Why is VNC of a VM so slow?

Operating Systems & Open Source Linux
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1

I have KaliLinux running in a VirtualBox VM on my Manjaro system. Usually, I ssh into the VM directly but sometimes a GUI is required. Initially, I started a VNC server on Manjaro and controlled the VM from there but recently I thought why not cut out the middle man and start a VNC server on the VM and then connect to the VM.

Oddly enough, the VM feels sluggish and responds in a slow manner, while using it over the host’s VNC is snappy like the host itself.

I was curious about both why this happens and if there might be a way to fix this.

2

After doing a bit of investigation on my own I may have found the reason and also a solution.

The reason for VNC being slow is that apparently the VirtualBox VM has is not able to provide sufficient VRAM required for a VNC session. As a result it is sluggish.

In order to solve this, it is recommended not using VNC, but rather enable the “Remote Display” functionality and use a RDP client instead of VNC.