Convert VMDK to OVA

What is VMDK file?

VMDK (.vmdk) is a virtual machine disk file used by VMware virtualization software. It shares the same format as other virtual disk formats such as those used for VirtualBox and Parallels Desktop virtual machines. VMDK files contain hard drive data that has been “zipped” and packaged for use by a hypervisor, like VMware Workstation, which abstracts physical hardware and allows multiple operating systems to run on different hardware profiles simultaneously. [ ⏩ ] VMDK file extension

What is OVA file?

Open Virtual Appliance (.OVA) files are virtual system images used for virtual environments. OVA files are widely used by desktop virtualization software such as VMWare or Oracle VirtualBox, and their cloud counterparts Amazon EC2, Google GCE and Microsoft Azure. OVA files are essentially a single file archive of the format OVF (Open Virtualization Format) which includes the .OVF descriptor file, and any other associated files needed for the virtual appliance. [ ⏩ ] OVA file extension

How to convert the file from VMDK to OVA?

To successfully convert the VMDK file to OVA, you should install one of the applications from the list. After installing the software, open the program and select the file you want to convert (file-name.VMDK). The next step is to select the target format from the list, in this case OVA (usually converters allow you to convert to several different formats, so check out their features - maybe one of the available formats will suit you more than OVA).

What is a file conversion?

A data conversion is normally an automated process to some extent. The effect of the operation of one program is automatically the input product of another application. If that does not happen we need to help the process a little bit and convert the file on our own, e.g. VMDK to OVA. To obtain a matched structure of the data, it is necessary to use an appropriate converter.

Program for converting VMDK files to OVA files is a kind of a "binary code translator" compensating for the differences in the code or translating it in such a way so that another application could use it. For us, as users, the visible change will be only another file extension. (After converting the file, it will be the extension OVA, while before this step we had the VMDK file). For the programs, the difference is on a much higher level – either the application will be able to open a new OVA file, or not.

Other VMDK and OVA file conversions