Hyper-V Features
Hyper-V offers enterprise-grade virtualization features designed for high availability, security, performance, and manageability. These features make it suitable for everything from development environments to mission-critical production workloads.
High Availability Features
Live Migration
Move running VMs between hosts with zero downtime.
- Transparent to users and applications
- Shared Nothing Live Migration
- Simultaneous migrations supported
- Compression and SMB options
- Cross-version migration support
Storage Migration
Move VM storage while the VM is running.
- No VM downtime required
- Move to different storage types
- Migrate between SANs
- Consolidate storage
- Works with Live Migration
Failover Clustering
Automatic VM failover for high availability.
- Up to 64 cluster nodes
- Cluster Shared Volumes (CSV)
- Scale-Out File Server support
- Automatic VM restart
- Rolling cluster upgrades
Hyper-V Replica
Disaster recovery through asynchronous replication.
- Replicate to secondary site
- 5-minute or 15-minute RPO
- Extended replication chain
- Application-consistent replicas
- Planned and unplanned failover
Security Features
Shielded Virtual Machines
Enhanced security for protecting VMs from compromised fabric administrators.
- BitLocker encryption: Full VM disk encryption
- Virtual TPM 2.0: Secure key storage and attestation
- Secure Boot: Protects against rootkits and bootkits
- Host Guardian Service (HGS): Attestation and key protection
- Encrypted VM state: Protects memory and saved state
Credential Guard
Protects domain credentials in VMs.
- Virtualization-based security
- Isolates credentials
- Prevents Pass-the-Hash attacks
- NTLM and Kerberos protection
Guarded Fabric
Infrastructure for running shielded VMs.
- Host attestation
- Key protection service
- Admin-based or TPM attestation
- Audit and compliance
Windows Defender
Integrated antivirus and security.
- Application Guard for VMs
- Exploit Guard
- Real-time protection
- Cloud-delivered protection
Network Security
Virtual network isolation and security.
- Private VLANs (PVLANs)
- DHCP Guard
- Router Guard
- Port ACLs and mirroring
Performance Features
| Feature | Benefit | Requirements |
|---|---|---|
| SR-IOV | Direct NIC access, near-native network performance | SR-IOV capable NIC, Gen 2 VM |
| RDMA (SMB Direct) | High-throughput, low-latency storage access | RDMA-capable NICs, Windows Server |
| Virtual NUMA | Better memory locality for large VMs | NUMA hardware, 1GB+ VM memory |
| Dynamic Memory | Efficient memory allocation and overcommitment | Supported guest OS, Integration Services |
| VMQ | Offloads network packet processing to hardware | VMQ-capable NIC |
| Virtual RSS | Distributes network traffic across VM CPUs | Multi-core VMs |
Management Features
Hyper-V Manager
Built-in GUI management console for local and remote Hyper-V hosts.
- Create and configure VMs
- Connect to VM consoles
- Manage virtual networks
- Configure replication
- Import/export VMs
PowerShell
Complete automation through cmdlets.
- 200+ Hyper-V cmdlets
- Script complex operations
- Bulk VM management
- Remote management
Windows Admin Center
Modern web-based management.
- Browser-based interface
- Manage clusters and hosts
- Performance monitoring
- Azure integration
System Center VMM
Enterprise datacenter management.
- Multi-host management
- Fabric management
- Service templates
- Self-service portals
Azure Arc
Hybrid cloud management.
- Azure portal management
- Policy enforcement
- Monitoring and logging
- Update management
Networking Features
Software Defined Networking
Programmatic network control and virtualization.
- Network Controller
- Virtual network overlays
- Software Load Balancer
- Datacenter Firewall
- RAS Gateway
NIC Teaming
Combine multiple NICs for redundancy and bandwidth.
- Switch Independent/Dependent
- Active/Active or Active/Standby
- Dynamic load balancing
- Up to 32 NICs per team
SET (Switch Embedded Teaming)
NIC teaming in virtual switch.
- Integrated with Hyper-V switch
- RDMA support
- Better than LBFO teaming
- Required for SDN
Virtual Switch Extensions
Extensible switch architecture.
- Capturing extensions
- Filtering extensions
- Forwarding extensions
- Third-party integration
Backup and Recovery
Production Checkpoints
Application-consistent VM snapshots using VSS.
- Windows: VSS-based snapshots
- Linux: File system freeze/thaw
- No performance impact after creation
- Suitable for production workloads
Standard Checkpoints
Legacy snapshots capturing VM state at a point in time.
- Captures memory, device, and disk state
- Quick creation and restoration
- Use for testing and development
- Not recommended for production
Storage Features
Storage QoS
Control IOPS allocation to VMs.
- Minimum and maximum IOPS
- Prevents noisy neighbors
- Performance guarantees
- Centralized policies
Storage Spaces Direct
Software-defined storage with local disks.
- No SAN required
- Hyperconverged infrastructure
- Automatic resilience
- Scale-out architecture
Storage Replica
Block-level storage replication.
- Synchronous replication
- Asynchronous replication
- Volume-level replication
- Disaster recovery
Resilient File System
ReFS for better reliability.
- Built-in corruption detection
- Automatic repair
- Large volume support
- Block cloning
Linux Support
Linux Integration Services
Full support for major Linux distributions.
- Supported Distros: RHEL, CentOS, Ubuntu, SUSE, Debian, Oracle Linux
- Synthetic Drivers: Network, storage, video, mouse
- Dynamic Memory: Hot-add memory support
- Time Sync: Integrated clock synchronization
- Backup: File system consistent backups
- Live Migration: Full support for Linux VMs
Container Support
Windows Containers
Native container support in Hyper-V.
- Process isolation containers
- Hyper-V isolation containers
- Docker and Kubernetes support
- Windows Server Core images
Nested Virtualization
Run Hyper-V inside VMs.
- Development and testing
- Container host VMs
- Lab environments
- Azure VM support