CreateOS Sandbox vs Smol Machines
Pick smol machines if you want to develop sandboxes locally, self-host an open-source runtime, or branch a running machine for rollouts. Pick CreateOS Sandbox if you want a hosted service with named regions, SOC 2 Type II and ISO 27001 reports, and no per-GB egress fee within each sandbox's budget.
Pricing at a Glance
CreateOS rates verified 17 October 2026. smol machines 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
Lower compute rate- Compute
- $0.0362 /vCPU-hr
- Memory
- $0.0116 /GiB-hr
smol machines
- Compute
- $0.0500 /vCPU-hr
- Memory
- See below
smol cloud charges $0.04 per running machine-hour, $0.05 per active vCPU-hour, $0.0162 per GB-hour of active memory, $0.0001 per GB-hour of disk and $0.05 per GB of egress, with a one-minute minimum, as of 17 October 2026.
Where CreateOS Sandbox Fits Better
What CreateOS Sandbox brings to this matchup, with a plain note on where smol machines has the edge.
Two named regions, eu and us; smol does not publish regions for its hosted cloud.
smol does not publish compliance for its hosted cloud. CreateOS is SOC 2 Type II and ISO 27001 certified, with reports available under NDA.
No per-GB egress fee, with a 50 GiB outbound budget per sandbox; smol charges $0.05 per GB out.
Where smol machines is strong
The same branchable libkrun micro-VM runs free on macOS, Linux or Windows and in smol's hosted cloud, and you can branch a running machine into copy-on-write children that continue from the same point. The smolvm runtime is open source under Apache-2.0.
Which to Pick
Pick CreateOS Sandbox if
- Your security review asks for SOC 2 Type II and ISO 27001 reports.
- You need to know which region your sandboxes run in.
- You want outbound traffic up to 50 GiB per sandbox without a per-GB fee.
Pick smol machines if
- You want to run the exact sandbox on your laptop before deploying it.
- You need to self-host the runtime without an enterprise contract.
- You want to branch a machine while it is running.
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 | smol machines |
|---|---|---|
| Isolation | Firecracker micro-VM with its own guest kernel | libkrun micro-VM with its own guest kernel, on KVM, Hypervisor.framework or Windows Hypervisor Platform |
| Pause and resume | Saves disk, memory and CPU state; vCPU billing stops, memory and storage still bill | Pause and checkpoints capture RAM, CPU state and disks; cloud checkpoints move between hosts |
| Fork | Forks a paused sandbox into many independent copies | Branch a running machine into copy-on-write children |
| 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 | Off by default (vendor-stated); blocked, open, or allowCidrs with named hosts |
| Inbound access | Closed by default; opt-in HTTPS URL | Up to 16 ports, private by default with an authenticated route, or public |
| Largest size | 8 vCPU / 16 GB on Enterprise; 8 vCPU / 8 GB on Pro | 8 vCPU / 16 GB standard; 16 vCPU / 24 GB pro; 32 vCPU / 32 GB startup |
| Concurrency | 1 / 5 / 20 / 30 by plan (Free to Enterprise); paused sandboxes count | 20 standard, 100 pro, 1,000 startup, contract on enterprise |
| Billing | Per second: $0.03616363/vCPU-hr, $0.01159025/GiB-hr, $0.0001584/GB-hr storage; no egress fees, 50 GiB bandwidth budget per sandbox | $0.04 per running machine-hour plus $0.05 per active vCPU-hour, $0.0162 per GB-hour of active RSS; egress $0.05/GB |
| Self-host or BYOC | Enterprise only, onboarded by our team | Yes: smolvm is open source under Apache-2.0 |
| GPU | No GPU | Local smolvm only; the hosted cloud has no GPU machines |
Common Questions
Can I run smol machines on my own laptop?
Yes. The smolvm runtime is open source under Apache-2.0 and runs locally on macOS, Linux or Windows, and the same .smolmachine artifact runs self-hosted or in smol cloud. CreateOS Sandbox is a hosted service; self-hosting is enterprise only and onboarded by our team.
Is network access on by default in smol machines?
smol says network is off by default, and its cloud docs advise setting network.mode explicitly to blocked, open or allowCidrs. CreateOS Sandbox is open by default and becomes deny-by-default once you add any host, IP, CIDR or wildcard rule.
How do smol machines and CreateOS Sandbox bill compute?
smol charges a $0.04 base per running machine-hour, $0.05 per active vCPU-hour, $0.0162 per GB-hour of active memory and $0.05 per GB out, with a one-minute minimum. CreateOS bills per second at $0.03616363 per vCPU-hour and $0.01159025 per GiB-hour, with no egress fee inside the 50 GiB budget.
Does smol cloud offer GPUs?
No. smol supports GPU only in local smolvm, through Vulkan via virtio-gpu and CUDA API remoting; the hosted cloud does not provide GPU machines. CreateOS Sandbox has no GPU shapes either, so plan GPU work elsewhere.
Sources
Checked 17 October 2026.
See CreateOS Sandbox for yourself
Book a demo, or explore the Sandbox and its pricing.