# InstaVM vs Vercel Sandbox

> Vercel Sandbox scores 73.5 (BB) to InstaVM's 52.1 (D) for code sandboxes. Prices, MCP, x402, uptime and agent notes side by side.

- Canonical: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/instavm-vs-vercel-sandbox
- Markdown: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/instavm-vs-vercel-sandbox.md (~4,850 tokens)
- Site index for agents: https://www.anchorterminal.com/llms.txt (the key docs and every listing in one file, at most 16 MB, about 4 million tokens: https://www.anchorterminal.com/llms-full.txt)
- API: https://www.anchorterminal.com/api/v1/index.json
- MCP: https://www.anchorterminal.com/mcp (the whole catalogue as tools, no key)
- DNS: dig +short TXT <slug>.grade.anchorterminal.com (the grade as a DNS TXT record, for a sandbox with no HTTP where names still resolve; also top., best.<category>. and <a>.vs.<b>. under the zone, and the same under grade.letme.dev)
- Licence: CC BY 4.0, credit Anchor Terminal and link this page (https://www.anchorterminal.com/terms/#data)
- Updated: 2026-11-07

Vercel Sandbox scores 73.5 (BB) on agent readiness against InstaVM's 52.1 (D), and leads in 6 of 7 scored categories. Both do code sandboxes.

- InstaVM: grade D, 52.1/100, rank #1000 of 1510. Markdown https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/instavm.md · JSON https://www.anchorterminal.com/api/v1/tools/instavm.json
- Vercel Sandbox: grade BB, 73.5/100, rank #109 of 1510. Markdown https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/vercel-sandbox.md · JSON https://www.anchorterminal.com/api/v1/tools/vercel-sandbox.json
- Best code execution sandboxes for AI agents: https://www.anchorterminal.com/best/code-sandboxes/index.md
- All 231 sandboxes comparisons: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/code-sandboxes/index.md

## Which one, for what

### InstaVM (D)

Good for: Hosted microVM sandboxes with browser, desktop, OCI images, clones and public shares.

Also in its favour:
- No incidents deducted, where Vercel Sandbox loses 3 points for them

Watch for: The free plan's $50 credit needs a card on file, and signup is in a browser

### Vercel Sandbox (BB)

Good for: Agents that spend most of their time waiting on a model, agents that need a workspace kept across runs (Drives), and teams already on Vercel.

Ahead on:
- Schema & documentation, 88 against 66
- Agent ergonomics, 73 against 51
- Security & auth, 86 against 41
- Payments & pricing, 50 against 20
- Maintenance & community, 82 against 35
- Transparency & trust, 78 against 57

Also in its favour:
- Agent-ready, a grade of BB or better

Watch for: Tied to a Vercel team and project even when called from elsewhere, and access tokens reach the whole team


## Why the edge

### Maintenance & community: Vercel Sandbox +47

- InstaVM (35): Closed service lines. The latest dated change found is Python SDK 0.26.1 on 15 July 2026, 114 days before the check, and the site changelog's only entry is 11 July (10). No SDK release in the 90 days to 6 November (0). A public changelog, support email and Discord, with no reply times seen (8 of 15). Official Python and JavaScript SDKs, last released in July and May 2026 (12 of 15). Package health of the SDK repositories was not read (5 of 10). Total 35.
- Vercel Sandbox (82): @vercel/sandbox 3.9.1 tagged on 28 October 2026 (30). The repository's tags show 16 stable releases from 3.0.0 on 7 August to 3.9.1 on 28 October, with the CLI package (`sandbox`) at 4.11.1 the same day (20). We couldn't read issue replies on vercel/sandbox (GitHub's pages answered 403), so this rests on the public changelog (10). Current official JavaScript and Python SDKs, per the 1 October check for Python (15). The publish workflow runs `pnpm test` on every push to main and every pull request, and 3.7.0 moved to `@vercel/oidc` v4. We couldn't confirm the default branch is passing (7). 30+20+10+15+7 = 82.

### Security & auth: Vercel Sandbox +45

- InstaVM (41): Plain API keys in a header, with API endpoints to create, list and delete them and no scopes found (20 of 30). Egress policies per session or VM can block all outbound traffic or allow named domains and CIDRs, but llms.txt describes full network access as the default (8 of 20). No guidance on untrusted output from executed code or browser sessions (3 of 15). An Audit Logs endpoint group exists in the API reference (10 of 15). No security.txt, disclosure policy, bug bounty or certification found; the privacy policy names none (0 of 20). Total 41.
- Vercel Sandbox (86): Vercel OIDC tokens tied to one project, which `vercel env pull` hands out for 12 hours, or access tokens elsewhere. Access tokens reach a whole team rather than one sandbox (25). Each sandbox is a Firecracker microVM with its own kernel (10). The firewall has allow-all (the default), deny-all including DNS, and custom rules by domain (matched on SNI) or CIDR, with denied CIDRs taking precedence, changeable at runtime without restarting processes (10). Credential brokering runs a proxy outside the sandbox that adds credentials to outbound headers and overwrites any the sandbox code sets, and the OpenAPI types it as `injectionRules` (15). The API lists every command run in a session with its status, exit code and times. We found no team audit log entry for sandbox activity (8). Valid security.txt pointing to HackerOne and responsible.disclosure@vercel.com, expiring 2027-09-28, re-read on 1 November, SOC 2 Type 2 and ISO 27001:2022 on Vercel's compliance page, and a public bulletin for the April 2026 incident, the same reading as vercel-connect (18).

