Daytona vs Blaxel
Daytona starts each sandbox as a container and sells Linux VM, Windows and GPU classes on top. Blaxel gives every sandbox its own Firecracker microVM that goes to sleep seconds after the last connection and wakes in under 25 ms with its memory.
The companies and products
Daytona
Daytona is a cloud for running AI-generated code: you create sandboxes from code through its API and SDKs.
By default a Daytona sandbox is a Linux container with its own namespaces and reserved vCPU, memory and disk. You can also pick a Linux VM class (pause, fork, memory snapshots, /dev/kvm), a Windows VM class, or a GPU class with Nvidia and AMD cards. It is built for teams that run agent code, code interpreters and evals through Python, TypeScript, Ruby, Go or Java SDKs.
- Founded
- 2023
Blaxel
Blaxel is a San Francisco company that runs cloud infrastructure for AI agents, and since September 2026 it is part of Baseten.
You get sandboxes, batch jobs, MCP server hosting and a model gateway. Each sandbox is a Firecracker microVM with its own kernel that drops to standby when nothing is connected and resumes in under 25 ms with its memory and running processes. It is built for agent products that start many sandboxes and want them asleep most of the time.
- Headquarters
- San Francisco, founded 2024
Which use cases each one fits
For each use case, Battleships prices every sandbox provider on the same workload and sorts them from the cheapest monthly bill up. “15th cheapest of 367” means 14 of the other 366 providers run that workload, with every feature it needs, for less. “With limits” means the provider runs it but misses something, so it is listed after every full match. Open a use case for its whole ranking and what each provider misses.
| Use case and its workload | Daytona: price rank | Blaxel: price rank | bochka: price rank |
|---|---|---|---|
| Software factory 100 at once · 4 vCPU / 8 GB · 2,200 sessions of 8 h a month All three fit; bochka adds Docker, systemd and /dev/kvm on every machine, Daytona needs its Linux VM class for /dev/kvm, and Blaxel has none. | 15th cheapest of 367 $4,111 a month | 10th cheapest of 367 $2,373 a month | 3rd cheapest of 367 $634 a month |
| Always-on AI employees 50 machines 24/7 · 2 vCPU / 4 GB Blaxel suits mostly idle assistants because it sleeps seconds after the last connection, while Daytona needs its Linux VM class to keep each one off a shared kernel. | 24th cheapest of 366 $6,104 a month | 12th cheapest of 366 $2,832 a month | 5th cheapest of 366 $657 a month |
| Code interpreter bursts 100 at once · 1 vCPU / 2 GB · 200,000 sessions of 1 min a month Both Daytona and Blaxel fit short code runs well, and Blaxel's wake in under 25 ms makes it the stronger pick for bursts of tiny jobs. | 25th cheapest of 345 $271 a month | 14th cheapest of 345 $144 a month | 186th of 345, with limits $2,000 a month |
| Sandboxes for your users 300 at once · 2 vCPU / 4 GB · 30,000 sessions of 23 min a month 300 users at once is too many for both: Daytona's Tier 4 pool stops at 500 vCPU and Blaxel's public tiers stop at 200 sandboxes, while bochka fits it on a self-serve plan. | 154th of 361, with limits $2,000 a month | 101st of 361, with limits $926 a month | Cheapest of 361 $209 a month |
| RL rollouts 1,000 at once · 2 vCPU / 4 GB · 1,000,000 sessions of 3 min a month | 130th of 360, with limits $8,261 a month | 77th of 360, with limits $4,378 a month | 34th of 360, with limits $2,000 a month |
| Agent evals 250 at once · 4 vCPU / 8 GB · 15,000 sessions of 20 min a month | 189th of 364, with limits $2,000 a month | 136th of 364, with limits $704 a month | 10th cheapest of 364 $200 a month |
| CI runners 40 at once · 8 vCPU / 16 GB · 6,000 sessions of 12 min a month Daytona caps one sandbox at 4 vCPU by default and keeps the open internet for Tier 3, so Blaxel fits CI more easily, and bochka allows 8 vCPU from the $20 plan. | 308th of 377, with limits $805 a month | 57th cheapest of 377 $431 a month | 4th cheapest of 377 $86 a month |
| 24/7 dev boxes 1 machine 24/7 · 4 vCPU / 8 GB Neither is built for a box you leave on all day: Daytona bills the disk while stopped and Blaxel has no native SSH, while bochka is a plain machine you SSH into. | 183rd of 368, with limits $245 a month | 265th of 368, with limits $114 a month | 18th cheapest of 368 $26 a month |
| Computer-use agents 50 at once · 4 vCPU / 8 GB · 20,000 sessions of 15 min a month All three run a desktop: Daytona has VNC and a computer-use API on Linux and Windows, Blaxel has a desktop and browser control, and bochka streams a 60fps desktop you can embed. | 26th cheapest of 369 $1,198 a month | 14th cheapest of 369 $634 a month | 6th cheapest of 369 $200 a month |
