DigitalOcean Harness Runtime vs DigitalOcean MicroVMs

DigitalOcean Harness Runtime costs $0.044 per vCPU-hour and DigitalOcean MicroVMs costs $0.022 per vCPU-hour. DigitalOcean Harness Runtime runs Firecracker microVMs. DigitalOcean MicroVMs runs Firecracker microVMs.

Updated Oct 15, 2026

DigitalOcean Harness Runtime

Managed microVM sandboxes for AI agents and their code.

Isolation: Firecracker microVM
Free tier: Not listed
Max session: Not listed

Visit site DigitalOcean Harness Runtime profile

DigitalOcean MicroVMs

Lightweight virtual machines that run a container image in their own kernel and pause when idle.

Isolation: Firecracker microVM
Free tier: Not listed
Max session: Not listed

Visit site DigitalOcean MicroVMs profile

What is different

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

Field

DigitalOcean Harness Runtime

DigitalOcean MicroVMs

vCPU, per hour: DigitalOcean Harness Runtime: $0.044; DigitalOcean MicroVMs: $0.022
RAM, per GiB-hour: DigitalOcean Harness Runtime: $0.0095; DigitalOcean MicroVMs: $0.0085
Storage: DigitalOcean Harness Runtime: Session volumes $0.05 per GiB-month; DigitalOcean MicroVMs: $0.05 per GiB per month, charged when running or paused. Checkpoints are charged until deleted.
Billing: DigitalOcean Harness Runtime: Active CPU time only; DigitalOcean MicroVMs: Per second
Idle stop: DigitalOcean Harness Runtime: After 15 minutes; DigitalOcean MicroVMs: After 5 minutes

Full comparison

18 fields, at each provider's list price

DigitalOcean Harness Runtimedigitalocean.com/pricing/harness-runtimedigitalocean.com

DigitalOcean MicroVMsdocs.digitalocean.com/products/microvms/details/pricingdocs.digitalocean.com

Pricing

vCPU, per hour: DigitalOcean Harness Runtime: $0.044; DigitalOcean MicroVMs: $0.022
RAM, per GiB-hour: DigitalOcean Harness Runtime: $0.0095; DigitalOcean MicroVMs: $0.0085
Storage: DigitalOcean Harness Runtime: Session volumes $0.05 per GiB-month; DigitalOcean MicroVMs: $0.05 per GiB per month, charged when running or paused. Checkpoints are charged until deleted.
Free tier: DigitalOcean Harness Runtime: Not listed; DigitalOcean MicroVMs: Not listed
Paid plan from: DigitalOcean Harness Runtime: Pay as you go; DigitalOcean MicroVMs: Not listed
Billing: DigitalOcean Harness Runtime: Active CPU time only; DigitalOcean MicroVMs: Per second

Limits

Max session: DigitalOcean Harness Runtime: Not listed; DigitalOcean MicroVMs: Not listed
Idle stop: DigitalOcean Harness Runtime: After 15 minutes; DigitalOcean MicroVMs: After 5 minutes
Largest sandbox: DigitalOcean Harness Runtime: 16 vCPU · 32 GiB; DigitalOcean MicroVMs: 16 vCPU · 32 GiB
Concurrent sandboxes: DigitalOcean Harness Runtime: Up to 100; DigitalOcean MicroVMs: Not listed

Platform

Isolation: DigitalOcean Harness Runtime: Firecracker microVM; DigitalOcean MicroVMs: Firecracker microVM
GPU: DigitalOcean Harness Runtime: Not listed; DigitalOcean MicroVMs: Not listed
Snapshots: DigitalOcean Harness Runtime:; DigitalOcean MicroVMs:
Pause and resume: DigitalOcean Harness Runtime:; DigitalOcean MicroVMs:

Developer

SDKs: DigitalOcean Harness Runtime: Python; DigitalOcean MicroVMs: Not listed
Integrations: DigitalOcean Harness Runtime: Claude Code; DigitalOcean MicroVMs: Not listed

Trust

License: DigitalOcean Harness Runtime: Not listed; DigitalOcean MicroVMs: Not listed
BYOC: DigitalOcean Harness Runtime: Not listed; DigitalOcean MicroVMs: Not listed

Hourly cost

One sandbox running for one hour

Size

DigitalOcean Harness Runtime

DigitalOcean MicroVMs

1 vCPU · 2 GiB: DigitalOcean Harness Runtime: $0.063; DigitalOcean MicroVMs: $0.039
2 vCPU · 4 GiB: DigitalOcean Harness Runtime: $0.126; DigitalOcean MicroVMs: $0.078
4 vCPU · 8 GiB: DigitalOcean Harness Runtime: $0.252; DigitalOcean MicroVMs: $0.156

Compute only, at list rates.

Open the calculator

Which one fits

Based on the fields above

DigitalOcean Harness Runtime fits when

You use Claude Code.
Your code waits a lot: CPU is billed only while it is in use.

DigitalOcean MicroVMs fits when

You want the lower list price: $0.078 against $0.126 an hour for 2 vCPU and 4 GiB.

More comparisons

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DigitalOcean Harness Runtime

DigitalOcean MicroVMs

What is different

Full comparison

Pricing

Limits

Platform

Developer

Trust

Hourly cost

Which one fits

DigitalOcean Harness Runtime fits when

DigitalOcean MicroVMs fits when

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