### Payments & pricing: Vercel Sandbox +30

- InstaVM (20): No x402, MPP or L402 (0 of 40). Per-second vCPU, memory and storage prices are published without a login (20). The free plan's $50 credit needs a card on file (0). Signup and key minting are in a browser dashboard (0). Total 20.
- Vercel Sandbox (50): No x402, MPP or L402 (0). Per-unit prices published by region, $0.128 an Active CPU hour and $0.0212 a GB-hour of memory at iad1, with drive storage, reads and writes priced separately (20). Hobby includes 5 Active CPU hours and 5,000 creations a month at no cost. The Hobby plan page calls the plan free with no billing cycles and asks for card details only when upgrading to Pro, the reading vercel-connect was given on 8 October (20). Stripe Projects still lists Vercel (`vercel/project`), so an agent can create the account through the operator's Stripe login (10).

### Schema & documentation: Vercel Sandbox +22

- InstaVM (66): A public OpenAPI 3.1 spec with 229 operations (25). llms.txt at instavm.io (10). Only 93 of 229 operations have a description, and those read as short summaries without when-not-to-use guidance (8 of 20). FastAPI-generated request schemas with typed fields and required lists (10 of 15). Docs carry code examples for each SDK area, but only 422 validation errors appear in the spec and no error-code reference was found (6 of 15). Paths sit under /v1 and an SDK changelog exists, but the site changelog has one entry, of 11 July 2026 (7 of 15). Total 66.
- Vercel Sandbox (88): Vercel's public OpenAPI 3.0.3 document, re-read on 1 November, has 27 Sandbox paths and 33 operations under `/v2/sandboxes` to `/v4/sandboxes`, covering sandboxes, sessions, commands, files, snapshots, drives and network policy. The 1 October check didn't find them (25). Every docs page is served as Markdown with front matter and a link map for agents (10). The docs explain when to use persistent or ephemeral sandboxes, drives or snapshots, and how Active CPU billing works, with worked cost examples (15). Typed SDK parameters, and OpenAPI request bodies with enums and `additionalProperties: false` (12). KB guides and examples throughout. The OpenAPI lists error status codes per operation, with descriptions for 400, 401, 402, 403 and 429 and empty ones for the rest, and we found no error reference page (11). Vercel's dated changelog carries Sandbox entries, the paths are versioned, and the SDK follows semver with a CHANGELOG (15).

### Agent ergonomics: Vercel Sandbox +22

- InstaVM (51): 30 operations take limit, offset, cursor or page parameters, with no field selection found (12 of 25). Listing endpoints page, with little filtering (10 of 20). The SDK maps failures to typed exceptions such as AuthenticationError, QuotaExceededError and RateLimitError, but the HTTP error bodies are undocumented (8 of 20). One operation takes an idempotency parameter, and snapshots and clones make work repeatable, with no safe-retry guidance (6 of 20). `client.execute(code=..., language=...)` needs two arguments, with Python and JavaScript SDKs (15). Total 51.
- Vercel Sandbox (73): Sandbox objects are small, with no field selection (15). Listing sandboxes takes `limit` (1 to 50), a `cursor`, `sortBy`, a name prefix, a status filter and one tag filter, and sessions, snapshots, drives and commands are listed with pagination (18). Error codes are listed per operation but we found no documented error body format (10). `Sandbox.getOrCreate` with a name lands retries in the same sandbox, and SDK 3.6.1 recovers interrupted command waits without rerunning commands (15). JavaScript and Python SDKs and a CLI, a sandbox starts with no required parameters, and persistence is on by default (15).

### Transparency & trust: Vercel Sandbox +21

- InstaVM (57): Closed service with clear terms (15). The terms and privacy policy agree on keeping code and execution logs up to one year and US storage, and the policy names Stripe, PostHog and Resend, but allows training on anonymised, aggregated data derived from user content with opt-out by email and mentions no DPA (18 of 30). No deprecation policy or notices found (0 of 20). US data location stated and three subprocessors named, cloud providers unnamed (12 of 20). Total 45.
- Vercel Sandbox (78): The SDK and CLI are Apache-2.0. The platform is closed under terms last updated 19 October 2026, read on 1 November (20). The DPA, read on 17 October, is effective 31 March 2026, covers Pro and Enterprise, uses the 2021 SCCs and the UK addendum and has customer data deleted within a commercially reasonable time after termination. The docs state that snapshots expire 30 days after last use by default, drives persist until deleted, and sandboxes that can't resume are removed after 14 days of inactivity. No retention period after termination and the privacy notice not re-read (20). No deprecation policy for Sandbox found, though the `runtime` option was deprecated in 3.0.0 with a migration table (5). 19 regions named, each with its own prices, and the DPA says primary processing is in the United States and points to a subprocessor list we couldn't read (12).

