Your complete guide for getting started with Red Hat OpenShift Virtualization

To a seasoned virtual machine (VM) administrator, the shift from a familiar environment to Red Hat OpenShift Virtualization can feel daunting. We understand that your primary concern is not just migrating mission-critical workloads, but rapidly gaining the proficiency to manage a new, integrated platform successfully

Migrating off your current hypervisor doesn't have to be a sudden leap. It is a gradual evolution, and Red Hat provides you with guided resources at every stage of the journey. That starts with free trials and learning hubs to support your initial exploration. These tools help you build confidence early on, and smoothly transition into expert-led implementation when you're ready to apply your knowledge in real-world scenarios. This ensures a steady, predictable path toward operational success.

In this article we provide recommended training and resource paths to make you and your teams successful as you transition to a new platform.

Phase 1: Exploration and foundational training

Start by familiarizing yourself with basic concepts and gaining hands-on exposure to OpenShift Virtualization. Most resources are free to access, and are designed to help get you comfortable with managing your enterprise VM workloads with OpenShift Virtualization.

Dive in (no cost)

• Experience OpenShift Virtualization Roadshow: A hands-on experience recommended for VM admins and infrastructure architects to learn about using OpenShift Virtualization as a viable alternative for managing enterprise VM workloads.
• OpenShift Virtualization Learning Hub: Tools and learning materials designed specifically to help users get started with OpenShift Virtualization, organized by task.
• 60-day OpenShift free trial: Hands-on experience with Red Hat OpenShift.
• Level up program Virtualization: Fully-supported subscriptions for pilot projects or production workloads.
• Red Hat interactive experiences (demos): Learn how to Deploy OpenShift Virtualization with the assisted installer and how to Migrate VMs at scale using Migration Factory.
• OpenShift learning path: A valuable resource providing insight into features and functionalities found across both Red Hat OpenShift and VMware.
• Getting started with OpenShift Virtualization learning path: A 1.5 hour learning path providing the steps to configure OpenShift Virtualization, deploy a new VM, and import an existing VM into your new environment.

Building foundational expertise (associated costs)

This phase is all about taking the first step through hands-on training in a practice lab environment, designed to help VM admins transition from other hypervisors and quickly build up the skills they need.

• Introductory course for VM admins focused on basic VM Operations (DO156): In this 3-day course, learn the essential skills required to create and manage VMs on OpenShift by using the Red Hat OpenShift Virtualization operator.
• Intermediate course for cluster or VM admins who want to learn more advanced topics (DO256): In this 3-day course (coming soon), learn to migrate VMs from other hypervisors to OpenShift Virtualization, provide data protection and backups of VMs, create efficient and standardized provisioning of VMs, and provide high availability to VMs with Kubernetes resources.

Phase 2: Real-world application, mentored implementation and day-2 ops

At this point, you’re ready to transition from training to practical execution. It's time for us to help you migrate initial workloads to OpenShift Virtualization and eventually expand your virtualization footprint to scale migration. This phase begins with production build and includes guidance from Red Hat Consulting and support from Red Hat Technical Account Management to help begin migration efforts.

Ready to dive deeper? Start with these free resources

• Advanced Operations and automation with OpenShift Virtualization workshop: Work with your account team to schedule a free workshop that provides attendees with the knowledge and tools needed to manage their environment and perform critical operational tasks from day-2 onward.
• Continue learning with RHLS + 90-day free trial: Regardless of where you are in the journey, you can address skill gaps with unlimited access to our comprehensive curriculum.

Your guided path forward, backed by Red Hat Services

Our expert-led approach eliminates common pitfalls and accelerates your time-to-value. A Forrester Consulting TEI study found that leveraging Red Hat Consulting streamlined the total OpenShift implementation timeline by 46% and resulted in a 213% ROI.

• Virtualization Migration Assessment (VMA): A 2-week assessment consisting of an initial discovery session and a subsequent series of assessment workshops with your platform teams, Red Hat consultants develop a holistic understanding of the current state of your environment, as well as your needs and goals for your future state.
• Virtualization Migration Factory (VMF): Typically begins with building a strong foundation in a non-production environment to derisk and prepare for future production readiness. After you’ve validated migration of initial VMs, we’ll scale the migration by focusing on production hardening, automating the migration of batched VMs, and developing repeat migration patterns.
• Technical Account Management (TAM): TAMs are vital to success throughout this phase. They support pre-migration testing, support and deployment and offer day-to-day production support, sharing best practices and operational guidance.
• Automate and Manage Red Hat OpenShift Virtualization with Ansible course (DO336): This course is designed to upskill VM admins interested in automating migration and management tasks of VMs in OpenShift Virtualization by using the Ansible Automation Platform operator.

Crucially, support from Red Hat Technical Account Managers (TAMs), especially for those who are new to OpenShift, means access to best practices, ongoing advisory support, and someone who advocates for your specific needs. A recent Forrester/Red Hat‐commissioned study shows that TAMs helped deliver a 67% reduction in system outage times.

Phase 3: Operational evolution and platform ROI

In the final phase, we focus on maximizing return on investment (ROI) by evolving operations through automation and efficiency. This includes automating infrastructure and application deployments using GitOps practices, with tools like Argo CD or OpenShift GitOps to manage and maintain desired state from Git repositories.

Your guided path forward, backed by Red Hat Services

• Evolve from ClickOps to GitOps: Focus on automating infrastructure and application deployments using GitOps principles. This involves defining the desired state of the environment in Git repositories and using tools like Argo CD or OpenShift GitOps to automatically reconcile the actual state with the desired state.
• Multicluster Management with Red Hat Advanced Cluster Management for Kubernetes course (DO432): Learn to deploy and manage virtual machines in a multi cluster environment by using Red Hat Advanced Cluster Management and GitOps.

Guidance you can count on at every stage

Migrating to a new platform can feel like a significant undertaking, especially with all the moving parts to consider. However, when approached in clear, structured phases, it becomes manageable. By following a phased approach starting with resource exploration, then moving into expert-guided deployment, continuing through full-scale migration, and concluding with infrastructure modernization, the process becomes more predictable and less overwhelming.

You don’t have to navigate it alone. With solid documentation, purpose-built tools, and guidance from Red Hat experts, you have what you need to move forward with clarity and confidence.

If you’re starting to think about strategy or next steps, talk to a consultant today.

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