10 Best Servers for Virtualization [Bare Metal Providers]

If you’re experiencing unpredictable performance and latency in a multi-tenant cloud or virtualized environment, or your project requires specific hardware such as powerful GPUs or particular RAID controllers, then you need a bare metal server for virtualization.

This guide identifies the top ten servers for virtualization in 2025, highlighting providers that deliver the raw performance, dedicated resources, and hardware flexibility essential for demanding workloads.

#Server virtualization explained

Server virtualization is the process of dividing a single physical server into multiple isolated virtual machines, each capable of running its own operating system and applications. Businesses opt for this technology to maximize hardware utilization, transforming one powerful server into several efficient, smaller units.

This leads to significant benefits, including improved server reliability, drastically lower total operational costs, and a more efficient utilization of power and space within the data center.

#10 Best bare metal servers for virtualization in 2025

When choosing a bare metal server provider, businesses should prioritize performance specifications such as CPU cores, RAM, and storage input/output that match their workloads. They should also ensure the provider offers easy scalability, robust automation APIs, and has data center locations that minimize latency for their users.

Here are the top bare metal virtualization providers:

#Cherry Servers (most flexible European option)

Why It Stands Out: Cherry Servers stands out for its exceptional hardware customization, which allows customers to build a bare-metal server from the ground up. With this approach, businesses can perfectly match their virtualization needs. Combined with one-click hypervisor installation and transparent, flexible billing options and crypto payments, the company offers a developer-friendly and predictable platform for high-performance workloads.

Key Features:

• Hardware customization: Users can select their exact CPU model, core count, RAM amount, and a combination of NVMe/SSD/HDD storage with custom RAID options.
• Hypervisor-Friendly: The provider uses open-source Kernel-based Virtual Machine (KVM) virtualization technology on their servers, which is one of the most performant hypervisor technologies available today.
• Powerful API & Automation: It offers full API and IPv6 support for automating infrastructure provisioning and management.
• Strong European Presence: Cherry Servers has its data centers in Lithuania, the Netherlands, and Germany, ensuring low latency and GDPR compliance.
• Cryptocurrency Payments: Bitcoin and 10+ other cryptocurrencies are accepted as a payment method.

Best For: Cherry Servers is ideal for developers, Web3 projects, and businesses that require a fully customizable, high-performance and low-latency European bare metal host for virtualization, hybrid clouds, and data-intensive applications.

Starting Price: Cherry Servers pricing

#RedSwitches (best overall for managed bare metal)

Why It Stands Out: RedSwitches distinguishes itself by offering aggressively priced bare metal servers. It has a strong global footprint, including European locations. This provider focuses on providing high-value, dedicated resources at a low cost, making its dedicated servers for virtualization accessible to smaller businesses and startups.

Key Features:

• Cost-Effective Global Reach: Its data centers are strategically located across North America, Europe, and Asia, enabling low-latency deployment without a premium price tag.
• Flexible and Simple Billing: The company offers flexibility for short-term projects or testing without requiring long-term commitments.
• Robust Customer Support and Management: Customers enjoy 24/7 support, along with options for fully managed services, which is rare at this entry price point.
• DDoS Protection: Their plans include basic DDoS mitigation on all servers, a critical feature for public-facing applications.

Best For: RedSwitches servers for virtualization are the best bet for startups, developers, and businesses seeking the lowest entry price for dedicated hardware with global options and good support.

Starting Price: Pricing

#DataPacket (best for low latency and high bandwidth)

Why It Stands Out: DataPacket is recognized for its high-performance network, optimized for low-latency and high-throughput applications, including game hosting, video streaming, and real-time data processing. Their core expertise is in providing a powerful and resilient network backbone.

