XCP-ng & Xen Orchestra

What Is XCP-ng & Xen Orchestra?

XCP-ng is an open-source type-1 hypervisor built on Xen, and Xen Orchestra is the web console that manages and backs it up. Vates SAS of Grenoble develops both and sells them together as Vates VMS, short for Virtualization Management Stack. The company was registered in 2012, and its subscription terms fall under French law with the Grenoble commercial court as venue.

History begins with a fork. XCP-ng began in 2018 as a community fork of XenServer, the Xen-based commercial hypervisor. Xen Orchestra is older still: its GitHub repository dates from 2013, and it grew up as an independent management layer for Xen pools. Vates now develops both projects and sells them as one commercial offer.

That history explains the product's character. It is a hypervisor lineage that never depended on a single vendor's goodwill, maintained by a small French team that has stayed independent for over a decade. In October 2026 Vates announced a €30 million round led by IRIS with Bpifrance, its first major outside funding after years of self-funded growth. Press coverage says the co-founders keep control.

The timing matters because of VMware. Broadcom ended VMware perpetual licences on 11 December 2023 and moved customers to VMware Cloud Foundation and vSphere Foundation subscriptions. A reported 72-core minimum in March 2025 was reversed within days, but the 16-core minimum stands. Buyers who watched that episode are now shopping for platforms with predictable terms, and Vates prices per host with no CPU or RAM limits.

For context, Vates counts more than 1,000 customers across roughly 100 countries, and it appears in Gartner's 2026 Magic Quadrant for server virtualisation platforms. Vates names Harman and Kayak among its users.

Key Features

Xen Versus KVM: What Actually Differs

Xen is a bare-metal hypervisor that boots first and runs a privileged control domain beside the guests. KVM, which powers Proxmox, instead turns the Linux kernel itself into the hypervisor. Both are mature and both run Windows and Linux guests well. The practical difference is operational: XCP-ng behaves like an appliance with a narrow, curated host layer, while Proxmox behaves like a Debian server you administer.

Teams that want a hypervisor they rarely touch at the shell level tend to like the Xen model. Those who want containers, custom kernels and full Linux tooling on the host tend to prefer KVM.

Xen Orchestra as the Management Plane

Xen Orchestra is where most of the value sits. It manages multiple pools across multiple sites from one interface, with role-based access control and delegation for self-service use. Its default interface is XO 6, with the older XO 5 still available for operations not yet ported.

Automation is well covered. There is a REST API and a CLI, plus integrations with Terraform, Ansible, Pulumi, Packer and PowerShell. A lightweight client called XO Lite handles basic host administration without the full appliance.

Agentless Backup and Replication

Backup is built into the console rather than bolted on. Xen Orchestra supports rolling snapshots, full and incremental backups, replication, mirroring and immutability, with targets including S3, NFS, SMB and Azure repositories. It needs no agent inside the guest.

For distributed estates, XO Proxy places backup workers close to remote sites so that data does not hairpin through headquarters. This is a real differentiator against hypervisors that leave backup to third-party products. Proxmox offers a comparable native option in Proxmox Backup Server, but that is a separate product with its own installation.

VMware Migration

Xen Orchestra includes a V2V tool for importing VMware machines, and the documentation also lists imports from Hyper-V, KVM and VirtualBox. Vates additionally sells fixed-scope, fixed-price migration services for teams that would rather not run the project alone.

Migration risk lives outside the tool. Drivers, backup agents, monitoring and licence-bound applications decide how smooth a cutover feels. Plan a pilot cluster first.

XOSTOR Hyperconverged Storage

XOSTOR is Vates' hyperconverged storage layer, built on DRBD, and it needs at least three hosts. It is sold as an add-on rather than included, and it is younger than Ceph, which Proxmox integrates. Treat it as a capable option that deserves a proof of concept against your own workload.

Pricing

Vates publishes its prices, which is rare for virtualisation vendors. All plans include the XCP-ng licences and one Xen Orchestra Appliance. Prices are in US dollars per year.

