CreateOS Sandbox vs Boxd
boxd suits teams that keep many agent or developer machines alive for days: they hibernate on idle, wake on traffic and bill RAM only on memory actually resident. Pick CreateOS Sandbox if you need a US region, list prices in US dollars, a compliance report for procurement, or SDKs beyond TypeScript and Python. boxd is EU-hosted and prices in euros.
Pricing at a Glance
CreateOS rates verified 17 October 2026. boxd 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
boxd
boxd charges €0.039 per vCPU-hour while running, €0.012 per GiB-hour of RAM in use (running or standby) and €0.00008 per GiB-hour of disk written, excluding VAT, with no monthly plan or seat fee, as of 17 October 2026.
Where CreateOS Sandbox Fits Better
What CreateOS Sandbox brings to this matchup, with a plain note on where boxd has the edge.
Two managed regions, eu and us; boxd is EU-hosted and does not publish specific regions.
List rates in US dollars: $0.03616363 per vCPU-hour and $0.01159025 per GiB-hour, billed per second.
Procurement-ready: CreateOS is SOC 2 Type II and ISO 27001 certified, with reports available under NDA. boxd does not publish a certification.
Six official SDKs, adding Go, Rust, C# and Java to TypeScript and Python (non-TypeScript pre-1.0).
Where boxd is strong
boxd machines act like persistent computers that cost little asleep: they hibernate automatically when network activity stops, wake on traffic, fork with memory, processes and databases, roll back in place from checkpoints, and bill RAM only on memory actually resident.
Which to Pick
Pick CreateOS Sandbox if
- Your users or data need a US region.
- You need SOC 2 Type II or ISO 27001 reports for a customer review.
- Your orchestration code is Go, Rust, C# or Java.
Pick boxd if
- You keep dozens of machines idle most of the day and want them to sleep cheaply.
- You want EU hosting and machines up to 8 vCPU / 32 GiB by default.
- You need in-place checkpoints you can roll back to.
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 | boxd |
|---|---|---|
| Isolation | Firecracker micro-VM with its own guest kernel | KVM microVM with its own kernel, network stack and disk |
| Pause and resume | Saves disk, memory and CPU state; vCPU billing stops while paused, memory and storage still bill | Standby keeps memory warm; hibernate writes memory to disk on idle and wakes on traffic |
| Fork | Fork a paused sandbox into many independent copies | Copies a running machine with memory, processes and disk |
| Outbound network default | Open with no rules; deny-by-default once any host, IP, CIDR or wildcard rule exists, enforced on the host outside the VM | Open; optional allowlist of hostnames, wildcards and IPv4 ranges |
| Inbound access | Closed by default; opt-in HTTPS URL | HTTPS domain per machine, subdomain proxies, SSH port, 3 TCP/UDP forwards, custom domains |
| Largest size | 8 vCPU / 16 GB on Enterprise; 8 / 8 on Pro, 4 / 4 on Beginner, 1 / 1 on Free | 8 vCPU / 32 GiB / 100 GB by default; larger by request |
| Concurrency | 1 / 5 / 20 / 30 by plan (Free to Enterprise); paused sandboxes count | 50 machines per organization by default (hibernated and stopped count) |
| Session length | No cap; optional idle auto-pause from 60 s to 24 h, off by default | Unlimited runtime; optional delete-after |
| Billing | Per second: $0.03616363 per vCPU-hour, $0.01159025 per GiB-hour, storage $0.0001584 per GB-hour; no egress fees (50 GiB bandwidth budget per sandbox) | €0.039 per vCPU-hour running, €0.012 per GiB-hour RAM in use, excluding VAT |
| Self-host or BYOC | Enterprise only, onboarded by our team | Self-host or BYOC via custom deal |
Common Questions
Does boxd bill memory while a machine sleeps?
In standby, yes: RAM in use is billed at €0.012 per GiB-hour. Hibernation writes memory to disk, after which you pay for disk written. A paused CreateOS sandbox stops vCPU billing but keeps billing memory and storage until you resume or destroy it.
Where is boxd hosted?
boxd says it is EU-hosted, with EU data residency on its custom plan, and it does not publish specific regions. CreateOS offers two managed regions, eu and us, selected per sandbox at create time.
Can boxd and CreateOS both fork a machine with its memory?
Yes, with one difference. boxd copies a running machine, including memory, processes, disk and databases. CreateOS forks a paused sandbox, cloning its saved disk, memory and CPU snapshot into independent copies while the source stays paused.
Sources
Checked 17 October 2026.
See CreateOS Sandbox for yourself
Book a demo, or explore the Sandbox and its pricing.