Bare Metal Vs Virtual Machine Kali Image

Virtual Machine Guide to Kali Images

When on the https://www.kali.org/ website, you have the choice to download Bare Metal install image or a Virtual Machine image.

Which you should choose is up to you.

The main difference is that the VM image is essentially already ready to go and you will log in using the generated user/pass of kali/kali. This is useful for testing things quickly especially if you are on the go. My main issue with this prefab box is that I always have a hard time installing features such as Drag'n'Drop or Shared Clipboard from host to VM. This is why I always install at least one bare metal version.

The Bare Metal give you more control because you will be installing it from scratch as though you were doing it on a physical machine. You will need to create a username and password for yourself and wait around 15-20 minutes for the install to complete. 

Both options works just fine with Oracle VM VirtualBox and VMWare. 

How to install the image.

For the VM image, you just have to install your favorite VM software (Oracle VM or VMWare for example) and click on the downloaded file. If all goes well it should automatically sets itself up.

How to install the Bare Metal version.

For the bare metal version you will need to create a Linux Ubuntu base machine, and then insert the disk downloaded from Kali under the Storage tab. 

Let me know in the comments below if you have any questions.