---
name: virtualization-what-hyper-v
title: What is Hyper-V?
description: Hyper-V is a virtualization system for the Windows that allows a single physical server to host multiple virtual machines all running their own Operating System.
last-updated: 2023-07-12
---

> ## Documentation Index
> The table of contents for this documentation set is at https://cloud.ibm.com/docs/virtualization?format=markdown
> The index for all IBM Cloud docs is at: https://cloud.ibm.com/docs/llms.txt
> Use these files to discover more information as needed.

# What is Hyper-V?
{: #what-is-hyper-v}

Hyper-V is a virtualization system for the Windows that allows a single physical server to host multiple virtual machines all running their own Operating System.

## Hyper-V hardware requirements
{: #hyper-v-hardware-requirements}

Hyper-V must be installed on a currently support version of Windows Server Datacenter.

All IBM Cloud® hardware meets the system requirements of Hyper-V. Microsoft recommends at least 2 GB of RAM on your server.