Nutanix AHV and Warren are both built on KVM. Warren swaps per-core subscriptions, qualified-hardware lists and self-run operations for a managed platform priced on capacity, with the price locked for up to 10 years.
Last reviewed 4 November 2026 · based on public pricing and documentation.
uptime SLA for customer VMs
maximum price lock on your term
licence and setup fees
Nutanix is a mature platform. These are the points buyers and licensing advisers flag most often.
Nutanix discounts hardest in the first term, and advisers warn against modelling that price as permanent. Renewals can move a deployment up an edition, and user reviews describe cheap entry pricing followed by expensive renewals.
With Warren: your price is locked for the length of your term, up to 10 years. There are no editions to be moved between.
NCI is a per-core subscription in Starter, Pro and Ultimate editions, and add-ons such as DR and database automation are priced outside the core bundle.
With Warren: priced on capacity (locations, nodes, RAM and storage) with no per-core or per-edition fees, or a share of the revenue the platform earns you.
NCI runs on qualified hardware from Dell, HPE, Lenovo or Nutanix NX, which carries a premium. Each node also reserves at least 32 GB of RAM for its controller VM.
With Warren: runs on compatible hardware of any vendor or generation. Compute, storage and control planes are separate, so each scales on its own.
Upgrades, capacity and incidents stay with your team. Migrations to Nutanix typically take 3–12 months; services for a 3,000-core estate are benchmarked at $150K–$400K.
With Warren: Warren runs the platform: 24/7 monitoring, upgrades twice a month, direct engineer access and a 99.95% uptime SLA. Migration is planned and led by Warren's team.
Facts as published by each vendor and independent sources, checked 4 November 2026.
Topic | Nutanix | Warren |
|---|---|---|
What it is | HCI software with the AHV hypervisor (KVM-based), operated by your team | Fully managed cloud platform (KVM) that Warren operates on your hardware |
Who runs it | Your team, with vendor or partner support | Warren runs the platform and 2nd-level support |
Architecture | Hyperconverged: a controller VM on every node, 32 GB+ RAM each | Disaggregated: compute, storage and control planes scale independently |
Hardware | Qualified hardware from Dell, HPE, Lenovo, Nutanix NX and others | Compatible hardware of any vendor or generation |
Upgrades | Planned and applied by your team | Twice a month, managed by Warren, no tenant disruption |
Multi-tenancy and self-service | Projects and RBAC through Prism Central; self-service depends on edition and add-ons | Tenants, quotas, branded portal and REST/GraphQL APIs built in |
Billing | Cost reporting for internal showback and chargeback | Invoices, pre/post-pay, tiered pricing, credits, local payments, KYC |
Object storage | Nutanix Objects, licensed separately | S3-compatible object storage on Ceph, part of the platform |
Licensing | Per physical core; 1–5-year subscription; Starter, Pro, Ultimate | Capacity-based or revenue share; no licence or setup fees |
Renewal | Re-quoted each term; deepest discount usually first | Locked for the term, up to 10 years |
Support | Vendor support tiers, often partner-delivered | Direct engineer access on every plan |
Uptime commitment | Your team operates the platform | 99.95% uptime SLA for customer VMs, with credits |
Lock-in | Nutanix-specific management and tooling | Open-source core (KVM, Ceph, OpenSDN), standard VM images |
Nutanix details come from public licensing analyses and sizing guidance; your quote may differ. Warren prices are list prices. Spotted something out of date? Contact us and we will correct it.
Share your current or upcoming quote and roughly what you run. We'll send a written comparison for the same capacity, with a migration outline timed to your renewal date.
Term discounts lock your price: 10% for 1 year, 20% for 3, 30% for 5, 10-year terms on request. See full pricing
AHV is built on KVM, like Warren, so workloads stay in the same hypervisor family. The aim: be live on Warren before your next Nutanix term starts.
Warren's team leads the migration, whichever platform you run today, with dated milestones in your plan.
Send your inventory and renewal date. We return a written migration plan and cost comparison.
Warren deploys the platform on compatible hardware, existing or new, with no setup fee.
Workloads move in planned waves, validated in a test environment before each cut-over.
IDCloudHost's first year on Warren, growing to €1.5M ARR in four years across four locations in Indonesia and Singapore.
ReadyIDC launched its cloud on Warren in October 2023, alongside providers across Asia, Europe and Africa.
For customer VMs, with service credits, a dedicated Slack channel and direct access to Warren engineers.
The virtualization world is undergoing a historic inflection point, and thousands of service providers and customers are reassessing their future. That’s why HPE is partnering with innovative partners like Warren. Their managed service approach and modern, open-source platform show significant promise for customers seeking stability and cost-predictability.
Chief Technologist and Solution Portfolio Lead, Service Provider Business Worldwide
Nutanix NX, Dell, HPE and Lenovo nodes are standard x86 servers, and Warren runs on compatible hardware of any vendor or generation. Your plan lists which nodes can be reused.
Not in the Nutanix sense. Warren separates compute, storage and control planes, so you add compute or storage independently.
No, it is the right time. Migrations go smoothest when planned ahead, and a written Warren number strengthens your position whichever way you decide.
It doesn't price per core. You pay for locations, nodes, RAM and raw storage, so denser CPUs don't raise your platform fee.
Kubernetes on Warren is in private beta. Tell us what you need and we will share where it stands.
Warren's engineers, through a dedicated Slack channel and ticketing, backed by a 99.95% uptime SLA. Extended hours are available by agreement.
Get a written Warren comparison for the same capacity, timed to your renewal.