ESX (Elastic Sky X) is the VMware’s enterprise server virtualization platform.
In ESX, VMkernel is the virtualization kernel which is managed by a console operating system
which is also called as Service console. Which is Linux based and its main purpose is it to provide
a Management interface for the host and lot of management agents and other third-party software agents
are installed on the service console to provide the functionalists like hardware management and monitoring of ESX hypervisor.


ESXi (Elastic sky X Integrated) is also the VMware’s enterprise server virtualization platform.
In ESXi, Service console is removed. All the VMware related agents and third party agents
such as management and monitoring agents can also run directly on the VMkernel.
ESXi is a ultra-thin architecture which is highly reliable and its small code-base
allows it to be more secure with fewer codes to patch.
ESXi uses Direct Console User Interface (DCUI) instead of a service console
to perform management of ESXi server. ESXi installation will happen very quickly as compared to ESX installation.