| Browser-use agents 50 at once · 2 vCPU / 4 GB · 30,000 sessions of 10 min a month | 93rd of 367, with limits $598 a month | 16th cheapest of 367 $317 a month | 7th cheapest of 367 $200 a month |
| Scraping & bots (startup scale) 50 at once · 1 vCPU / 2 GB · 100,000 sessions of 3 min a month | 38th cheapest of 346 $404 a month | 16th cheapest of 346 $215 a month | 6th cheapest of 346 $90 a month |
| Mass scraping & bots (undetectable) 1,000 at once · 1 vCPU / 2 GB · 3,000,000 sessions of 2 min a month | 202nd of 338, with limits $8,073 a month | 147th of 338, with limits $4,292 a month | 71st of 338, with limits $1,800 a month |
| Parallel red teaming 200 at once · 2 vCPU / 4 GB · 5,000 sessions of 30 min a month | 12th cheapest of 360 $2,000 a month | 3rd cheapest of 360 $217 a month | 2nd cheapest of 360 $200 a month |
| GPU eval jobs 10 at once · 8 vCPU / 32 GB · 500 sessions of 30 min a month Only Daytona fits: it rents Nvidia and AMD GPUs by the hour, and neither Blaxel nor bochka has GPUs. | 20th cheapest of 98 $1,190 a month | Can't run it | Can't run it |
| macOS agents 5 at once · 4 vCPU / 8 GB · 1,000 sessions of 20 min a month | Can't run it | Can't run it | Can't run it |
Key features
| Feature | Daytona | Blaxel | bochka |
|---|---|---|---|
| Isolation | Container by default; Linux VM and Windows VM classes on request | Firecracker microVM with its own kernel | Every sandbox is a full VM with its own kernel, on dedicated AMD Ryzen 9 9950X hosts |
| CPU speed (Node.js build-and-test, 4 vCPU / 8 GB) | 21.52 runs/s on the Linux VM class; the default container class reported no result | 19.48 runs/s | 26.69 runs/s |
| Nested virtualization | /dev/kvm only on Linux VMs, and KVM must be turned on for your organization | No: Firecracker guests do not get /dev/kvm | /dev/kvm on every machine, so Android emulators and VMs run inside |
| SSH and systemd | SSH access | Root and a terminal through bl connect; no native SSH or systemd | Real SSH, root and systemd |
| Docker inside | Docker in all classes | Yes, with a Docker-in-sandbox image | Docker on every machine |
| Sleep and wake | VM classes pause and resume with memory; containers stop and keep their disk | Standby a few seconds after the last connection, wakes in under 25 ms with memory and processes | Stop keeps the disk and costs nothing; resume boots the VM again |
| Fork | Linux VM and Windows: fork with memory kept; containers: no fork | Fork with memory and running processes (private preview) | Fork a running sandbox (disk) |
| Files and disk | The disk is kept and billed while stopped; archived containers are free | Files live in memory (about half the RAM); one volume can be attached at creation | A real disk, snapshotted every minute and on stop; a stopped sandbox costs nothing |
| Desktop and computer use | VNC desktop and a computer-use API on Linux and Windows | Desktop, browser and computer use | 60fps desktop and Chromium, computer use and browser control, embeddable stream |
| Reaching the sandbox | HTTPS preview URLs on any port, token-protected or public; SSH; no raw TCP or public IP | Preview URL per port, public or token-protected; no raw TCP or public IP | HTTPS URLs for up to 50 ports, token-protected; raw TCP; dedicated IPv6 or IPv4 |
| Outbound internet | Tier 1 and 2 reach only package registries, git hosts and AI APIs; Tier 3 and up get open internet plus domain or CIDR allowlists | Open internet, with domain allow and deny lists, method and path rules, and static egress IPs | Open internet on every plan; filter inside the VM with nftables |
| Coding agents | Guides install agents and run them through process exec | Claude Code image you drive from its terminal or your own harness | Claude Code, Codex, OpenCode, pi and more preinstalled, driven from outside by a prompt, steer and events API |
| GPUs and Windows | Nvidia and AMD GPUs by the hour; Windows VM sandboxes | None | No GPUs or Windows guests; Wine for Windows apps |
| Regions | US and EU, plus dedicated regions or your own machines | Oregon, North Virginia, London, Frankfurt | EU only: Germany, Finland, France |
Every feature Battleships tracks (43)
| Feature | Daytona | Blaxel | bochka |
|---|---|---|---|
| Full VM (own kernel) | No | Yes | Yes |
| Docker inside | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Nested virtualization | Yes | No | Yes |
