How to create a Virtual Machine in Hyper-V on Windows 10?

If you are running Windows 10 and your system has hardware support for Hyper-V, you can create an isolated storage to deploy your own Virtual Machine and use it. You can create one or more Virtual Machines and run them at the same time.

In this blog post, we are going to discuss in detail to known the process to create a Virtual Machine using the Hyper-V Manager on Windows 10.

Let's assume that, your system supports hardware virtualization (Hyper-V) and you have already installed the Hyper-V Manager. In case you didn't install it, open the 'Windows Feature' from the Control Panel and install the same. To get started with creating our first Virtual Machine, open the Hyper-V Manager. As shown in the below screenshot, click on 'New' -> Virtual Machine, from the right side panel, to begin the creation process of new Virtual Machine (VM):

The following wizard will help you to create your new virtual machine based on default or custom configuration. After creation of the VM if you want to change any configuration settings, you can do so later at any time. Click on 'Next' button on this screen to continue.

In the following screen, you will be allowed to give a name and location for this virtual machine. The name will be displayed in the Hyper-V Manager dashboard, so that you can easily identify it. Select a proper location to host the VM, or go with default one. When you are ready, click on 'Next' button to continue.

The 'Generation' page allows you to select the generation type of your VM that you are going to create. If you want it to have support for both 32-bit and 64-bit guest operating system, select 'Generation 1'. In case you want to have 64-bit operating system hosted in the VM and/or want to have support for UEFI based firmware, select 'Generation 2'. When you are done, click on 'Next' button to continue.

The following screen will allow you to specify the RAM size that you would like to assign to your virtual machine. Prefer to allocate higher memory to improve the performance of the system. Click on 'Next' button to continue.

The next screen will allow you to assign a virtual network adapter for your virtual machine. Select from the available list or keep it as 'Not Connected'. You can configure it later, once the VM gets created. Click 'Next' to continue.

Now, it's time to create a storage space for your virtual machine. You can create a new Virtual Hard Disk, assigning a size, from this screen. You can also attach and existing virtual hard disk or keep it open to attach the virtual disk later. Click 'Next' to continue to next screen.

In this screen, you can install an operating system in your Virtual Machine. If you have an ISO/DVD image of the operating system installation media, select the one or select 'Install an operating system later' to install it after creation of the VM. When you make your choice, click on 'Next' to continue.

The next screen will give you a summary of what's going to build now. It will list down all the configurations that you made. Review the settings and click on 'Finish' to proceed towards Virtual Machine creation.

Once the virtual machine gets created, it will list it under the Virtual Machines section of the Hyper-V Manager/Dashboard, as shown in the below screenshot:

As discussed the step-by-step process above, follow it to create a new virtual machine on your Windows 10 system. In the next article, we will learn how to install an operating system on your virtual machine. Later, we will also discuss how to modify the configuration settings at a later point of time.