Sandboxer vs Tencent Cloud Agent Runtime (Agent Sandbox)

Tencent Cloud Agent Runtime's Agent Sandbox service is a managed, Tencent Cloud-hosted sandbox for agents, with code, browser and custom sandbox types, VM-level isolation and per-second CPU/memory billing in CNY. Sandboxer gives each sandbox a full Ubuntu 24.04 VM with Docker, nested KVM and coding agents preinstalled. Teams already on Tencent Cloud or serving users in China should look at Tencent; teams wanting a full Linux VM with agents ready to run fit Sandboxer.

Checked against Tencent Cloud Agent Runtime (Agent Sandbox)'s public docs on October 24, 2026. Sources are linked in the table and listed below.

At a glance

Sandboxer and Tencent Cloud Agent Runtime (Agent Sandbox) compared
Capability	Sandboxer	Tencent Cloud Agent Runtime (Agent Sandbox)
Isolation	microVM Cloud Hypervisor, its own kernel	VM-level isolation The product page says each agent task gets VM-level isolation; the docs do not name the hypervisor. Tencent also open-sources Cube Sandbox (KVM microVMs), but the docs do not say the hosted service runs it.
Full Linux with root	Ubuntu 24.04, sudo, systemd
Docker inside	Preinstalled
Nested virtualization (/dev/kvm)
Pause and resume with memory	Running processes come back	partial Pause and resume are documented (20 paused instances per account per region by default); the pause page does not say whether memory and processes are kept. The snapshot API has an optional flag to include memory state.
Fork a sandbox	Copy-on-write disk copy that boots fresh	partial A sandbox snapshot API exists (optionally including memory); the docs read do not say whether new sandboxes can be created from a snapshot.
HTTPS URL per port	Private with a token, or public	Ports 1-65535 reachable at {port}-{sandbox-id}.{region}.tencentags.com, authenticated with an access token; anonymous public access is not described.
Longest session	No limit on paid plans Auto-stop is up to 30 days or off	default 5 min timeout; no maximum stated Timeout is settable; instances marked Persistent are exempt from timeout reclamation.
Billing	Per second, flat rate per size Stopped sandboxes are free	per second, CPU + memory (CNY) CNY 0.000081 per core-second and CNY 0.000025 per GiB-second; paused instances pay only for storage; 15 GiB of system disk free while running.
GPUs
Self-host or open source		The hosted service is Tencent Cloud only. Tencent separately publishes Cube Sandbox as open source (Apache-2.0) for self-hosting.
Regions	US East (Virginia) and EU Central (Finland)	Tencent Cloud regions (per-region quotas) Quotas apply per region and access domains are per region (e.g. ap-guangzhou); prices do not vary by region. A full region list was not found.

= not documented publicly.

Where Tencent Cloud Agent Runtime (Agent Sandbox) is strong

Per-second billing for CPU and memory, with compute charges stopping while a sandbox is paused.
Accessible through SDK, CLI, MCP and REST API, and compatible with community open-source sandbox protocols.
Runs inside Tencent Cloud with fine-grained role control over which cloud resources a sandbox can reach.

Where Sandboxer differs

Tencent lists prices in CNY per core-second and GiB-second; Sandboxer sells fixed sizes in USD per second with monthly plans.
Tencent's default timeout is 5 minutes (Persistent instances exempt); Sandboxer sandboxes on a paid plan can run with no time limit.
Tencent's docs do not state root, Docker or nested KVM; Sandboxer documents all three in a full Ubuntu 24.04 VM.
Tencent offers browser, mobile and benchmark sandbox types out of the box; Sandboxer ships one general VM with coding agents installed.

Pick Tencent Cloud Agent Runtime (Agent Sandbox) if

You already run on Tencent Cloud or need to serve users in mainland China.
You want ready browser, mobile or benchmark (SWE-bench, OSWorld) sandboxes rather than a general VM.
You need short-lived sandboxes billed by the second at fine-grained CPU and memory sizes.

Pick Sandboxer if

You need a full Ubuntu VM with root, systemd, Docker and nested KVM.
You want coding agents (Claude Code, Codex, OpenCode and others) preinstalled and driven through a prompt API.
You want long-running sandboxes with no time limit and stop/resume that brings running processes back.

Sources

Products change. If something here is out of date, email hello@sandboxer.com and we'll fix it. Tencent Cloud Agent Runtime (Agent Sandbox) is a trademark of its owner. Sandboxer is an independent product and is not affiliated with Tencent Cloud Agent Runtime (Agent Sandbox).

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