Key Features:

• Premium Network Tiers: The company offers multiple tiers of DDoS protection, including always-on mitigation scrubbing.
• VirtFusion Control Panel: It provides a modern, integrated control panel for managing bare metal servers, automation, and virtualized instances.
• Custom Hypervisor Support: The company facilitates the easy installation of custom ISO images or supported hypervisors, such as Proxmox, for virtualization.
• Global Low-Latency: Its data centers are strategically located in Amsterdam and Dallas, optimized for global performance.

Best For: DataPacket is ideal for game server hosting, streaming platforms, and any business where network performance and robust DDoS protection are top priorities.

Starting Price: Pricing

#Servers.com (best for DevOps automation)

Why It Stands Out: Servers.com stands out for bridging the gap between cloud flexibility and bare metal performance. The company offers an on-demand provisioning model with a strong focus on single-tenant hybrid deployments and private cloud solutions, which can be accessed directly through their portal.

Key Features:

• On-Demand Provisioning: Servers can be deployed on demand in minutes, similar to cloud instances, but on dedicated hardware.
• Bare Metal Cloud: Their flagship product allows for the deployment of isolated bare metal instances with cloud-like flexibility and hourly billing.
• VMware and Private Cloud: The company offers integrated VMware-based private cloud solutions, appealing to enterprises looking to extend their VMware environment.
• Global Infrastructure: It has a wide network of data centers across North America, Europe, and the Asia-Pacific in key internet hubs.

Best For: Servers.com virtualization servers are most suitable for enterprises and mid-market businesses seeking to establish a hybrid cloud infrastructure that combines bare metal performance with cloud automation.

Starting Price: Pricing

#OVHcloud (best for EU compliance and affordability)

Why It Stands Out: OVHcloud stands out due to its massive global scale, owning and operating its data centers and fiber network. This allows it to offer highly competitive pricing. It provides a wide range of bare metal options, spanning from entry-level to high-performance GPU servers. This makes it one of the best providers of bare metal servers for virtualization.

Key Features:

• Unbeatable Price-to-Performance: OVHcloud is often recognized as the cost leader in the bare metal space, especially for standard configurations.
• Global Infrastructure with Data Sovereignty: It offers a wide range of data centers across North America, Europe, and the Asia-Pacific region, with a strong focus on European data sovereignty.
• Extensive Bare Metal Catalog: OVHcloud features a huge collection of dedicated servers, including AMD EPYC, Intel Xeon, and highly specialized GPU and storage servers.
• Additional Ecosystem: This provider offers integrated services, including VPS, Public Cloud, and managed Private Cloud solutions, for building a comprehensive infrastructure stack.

Best For: OVHcloud is ideal for developers, startups, and enterprises seeking the best value, a diverse range of server options, and a substantial global presence.

Starting Price: Pricing

#Liquid Web (best managed enterprise hosting)

Why It Stands Out: Liquid Web is known for its focus on providing a fully managed premium support experience, offered by teams committed to excellence in hosting. They take on the operational burden of managing the server, OS, and control panel.

Key Features:

• Fully Managed Service: Their plans include server hardening, monitoring, software updates, and expert support handling all technical administration.
• Proactive Support: It offers 24/7/365 customer support via phone, chat, and email, with high response times and in-depth expertise.
• Integrated Control Panels: Servers come with the customer’s choice of cPanel, Plesk, or InterWorx pre-installed and managed.
• High-Availability Options: Liquid Web offers comprehensive solutions, including VMware Private Cloud and high-availability clusters with redundant hardware.

Best For: Liquid Web virtualization servers are best for businesses, agencies, and users who require maximum reliability and need a hands-off, fully managed solution with exceptional support.

Starting Price: Pricing

#Hivelocity (best for on-demand GPU and global reach)

Why It Stands Out: Hivelocity stands out for its powerful automation API, extensive self-service customization options, and a unique blend of cloud-like provisioning speed for bare metal servers. Everything is backed by 24/7 support.

