CreateOS Sandbox vs Azure Pipelines
Azure Pipelines is the obvious choice for CI/CD across Windows, Linux and macOS inside Azure DevOps. CreateOS Sandbox is for agent code that needs bigger machines than a 2-core hosted agent, sessions past 6 hours, and a way in over HTTPS or shell.
Pricing at a Glance
CreateOS rates verified 17 October 2026. Azure Pipelines pricing as published on 17 October 2026. Rates billed per GB rather than per GiB, or as bundled sizes, are quoted as published rather than converted.
CreateOS Sandbox
- Compute
- $0.0362 /vCPU-hr
- Memory
- $0.0116 /GiB-hr
Azure Pipelines
Azure Pipelines charges $40 per month per extra Microsoft-hosted parallel job and $15 per month per extra self-hosted parallel job, each with unlimited minutes, with one free hosted job at 1,800 minutes per month, as of 17 October 2026.
Where CreateOS Sandbox Fits Better
What CreateOS Sandbox brings to this matchup, with a plain note on where Azure Pipelines has the edge.
Shapes up to 8 vCPU / 16 GB on Enterprise, where Microsoft-hosted agents are fixed at 2 cores / 7 GB.
No 6-hour job limit; sandboxes run until you stop them.
Remote access by shell, tunnels or an opt-in HTTPS URL; hosted agents cannot be remotely connected to.
Pause and resume with memory state for later sessions.
Where Azure Pipelines is strong
Azure Pipelines reimages a fresh VM for every job across Linux, Windows and macOS, prices hosted capacity as flat, unlimited-minute parallel jobs, and plugs straight into Azure DevOps, with self-hosted, scale-set and on-premises options.
Which to Pick
Pick CreateOS Sandbox if
- Agent jobs need more than 2 cores or run past 6 hours.
- You need to connect to the environment while code runs.
Pick Azure Pipelines if
- Your team is standardised on Azure DevOps.
- You need Windows or macOS build agents.
- You want a flat monthly price per parallel job with unlimited minutes.
Head-to-Head Comparison
Every dimension side by side, checked on 17 October 2026 against each vendor's own docs and pricing pages. "Not published" means we could not find it on the vendor's pages, not that the feature is missing.
| Dimension | CreateOS Sandbox | Azure Pipelines |
|---|---|---|
| Built for | Sandboxes created by API for agent and untrusted code | Building, testing and deploying code in Azure DevOps |
| Isolation | Firecracker micro-VM with its own guest kernel | Full VM: a fresh Azure VM per job, reimaged after each run, dedicated to one organisation |
| Trigger model (pipeline vs API) | API call from REST, SDK, CLI or MCP | YAML pipelines; Azure DevOps REST API and CLI |
| Session length | No session length cap; optional idle auto-pause from 60 s to 24 h, off by default | Free tier 60 minutes per job; paid parallel jobs up to 360 minutes (6 hours) |
| Pause and resume | Yes: pause saves disk, memory and CPU state; vCPU stops billing, memory and storage still bill | None: the VM is discarded after one job |
| Outbound network | Open with no rules; deny-by-default once any host, IP, CIDR or wildcard rule exists, enforced on the host outside the VM | Outbound over the public Azure network; no public IP; no ExpressRoute or VPN for hosted agents |
| Billing | Per second: $0.03616363 per vCPU-hour, $0.01159025 per GiB-hour, storage $0.0001584 per GB-hour | Monthly per parallel job: $40 hosted, $15 self-hosted, unlimited minutes |
Common Questions
How big is a Microsoft-hosted Azure Pipelines agent?
A Microsoft-hosted Windows or Linux agent is fixed at 2 cores, 7 GB of RAM and 14 GB of SSD, and macOS agents get 3 cores and 14 GB. Larger machines need self-hosted agents, scale sets or Managed DevOps Pools. CreateOS shapes go up to 8 vCPU / 16 GB on Enterprise.
Can I SSH into an Azure Pipelines hosted agent?
No. Microsoft-hosted agents have no public IP and cannot be remotely connected to. CreateOS sandboxes offer API-authenticated shell and port-forward tunnels, an SSH gateway for attached keys, and an opt-in public HTTPS URL.
Does Azure Pipelines offer macOS that CreateOS lacks?
Yes. Azure Pipelines runs macOS agents, always hosted in the US, alongside Windows and Linux. CreateOS images are Linux only: devbox:1, desktop:1, ubuntu:26.04, debian:13 and alpine:3.20.
Sources
Checked 17 October 2026.
See CreateOS Sandbox for yourself
Book a demo, or explore the Sandbox and its pricing.