IBM Cloud Docs
Getting started with virtual servers

Getting started with virtual servers

You can deploy IBM Cloud® Virtual Servers in a matter of minutes. The virtual servers are deployed from your choice of virtual server images and in the geographic region that makes sense for your workloads.

Newer version available. Try our Virtual Servers for VPC. For more information, see Virtual Private Cloud.

When you create a virtual server in the classic infrastructure, you can choose between a public (multi-tenancy) environment or a dedicated (single-tenancy) environment. Then, depending on the chosen environment, you must also select hourly, monthly, or transient virtual servers. With public virtual servers, you also choose to use either SAN-based storage or local storage.

Before you begin

Before you begin, review the following prerequisites.

  1. You must have an upgraded account to order virtual servers. This process can take some time and requires your request to be approved before you can continue. For more information about upgrading your account, see Account types.
  2. Review and choose your deployment options. For more information, see the following topics:
Table 1. Deployment options
Deployment options Description
Public virtual server IBM-managed, multi-tenancy virtual server deployments
Transient virtual server IBM-managed, multi-tenancy virtual server deployments offered at a reduced cost and best suited for flexible workloads
Reserved virtual server IBM-managed, multi-tenancy virtual server deployments with guaranteed capacity for a contract term
Dedicated virtual server IBM-managed, single-tenancy virtual server deployments

IBM Cloud® Virtual Servers are powered by Citrix Hypervisor. As with most hypervisors, guest additions help maintain a properly working computing environment. IBM Cloud® uses the information from guest additions to make informed decisions about routine server maintenance. Without the required guest additions, your virtual servers might miss critical maintenance updates. So, don't disable or remove any default guest additions. If you are brining your own image to, you need to install the associated guest images. For more information about installing guest additions, see Preparing and importing images.

Provisioning a virtual server

After you decide upon a deployment option, begin the provisioning process.

Table 2. Provisioning information
Provisioning instructions Description
Provisioning public instances Provision public instances with various options
Provisioning transient instances Provision transient instances with various options
Provisioning reserved capacity and instances Provision reserved capacity and instances with various options
Provisioning dedicated hosts and instances Provision private instances or dedicated instances on dedicated hosts

Next steps

After your virtual server is provisioned and available to use, you can configure your virtual servers by using the IBM Cloud console. For more information, see Configuring virtual servers.