Three-year terms save up to 10% and five-year terms up to 15%. XOSTOR costs $800 to $1,200 per host per year depending on tier, with $1,200 at Enterprise level, and the Easyvirt monitoring add-on costs $700.

A four-host cluster on Enterprise therefore costs $7,200 a year for the platform, or $12,000 with XOSTOR on all four hosts. Three hosts on Pro come to $3,000. Note that Vates' price list is in dollars only. Euro buyers carry the exchange-rate risk, and a billing team may ask for an invoice in euros.

The free route exists. You can run the hypervisor for free. Xen Orchestra can be built from its AGPL-3.0 sources at no cost; the supported prebuilt appliance comes with the paid plans.

EU Compliance & Privacy

Vates SAS is registered in Grenoble, France, and is subject to GDPR. The company's legal notice names the French entity only, and we found no US parent or US subsidiary in its terms. Ownership is independent: the register records natural persons as owners, and press coverage of the 2026 round says the founders keep control.

Because XCP-ng runs on hardware you control, workload data does not travel to Vates. This is the central EU sovereignty argument. There is no hosted control plane and no cloud account to create.

The funding round deserves a note. Vates says the money is aimed at North American expansion, platform development and its partner ecosystem. Nothing suggests a change of control, but an investor-backed vendor with a US growth push is a different proposition from a bootstrapped one. Re-read the ownership picture at renewal.

Certification claims are not listed here because we found no verified compliance certificates for the company itself. Request its security documentation if your procurement needs ISO 27001 or similar.

Who It's Best For

Teams leaving VMware who want an appliance-style hypervisor. If you run a few hosts and value backup and replication in the same console, XCP-ng with Xen Orchestra is a direct fit.

Organisations that need a supported contract with a French vendor. If procurement wants a named European supplier, an SLA and a public price list, Vates VMS fits that pattern better than a pure community project.

Hosting providers and MSPs. If you need delegation, multi-pool management and API-driven provisioning, Xen Orchestra covers it with Terraform support.

Homelabbers and small teams. If the budget is zero and you can build from sources, the free path works, but Proxmox has a larger community of guides.

Teams that need Kubernetes-first private cloud. If your target is a self-service cloud rather than a hypervisor farm, look at OpenNebula instead.

The Verdict

XCP-ng and Xen Orchestra make a credible, independent European answer to VMware. Its Xen base is mature, the backup tooling is built in, and the price list is public and finite. The weaknesses are practical: a smaller ecosystem than Proxmox, dollar-only pricing, and a support model that reaches 24/7 only at four hosts and above. Those are manageable for most teams. Check hardware and third-party tooling against the compatibility lists, then pilot before committing. You can find more options in the cloud hosting category and on the VMware alternatives page.

Frequently Asked Questions

What is the difference between XCP-ng and Xen Orchestra?

XCP-ng is the hypervisor that runs on each server, built on the Xen project. Xen Orchestra is the web console that manages pools of XCP-ng hosts and handles backup, replication and V2V migration. Vates sells both together as Vates VMS.

Is XCP-ng free?

The XCP-ng hypervisor is free and open source under GPL-2.0, and Xen Orchestra can be built from its AGPL-3.0 sources at no cost. Paid Vates VMS subscriptions add the supported Xen Orchestra Appliance, professional support and add-ons such as XOSTOR.

How much does Vates VMS cost?

Vates publishes prices in US dollars. Essential is $2,000 per year for up to 3 hosts, Pro is $1,000 per host from 3 hosts, and Enterprise is $1,800 per host from 4 hosts with 24/7 support. Longer terms save up to 15%.

Can XCP-ng replace VMware vSphere?

For many on-premises estates, yes. Xen Orchestra includes a V2V tool for importing VMware machines, and there are no CPU or RAM limits. Check hardware compatibility, third-party backup agents and ISV support statements before committing, as the ecosystem is smaller than VMware's.

Is XCP-ng GDPR compliant and European?

Vates SAS is a French company registered in Grenoble, and its subscription terms fall under French law. XCP-ng runs on your own hardware, so workload data does not leave your infrastructure. The company states that its co-founders keep control after its 2026 funding round.