# smolmachines

27 Hacker News commenters recommended smolmachines and 3 criticized it, November 2025 to November 2026. It was recommended in 6 of 13 months. It meets the Hacker Approved badge rule.

**Verdict:** Recommended as a VM with container-like ergonomics, portable images and subsecond starts for isolated sandboxes. Main caveat: Windows support is lacking.

## Why people recommend it

- Strong isolation for sandboxes (3 comments): "I've just discovered and started using smolmachines which actually have the requisite isolation." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47934661)) "I definitely would try using this for benchmarks and other places where I need strong isolation" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47810821)) "this seems very useful for coding agent sandbox environments" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47813413))
- VM with container ergonomics (2 comments): "smol machines is a virtual machine that has properties and ergonomics of containers." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47814768)) "a virtual machine with the ergonomics of containers + subsecond start times" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47808326))
- Fast subsecond startup (2 comments): "a virtual machine with the ergonomics of containers + subsecond start times" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47808326)) "its super fast im just not sure is this really secure" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48767983))
- Portable artifacts across platforms (2 comments): "It enables a cross platform, language agnostic plugin system, especially for agents, while being safe in a VM." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47810701)) "The images or rather portable artifacts rehydration on any platform plus the packaging is neat." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47812141))

## Alternatives hackers recommend

- [Firecracker](https://hackerapproved.com/p/firecracker.md): 78 recommend
- [smolvm by smolmachines](https://hackerapproved.com/p/smolvm.md): 28 recommend
- [libkrun](https://hackerapproved.com/p/libkrun.md): 13 recommend
- [Bhatti](https://hackerapproved.com/p/bhatti.md): 8 recommend
- [Local-First Linux MicroVMs for macOS](https://hackerapproved.com/p/local-first-linux-microvms-for-macos.md): 8 recommend

## Cite as

Hacker Approved, "smolmachines", https://hackerapproved.com/p/smol-machines/ (counts from 1,795,640 Hacker News comments, November 2025 to November 2026).