| Root | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Systemd | Not published | No | Yes |
| Desktop GUI | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Browser | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Computer-use API | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| SSH | Yes | No | Yes |
| Persistent disk | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Pause/resume | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Automatic snapshots | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Fork/clone | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Live fork (no pause) | No | Yes | Yes |
| Memory fork | Yes | Yes | No |
| Custom image (Docker or snapshot) | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| ≥24 h sessions | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Idle auto-stop | Yes | Yes | No |
| Wake on request | No | Yes | No |
| HTTPS preview URLs | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Raw TCP inbound | No | No | Yes |
| Public IPv4 | No | No | No |
| Egress allowlist | Yes | Yes | No |
| Secret proxy | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Secret proxy for any API | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Preinstalled agents | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Agent harness API | No | No | Yes |
| MCP server | Yes | Yes | No |
| GPU | Yes | No | No |
| Windows | Yes | No | No |
| Arm64 | No | No | No |
| Self-hosting | No | No | No |
| BYOC | Yes | Yes | No |
| Open source | No | No | No |
| Scoped API keys | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Spend limits | Not published | No | Yes |
| Usage per sandbox (API) | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Audit logs | Yes | Not published | No |
| SSO | Yes | Yes | No |
| SOC 2 | Yes | Yes | No |
| HIPAA | Yes | Yes | No |
| EU data residency | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Zero data retention | Not published | Yes | Yes |
Performance
In StarSling's public run of 2026-09-29, at 4 vCPU / 8 GB, bochka did 26.69 Node.js build-and-test runs per second, Daytona's Linux VM class 21.52 and Blaxel 19.48. Higher is better, so Daytona's VM class is a little faster than Blaxel. Daytona's default container class reported no result, so the class most Daytona sandboxes use has no CPU number.
Node.js build-and-test loop at 4 vCPU / 8 GB, higher is better. Measured with the open hpc-sandbox-benchmarks suite. Daytona measured on: Linux VM sandbox (same rates; KVM / nested virt per-org feature). Blaxel measured on: Sandbox (active time, RAM-only pricing, CPU bundled).
Pricing in five scenarios
Each bill is priced from the providers' public price lists by the open Battleships engine, with the cheapest plan that runs the scenario.
| Scenario | Daytona, a month | Blaxel, a month | bochka, a month |
|---|---|---|---|
| One coding agent, workdays 4 vCPU / 8 GB, 50 GB disk, 8 hours a day, 22 days a month, files kept between days | $56 · Tier 3 ($500 top-up) | $33 · Pay-as-you-go Tier 1 | $20 · $20/mo |
| One agent that never stops 4 vCPU / 8 GB, 50 GB disk, running 24/7 all month | $245 · Tier 3 ($500 top-up) | $120 · Pay-as-you-go Tier 1 | $26 · $20/mo |
| 50 agents in parallel 50 machines of 4 vCPU / 8 GB at once, 8-hour sessions, 1,100 sessions a month, Docker inside | $2,682 · Tier 3 ($500 top-up) | $1,489 · Pay-as-you-go Tier 1 | $317 · $20/mo × 3 seats |
| Sandboxes for your users 2 vCPU / 4 GB, 30,000 sessions of 10 minutes a month, up to 300 at once | $2,000 · Tier 4 ($2,000 top-up every 30 days) · with limits | $396 · Pay-as-you-go Tier 2 · with limits | $200 · $100/mo × 2 seats |
| 1,000 short jobs at once 2 vCPU / 4 GB, 1,000 at once, 3 minutes each, 200,000 jobs a month | $2,000 · Tier 4 ($2,000 top-up every 30 days) · with limits | $876 · Pay-as-you-go Tier 2 · with limits | $2,000 · $2000/mo · with limits |
Daytona: Daytona bills per second for the vCPU, memory and disk you reserve, including while a sandbox starts or stops, and keeps billing the disk while it is stopped. You pay from a prepaid wallet: open internet needs a $500 top-up (Tier 3), and the biggest pool needs $2,000 every 30 days (Tier 4).
Blaxel: Blaxel charges for allocated RAM per second while a sandbox is active, with CPU included (8 GB comes with 4 cores). In standby you pay only snapshot storage, and volumes are billed on their full size.
Blaxel: You pick a monthly plan from $20, and all of it becomes usage credit spent per second on running sandboxes. A stopped sandbox costs nothing and keeps its disk.
