BoxCompute vs Zipbox

BoxCompute costs $0.10 per vCPU-hour and Zipbox costs $0.00685 per vCPU-hour. BoxCompute runs full VMs and has no session limit. Zipbox runs Firecracker microVMs and has no session limit.

Updated

BoxCompute

Isolation
Full VM
Free tier
$5 credit, one time, valid 14 days
Max session
No limit

Zipbox

Isolation
Firecracker microVM
Free tier
$25 credit after a one-time $5 top-up
Max session
No limit

What is different

7 fields differ. The rest are the same or not listed.

BoxCompute
Zipbox
vCPU, per hour
BoxCompute: $0.10
Zipbox: $0.00685
Free tier
BoxCompute: $5 credit, one time, valid 14 days
Zipbox: $25 credit after a one-time $5 top-up
Largest sandbox
BoxCompute: 4 vCPU · 16 GiB
Zipbox: 6 vCPU · 16 GiB
Isolation
BoxCompute: Full VM
Zipbox: Firecracker microVM
Pause and resume
BoxCompute:
Zipbox: No
SDKs
BoxCompute: Python, TypeScript
Zipbox: TypeScript, Python, Go, Rust
Integrations
BoxCompute: Claude Code, MCP
Zipbox: MCP, Claude Code, Claude Agent SDK, OpenAI Agents SDK, Vercel AI SDK, LangChain

Full comparison

18 fields, at each provider's list price

Pricing

vCPU, per hour
BoxCompute: $0.10
Zipbox: $0.00685
RAM, per GiB-hour
BoxCompute: Included
Zipbox: Included
Storage
BoxCompute: Not listed
Zipbox: Free
Free tier
BoxCompute: $5 credit, one time, valid 14 days
Zipbox: $25 credit after a one-time $5 top-up
Paid plan from
BoxCompute: Not listed
Zipbox: Pay as you go
Billing
BoxCompute: Bundled machine time
Zipbox: Bundled machine time

Limits

Max session
BoxCompute: No limit
Zipbox: No limit
Idle stop
BoxCompute: After 30 minutes
Zipbox: Not listed
Largest sandbox
BoxCompute: 4 vCPU · 16 GiB
Zipbox: 6 vCPU · 16 GiB
Concurrent sandboxes
BoxCompute: Up to 8
Zipbox: Not listed

Platform

Isolation
BoxCompute: Full VM
Zipbox: Firecracker microVM
GPU
BoxCompute: Not listed
Zipbox: Not listed
Snapshots
BoxCompute: No
Zipbox: No
Pause and resume
BoxCompute:
Zipbox: No

Developer

SDKs
BoxCompute: Python, TypeScript
Zipbox: TypeScript, Python, Go, Rust
Integrations
BoxCompute: Claude Code, MCP
Zipbox: MCP, Claude Code, Claude Agent SDK, OpenAI Agents SDK, Vercel AI SDK, LangChain

Trust

License
BoxCompute: Not listed
Zipbox: Not listed
BYOC
BoxCompute: Enterprise pilot on your hardware or cloud account
Zipbox: Not listed

Hourly cost

One sandbox running for one hour

BoxCompute
Zipbox
1 vCPU · 2 GiB
BoxCompute: $0.100
Zipbox: $0.007
2 vCPU · 4 GiB
BoxCompute: $0.200
Zipbox: $0.014
4 vCPU · 8 GiB
BoxCompute: $0.400
Zipbox: $0.027

Compute only, at list rates.

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Which one fits

Based on the fields above

BoxCompute fits when

  • You want each sandbox to be a full VM.
  • You need pause and resume.
  • You need the sandboxes in your own cloud account.

Zipbox fits when

  • You want each sandbox in its own microVM.
  • You use the Claude Agent SDK, the OpenAI Agents SDK, the Vercel AI SDK or LangChain.
  • You want the lower list price: $0.014 against $0.200 an hour for 2 vCPU and 4 GiB.
  • You want the larger free credit: $25 against $5.

More comparisons

See all comparisons

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