What Is Hyper-V?
Hyper-V Defined: Microsoft's Hypervisor for Windows
Hyper-V is Microsoft's hypervisor for creating and running virtual machines. It is available in Windows Server and in some editions of Windows for desktops. When the Hyper-V feature is turned on, the hypervisor takes control of the hardware and Windows itself runs as a special management partition.
This makes Hyper-V a type 1 hypervisor design, even when it is enabled on a desktop PC. The hypervisor is the first layer above the hardware, and the installed Windows system runs on top of it alongside the guests.
Parent and Child Partitions Explained
Hyper-V divides the machine into partitions, which are isolated units that hold a guest's resources. The parent partition is the management partition running Windows. It handles hardware drivers, creates and manages virtual machines and provides administration tools. Each virtual machine runs in its own child partition.
Child partitions reach hardware through the parent. Guests that include Hyper-V integration components use fast synthetic devices that the parent provides, which reduces overhead compared with fully emulated hardware. This is a practical form of paravirtualization, where the guest cooperates with the hypervisor through drivers.
Hyper-V in Practice: Windows VPS and Desktop Use
Many providers that sell Windows VPS plans run Hyper-V, since it is designed to host Windows guests well. On a single PC, a developer might use Hyper-V to run a separate Linux or Windows test environment without affecting the everyday desktop.
Hyper-V can also run inside another virtual machine, which is useful for labs and testing but adds overhead to every layer. This arrangement is covered in the article on nested virtualization.
Frequently asked questions
Can Hyper-V run Linux virtual machines?
Yes. Hyper-V supports many Linux distributions as guests, and Microsoft provides integration components that improve performance and management for supported Linux systems. Support varies by guest version, so check the list of supported guests for the Hyper-V version you run.
Is Hyper-V a type 1 or type 2 hypervisor?
It is generally classed as type 1, because the hypervisor runs directly on the hardware and Windows runs above it as a privileged partition. Enabling Hyper-V on a desktop does not change that design. For comparison, VMware ESXi is also a bare-metal platform, but it does not run a full desktop operating system underneath.