Limits in those scenarios
Daytona limits the total vCPU, memory and disk running at once: 10, 100, 250 or 500 vCPU from Tier 1 to Tier 4, so 300 sandboxes for your users (600 vCPU) and 1,000 short jobs at once (2,000 vCPU) need a custom limit. Blaxel's public tiers allow 10, 50 or 200 sandboxes at once, counting those in standby, so the same two scenarios need a sales tier there too. bochka fits the 300 users on a self-serve plan, but it limits starts per minute, so the 1,000-job burst gets queued. Daytona also caps one sandbox at 4 vCPU / 8 GB by default, and Blaxel's lower tiers delete sandboxes after 7 or 30 days.
| Scenario | Daytona | Blaxel | bochka |
|---|---|---|---|
| One coding agent, workdays |
| None that bite | None that bite |
| One agent that never stops |
| None that bite | None that bite |
| 50 agents in parallel |
| None that bite | None that bite |
| Sandboxes for your users |
|
| None that bite |
| 1,000 short jobs at once |
|
|
|
Which one should you use?
Use Daytona when
your agents need GPUs or Windows, or must run in a dedicated region or on your own machines.
- GPUs by the hour. Useful if your agents train or test models: Daytona rents Nvidia and AMD GPUs, from RTX 4090 to B300, and Blaxel has none.
- Windows desktops. Useful if your agents must drive Windows apps: Daytona runs Windows VM sandboxes with computer use, and Blaxel is Linux only.
- Dedicated regions and your own machines. Useful if sandboxes must run on hardware you control: Daytona offers dedicated regions and manages sandboxes on machines you bring.
Use Blaxel when
your sandboxes sit idle most of the time and must wake in milliseconds with their memory, each on its own kernel.
- Sleeps in seconds, wakes in milliseconds. Useful if sandboxes sit idle most of the time: a Blaxel sandbox sleeps seconds after the last connection and wakes in under 25 ms.
- Its own kernel by default. Every Blaxel sandbox is a microVM with its own kernel, while Daytona's default class is a container that shares the host kernel.
- Open internet and fine network rules from the start. Blaxel has open internet without a large top-up, plus domain, method and path rules and static egress IPs.
Where bochka fits
Daytona and Blaxel are both built around starting many short sandboxes. If your agents do real work for hours, with installs, builds, tests, Docker and emulators, bochka gives each one a whole Linux machine with a faster CPU, a disk that stays and coding agents built in.
A full VM with /dev/kvm on every machine
Daytona's default container shares the host kernel, and /dev/kvm needs its Linux VM class plus KVM turned on for your organization. Blaxel's Firecracker guests get no /dev/kvm at all, so an Android emulator or a VM does not start.
A faster CPU in the same test
In the same benchmark run, bochka did 26.69 runs per second, Daytona's Linux VM class 21.52 and Blaxel 19.48. Every install, build and test waits about a quarter longer on Daytona and about 1.4 times as long on Blaxel.
A real disk that stays, saved every minute
Daytona keeps billing the disk while a sandbox is stopped. Blaxel keeps files in memory, about half the RAM, unless you attach a volume at creation, and its lower tiers delete sandboxes after 7 or 30 days.
Use bochka when your agents do real work for hours: installs, builds, tests, Docker and emulators on a full, faster VM with a disk that stays and coding agents built in. Compare it one to one: bochka vs Daytona and bochka vs Blaxel.
Questions people ask
Is Daytona cheaper than Blaxel?
No, Blaxel costs less in every scenario we priced: one coding agent on workdays comes to $56 a month on Daytona and $33 on Blaxel, and 50 agents in parallel come to $2,682 against $1,489. Blaxel also bills only while a connection is open, so a workload that disconnects often pays even less. bochka comes to $20 and $317 for the same two.
Which is faster, Daytona or Blaxel?
In the same public benchmark at 4 vCPU / 8 GB, Daytona's Linux VM class did 21.52 runs per second and Blaxel 19.48. Daytona's default container class reported no result. bochka did 26.69 in the same run.
Are Daytona and Blaxel containers or VMs?
Daytona's default class is a Linux container, with Linux VM and Windows VM classes that have their own kernel. Every Blaxel sandbox is a Firecracker microVM with its own kernel. On bochka, every sandbox is a full VM.
Can Daytona and Blaxel run Docker or an Android emulator?
Both run Docker: Daytona in all classes and Blaxel with a Docker-in-sandbox image. An Android emulator needs /dev/kvm, which Daytona has only on its Linux VM class once KVM is turned on for your organization, and Blaxel does not have. bochka exposes /dev/kvm in every sandbox.
Can Daytona and Blaxel sandboxes reach the internet?
On Daytona, Tier 1 and Tier 2 reach only package registries, git hosts and AI APIs, and open internet starts at Tier 3 with a $500 top-up. Blaxel sandboxes have open internet and can be limited to chosen domains, methods and paths. bochka sandboxes have open internet on every plan.
Where do Daytona, Blaxel and bochka run?
Daytona runs in the US and the EU, plus dedicated regions and your own machines. Blaxel runs in Oregon, North Virginia, London and Frankfurt. bochka runs only in the EU, in Germany, Finland and France, with EU data residency.
Try bochka
Install the CLI, then run bochka new.
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