Key Features:

• Rapid Deployment and Automation: Servers can be deployed in minutes, supported by a robust API and customer portal, enabling full automation and control.
• Instant Provisioning Stock: The provider maintains a large inventory of popular server configurations for immediate deployment across its global data centers.
• Extensive Customization: It offers deep hardware customization, including a wide range of CPU, RAM, storage, and RAID options.
• Global Data Centers: This provider has a strong presence in the US and Europe (Tampa, Atlanta, New York, Amsterdam, Tokyo) with low-latency networks.

Best For: Hivelocity is ideal for DevOps teams, SaaS companies, and IT professionals who require automated, on-demand bare metal infrastructure with deep customization and rapid deployment.

Starting Price: Pricing

#IBM Cloud Bare Metal (best for enterprise solutions)

Why It Stands Out: IBM Cloud Bare Metal is among the most popular providers in the cloud computing space. The company is recognized for its extensive integration with the broader IBM Cloud ecosystem, encompassing AI (Watson), blockchain, and analytics services. It’s built for enterprise-grade hybrid and multi-cloud deployments with a strong security focus.

Key Features:

• Seamless Hybrid Cloud: It integrates with IBM Cloud Satellite, allowing customers to run consistent cloud services on-premises or on other providers’ infrastructure.
• Single-Tenant Security: This provider offers true single-tenant isolation with compliant-ready infrastructure and “Keep Your Own Key (KYOK)” encryption management.
• Global and Local Billing: This feature provides consolidated global billing, a significant advantage for large-scale enterprises operating in multiple regions.
• Diverse Hardware Options: It features a wide catalog, including SAP-certified, GPU-intensive, and high-frequency compute servers.

Best For: IBM Cloud Bare Metal is best for large enterprises already invested in the IBM ecosystem or those requiring a secure, compliant foundation for complex hybrid cloud strategies.

Starting Price: Pricing

#Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI) Bare Metal (best for HPC and AI virtualization)

Why It Stands Out: OCI Bare Metal stands out due to its architecture, designed for extreme performance. It’s particularly built for Oracle Database workloads, with unique flexible core shapes that allow for custom CPU and RAM ratios.

Key Features:

• Oracle Database Optimization: OCI offers bare metal servers with direct access to RDMA networking for ultra-low latency database clustering (RAC).
• Flexible Core Shapes: This allows for customizing the number of cores and amount of RAM on certain instances, preventing customers from paying for unused resources.
• High-Speed Network Fabric: It features a non-oversubscribed, flat network fabric designed for high throughput and low latency between resources.
• Deep Storage Integration: Their servers are tightly integrated with Oracle’s high-performance block storage and Exadata systems.

Best For: OCI dedicated servers for virtualization are best for organizations running performance-sensitive Oracle Databases and applications. It also works for consumers seeking highly customizable compute shapes on a high-speed network.

Starting Price: Pricing

#Rackspace (fully managed bare metal)

Why It Stands Out: Rackspace is renowned for its celebrated Fanatical Support model, providing expert-led managed services across various platforms (AWS, Azure, VMware, OpenStack) in addition to its own infrastructure.

Key Features:

• Expert-Led Managed Services: It provides 24/7 support from certified experts in specific applications, security, and cloud platforms. This positions it to act as an extension of your team.
• Multi-Platform Mastery: It offers managed services not just on its own infrastructure but across all major public clouds and private technologies.
• Security & Compliance Focus: Their plans include proactive monitoring, managed security services, and compliance guidance for industries like healthcare and finance.
• Legacy & Modern Workloads: This provider has expertise in managing everything from legacy applications to modern, cloud-native architectures.

Best For: Rackspace virtualization servers are best for businesses of any size that want to offload the complete operational management, security, and support of their infrastructure to a team of experts.

Starting Price: Pricing

#Final Thoughts

The ideal bare metal provider isn’t a one-size-fits-all choice. Teams are advised to pick the one that best aligns with their specific needs for performance, control, support, and budget. Whether you prioritize raw flexibility, enterprise integration, or fully managed expertise, this list provides a top-tier option for every scenario. Your perfect infrastructure foundation is out there, waiting to be configured.