proxmoxx on nix os

NixOS isn’t designed primarily as a hypervisor like Proxmox — it’s a general-purpose declarative Linux distro — but you can turn it into a powerful virtualization host for home labs or servers. Many people migrate from Proxmox to NixOS precisely for the declarative config, reproducibility, atomic updates/rollbacks, and integration with Nix flakes/modules.

Closest Equivalents / Setups on NixOS

Here are the main realistic paths, ordered from “most Proxmox-like” to more lightweight/declarative:

1. Proxmox-NixOS (experimental port of Proxmox itself to NixOS)

   • This is literally Proxmox running on NixOS — including the web interface, clustering, PBS (backup server), etc.
   • GitHub project: SaumonNet/proxmox-nixos
   • Status: Still experimental (as of recent discussions), basic features work (booting VMs, user management), but advanced stuff like full HA/clustering is WIP.
   • If you love Proxmox’s UI and workflow but want NixOS declarative config underneath → this is the closest match.
   • People are testing it on real hardware; not yet production-ready for everyone.

2. NixOS + Incus (most popular migration path right now)

   • Incus = community fork of LXD → supports both system containers (like Proxmox LXC) and full VMs (QEMU-based).
   • Many ex-Proxmox users switch to bare-metal NixOS + Incus for their entire homelab (2025–2026 blog posts show full migrations).
   • Benefits: Declarative host config via Nix, lightweight (no heavy hypervisor overhead), ZFS support, easy migration from Proxmox LXC/VMs.
   • No built-in web UI like Proxmox, but you can use:
     • Incus CLI (very powerful)
     • Web UIs like Incus UI projects or third-party tools
   • Example: Run containers for services + VMs for things like Home Assistant or Windows.
   • Great if you want Nix purity + container/VM mix without Proxmox’s “imperative” feel.

3. NixOS + libvirt + Virt-Manager / virsh (classic KVM stack)

   • Enable in configuration.nix:

     virtualisation.libvirtd.enable = true;
     virtualisation.libvirtd.qemu.enable = true;  # or similar options
     boot.kernelModules = [ "kvm-intel" "kvm-amd" ];  # depending on CPU
     

   • Manage remotely via virt-manager (GUI from your desktop) or virsh CLI.
   • Supports KVM/QEMU VMs (full OS isolation), PCI passthrough, snapshots, etc.
   • For declarative VMs: Check out NixVirt or combine with microvm.nix.
   • Solid for headless servers; many use this for home labs.
   • Less “integrated” than Proxmox but very flexible.

4. microvm.nix (ultra-lightweight, declarative NixOS VMs)

   • If your VMs are mostly NixOS guests → run them as micro-VMs (Firecracker or QEMU).
   • Extremely efficient, boot in seconds, perfect for “cattle” workloads.
   • Not ideal for Windows/non-NixOS guests or if you need a rich GUI.

Quick Comparison Table

Recommendation

• If you want as close as possible to Proxmox (UI + features) → try Proxmox-NixOS first (experimental, but improving fast).
• If you want Nix philosophy + good VM/container support → go NixOS + Incus (most real-world migrations in 2025–2026).
• If you mostly need VMs and remote GUI → NixOS + libvirt + virt-manager is straightforward and battle-tested.

All of these are doable today on current NixOS (unstable or 25.05+ channels have good module support). Start with the NixOS wiki pages on libvirt/Incus, or search Discourse/Reddit for recent configs — people share full configuration.nix examples for hypervisor setups.

Let me know what your main use case is (e.g., mostly containers, Windows VMs, ZFS, clustering), and I can give more targeted config pointers!