Which hypervisor is classified as a type-1 hypervisor?

A type-1 hypervisor, also known as a bare-metal hypervisor, is installed directly on the physical hardware of the host machine, allowing it to manage the hardware resources and run virtual machines (VMs) directly. This provides improved performance and efficiency because it does not have the overhead associated with a host operating system.

VMware ESXi falls into this category as it is specifically designed to be installed directly on a physical server. It leverages the server's hardware for better resource allocation and faster VM operation, making it an ideal choice for enterprise environments where performance and scalability are critical.

In contrast, the other options listed—VMware Fusion, VMware Workstation, and Oracle VM VirtualBox—are examples of type-2 hypervisors. These hypervisors run on top of an existing operating system, relying on the OS to allocate resources and manage hardware interfaces for the guest operating systems. As a result, they are typically suited for desktop virtualization rather than enterprise server environments where a type-1 hypervisor like VMware ESXi would be used.