Extract text from Virtual machine files (OVF)
To convert OVF Virtual machines to another format, you need VMware Workstation or other System software.
To convert other file formats to the "Virtual Machine Settings" file type, you need software like VMware Workstation or a similar tool.
The .OVF file format stands for Open Virtualization Format. It is a standard XML document created by the Distributed Management Task Force (DMTF) to package and distribute virtual machines across different platforms. You can deploy it using hypervisors like VMware Workstation, Oracle VM VirtualBox, or Microsoft Hyper-V. In scientific fields, .OVF is also used by the OOMMF Project to store micromagnetic simulation vector fields.
The biggest disadvantage of an .OVF virtual machine file is that it is not a standalone container. It only contains configuration text (CPU, RAM, network settings) and relies on external pointers to virtual disk files (like VMDK or VHD) and manifest files (MF). If you move the .OVF without its corresponding heavy disk images, the virtual machine will fail to load. Furthermore, manual edits to the .OVF will break the SHA-1 or SHA-256 hashes stored in the MF file, causing strict hypervisors to instantly block the import.
For easier distribution and archiving, convert the entire OVF package to an OVA file, which acts as a single TAR archive containing the .OVF and all its dependent disks. If you need a proprietary format for native editing, convert to VMX for VMware environments. Drop your file here to analyze and convert it securely right in your browser.
Convert.Guru analyzes your OVF file, detects the exact format, and lets you read the text inside.
Users also converted OVA, VMDK, SH, ODT, ODG, PDF, 7Z, TXT, ISO, ZIP, VDI, VBOX and QCOW2 files.
If you want to convert OVF file to OVA, QCOW2, VMDK, VHD, ISO, VHDX, CSV, JSON, XML, YAML, YML or TOML, you can use VMware Workstation or similar software from the "Virtual Machine Configuration" category. In the File menu, look for Save As… or Export….
To convert DBF, XML, SQLITE, XLSX, SQL, TSV, ACCDB, YAML, MDB, CSV, ODS or JSON files to OVF, try VMware Workstation or another comparable tool in the "Virtual Machine Configuration" category.
The history of Convert.Guru began over 25 years ago in California with Tom Simondi’s file-format database. A former contributor to Space Shuttle development and a software pioneer of the 1980s, Simondi established a trusted resource for file type analysis that was even referenced by Microsoft Windows XP. Today, we use modern technology to process and convert thousands of file formats while continually improving our OVF converter.