The best cloud sandboxes, according to hackers
12 cloud sandboxes recommended in Hacker News comments over the past year, ranked by how many separate people recommend each one.
- Most recommendedSprites58 people recommend it
- Least regretShellbox13 recommend, 1 criticize
- Free and lovedAmla Sandbox11 people recommend it
All cloud sandboxes
- SpritesPeople recommend Sprites as persistent Linux machines for running AI coding agents, with checkpoints and usage-based pricing. Critics most often cite bugs, unclear documentation, and idle billing that they could not verify.58recommend
- E2BHosted sandboxes for running AI agent code, with snapshots, networking and integrations. Critics mention platform lock-in and a 24-hour session cap.23recommend
- Deno SandboxCloud sandboxes for running untrusted code, including AI agent code, that people find fast and easy to set up. Critics say it is expensive at scale and lacks some networking features.21recommend
- Freestyle SandboxesRecommended for full Debian VMs that pause, resume and fork quickly for AI coding agents; critics mainly flag a slow dashboard and unclear pricing.20recommend
- Agent37Low-cost agent sandboxes, cheaper than Boat and Cloudflare by many people's comparisons. Caveat: gVisor limits, and low prices only for preset templates.15recommend
- ShellboxInstant Linux VMs over SSH that suspend when disconnected and bill only for running time, useful as sandboxes for coding agents. Critics say the website lacks clear information and sign-up steps.13recommend
- Amla SandboxLets AI agents run code in a constrained WASM bash sandbox, with capability-based tool validation and trace replay. Caveat: the WASM binary is proprietary and Python support is partial.11recommend
- amazing-sandbox by ashishbDevelopers run third-party code and AI agents inside it to limit damage from malicious packages; the main caveat is that it requires Docker, which uses large images and disk space.8recommend
- KedgePeople like its instant, ephemeral cloud sandboxes, which remove the need to profile or right-size instances, along with its replicated SQLite and filesystem.8recommend
- DaytonaSandboxes that boot quickly and keep VMs warm for AI agents; critics find pricing high against a plain VPS and cap concurrent resource use.7recommend
- Cloudflare SandboxesRecommended for running agent coding loops cheaply and quickly, with a safe sandbox and persistent agent state. Critics say it costs more than most alternatives.6recommend
- AWS MicroVMsLets you run isolated sandboxes with snapshot and restore and RAM scaling. Critics say it is costly and lacks bandwidth and spending limits.5recommend