexity Sonar · Server virtualization · negative prompt · soft negative

“a self-maintained KVM setup or a community-supported platform used for business-critical systems without staff expertise or paid support” GPT-6 Luna · Server virtualization · negative prompt · soft negative

“41 guest-triggerable CVEs identified in KVM since 2009” Claude Haiku 4.5 · Server virtualization · negative prompt · soft negative

Named alongside

The products named in the same answers as KVM, over the 43 answers that named it. Took the first choice instead counts the answers where the other product was the first choice and KVM was named but was not.

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ProductSame answerTook the first choice insteadHead to head

VMware vSphere40 of 4310Not among the top eight

Proxmox VE35 of 4310Not among the top eight

Microsoft Hyper-V31 of 4310Not among the top eight

Nutanix AHV22 of 432Not among the top eight

Citrix Hypervisor15 of 430Not among the top eight

Red Hat Virtualization10 of 430Not among the top eight

oVirt8 of 430Not among the top eight

XCP-ng7 of 430Not among the top eight

Hyper-V5 of 431Not among the top eight

Oracle VM VirtualBox5 of 430Not among the top eight

A head-to-head page exists where both products are among a category's top eight. The other rows are the same fact without a page behind them, so they link to the product instead.

What carried it into the answer

The sites and pages cited by the answers that named KVM. A fact about retrieval, not a lever on the model.

Citations exist only for the models that return a source list, five of the fourteen in this edition, so these counts come from 27 of the 43 answers that named KVM and are not a share of its labels.

Domains cited

gitnux.org11

guideflow.com9

linkedin.com8

virtualizationhowto.com8

devopsschool.com7

diskinternals.com7

g2.com7

proxmox.com7

techdogs.com7

us.fitgap.com7

No domain is on file for KVM, so its own site is not marked.

Pages cited

guideflow.com/blog/server-virtualization-software9

devopsschool.com/blog/top-10-virtualization-platforms-features-pros-cons-comparison7

ciopages.com/buyer-guides/virtualization-platform6

techdogs.com/td-articles/product-mine/best-server-virtualization-software6

v2cloud.com/blog/top-5-virtualization-platforms6

veeam.com/blog/small-business-virtualization-guide.html6

diskinternals.com/vmfs-recovery/hypervisor-comparison5

dnsstuff.com/server-virtualization-software5

Pages are listed as the models cited them.

Search and answers

Where KVM stands in Google search beside where it stands in the models' answers.

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In search

Google, US estimates

Searches for its name, Google: 18,100 a month (“kvm”)
AI search demand for its name, est.: 7,024 a month
Its own site: No site of its own on file, so no site figures

In answers

This edition

Share of first choices

rank 13 of 78 in server virtualization

Segment leader

42%

Proxmox VE

First choices: 1 across its categories
Named in: 43 answers
Its own site cited: No site on file to match

Search figures are US estimates from DataForSEO, read October 5, 2026; AI search demand is its modeled, directional estimate, not a count of queries to any assistant. The answers are this edition's. Two measurements side by side: neither is read as the cause of the other.

Names read as KVM

What the judge wrote, as written, with how often. The vendor table decides that these count as KVM; a claim can dispute any of them.

KVM (Kernel-based Virtual Machine) 5KVM (Kernel‑based Virtual Machine) 1KVM (Red Hat Virtualization, Proxmox, etc.) 1KVM (plain, via libvirt on Linux) 1KVM/RHEL Virtualization 1KVM/libvirt 1

Follow KVM

An email the morning each edition publishes: where this product moved, where it held, and by how much against the noise floor. One address, confirmed by a click; a stop link in every email.

Already following? Everything you follow, with a stop for each.

Is this your product?

Claim this page

Claiming is free and changes nothing in the data. A claimed page shows a verified contact who is told when each edition publishes and when KVM's standing changes by more than the noise floor; the right to propose corrections to the vendor table, meaning names the judge wrote that should or should not read as KVM, applied by version and listed in the change log; and a one-line description supplied by the vendor and marked as such.

What a new claim receivesHide what a new claim receives

A new claim receives the current edition's vendor brief for KVM by email, built from the raw record of the edition. It shows:

where KVM is named, by buyer and by framing, and which cells hold its first choices;
the claims the models make when they name it, ranked, with the strongest and the weakest quoted;
its vocabulary against the segment leader's, and the pages the models cited;
who was chosen in the answers that did not name KVM, and every reason the record gives;
a battlecard for each top rival: the head-to-head split, why they win, and the reservation quoted against them;
one page of published figures cleared to show a buyer.