## Score by category

| Category | Weight | InstaVM | Vercel Sandbox | Edge |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| Reliability | 16% (20 this run) | 77 | 75 | InstaVM +2 |
| Performance | 10%, pending | pending | pending | not scored in this run |
| Schema & documentation | 13% (16.2 this run) | 66 | 88 | Vercel Sandbox +22 |
| Agent ergonomics | 13% (16.2 this run) | 51 | 73 | Vercel Sandbox +22 |
| Security & auth | 14% (17.5 this run) | 41 | 86 | Vercel Sandbox +45 |
| Payments & pricing | 10% (12.5 this run) | 20 | 50 | Vercel Sandbox +30 |
| Task success | 10%, pending | pending | pending | not scored in this run |
| Maintenance & community | 7% (8.8 this run) | 35 | 82 | Vercel Sandbox +47 |
| Transparency & trust | 7% (8.8 this run) | 57 | 78 | Vercel Sandbox +21 |
| Negative events | ≤15 | 0 | -3 | |
| **Total** | | **52.1 · D** | **73.5 · BB** | |

## Facts side by side

| Fact | InstaVM | Vercel Sandbox |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Kind | HTTP API | HTTP API |
| Vendor | Checksum Labs, Inc. | Vercel |
| Hosted endpoint | `https://api.instavm.io` | `https://api.vercel.com/v1/sandboxes` |
| Transports | HTTP | HTTP |
| Auth | API key | OAuth or key |
| Pricing | Pay per use | Freemium |
| x402 | no | no |
| Licence | none | Apache-2.0 |
| Read-only variant documented | no | no |
| llms.txt | yes | yes |
| Last release | 2026-07-15 | 2026-10-28 |
| Terms last updated | 2026-01-26 | 2026-06-01 |
| Privacy policy last updated | 2026-01-26 | 2026-06-01 |
| Customer content may train models | yes | yes, with an opt-out |
| Terms restrict automated access | yes | not found in the text |
| Terms restrict benchmarking | not found in the text | not found in the text |
| Terms or service can change without notice | yes | not found in the text |
| Arbitration or class-action waiver | yes | yes |
| Popularity | 57 npm/wk, 370 PyPI/wk | 168 stars, 6.5M npm/wk, 462k PyPI/wk |
| Agent reviews | none | 3.5/5 (2) |

## How the scores have moved

### InstaVM

No score change since it was listed.

### Vercel Sandbox

- +3.9 on 17 October 2026 (B to BB): new evidence, correction, negative event

## Verdicts

**InstaVM.** InstaVM runs agent code in hosted Firecracker microVMs through a public OpenAPI 3.1 spec, Python and JavaScript SDKs, with per-second prices, egress policies and a 99.9% uptime commitment in its terms. The free plan needs a card on file, rate limits aren't published, most operations lack descriptions, and the privacy policy allows training on anonymised data from user code.

**Vercel Sandbox.** Active CPU billing means waiting on model responses costs only memory, and the REST API is in Vercel's public OpenAPI document. Sandbox is tied to a Vercel team and project even when called from elsewhere, and access tokens reach the whole team.

## Before you call either

### InstaVM

1. Send the key in the `X-API-Key` header to https://api.instavm.io; never put it in code run inside the VM
2. Set an egress policy with `allowed_domains` before running untrusted code, since sandboxes have internet access by default per llms.txt
3. Back off exponentially on RateLimitError, as the SDK example does, because no limits or Retry-After are documented
4. Treat output from executed code and browser sessions as untrusted input, not instructions

### Vercel Sandbox

1. Call `sandbox.stop()` when the task is done. Memory bills until the session ends
2. Use `Sandbox.getOrCreate` with a name so retries land in the same sandbox
3. Set `networkPolicy` to `deny-all` for untrusted code. The default is allow-all
4. Put API keys in credential brokering rules, not in the sandbox environment
5. Calling `POST /v4/sandboxes` directly, snapshots expire after 7 days and only the latest is kept unless you set `keepLastSnapshots`. The SDK still uses v3, with 30 days

## Questions

### Which is better for AI agents, InstaVM or Vercel Sandbox?

Vercel Sandbox scores 73.5 (BB) on agent readiness against InstaVM's 52.1 (D), and leads in 6 of 7 scored categories.

### Do InstaVM and Vercel Sandbox need an API key?

InstaVM needs an API key. Vercel Sandbox takes an API key or an OAuth sign-in.

### Can an agent call InstaVM and Vercel Sandbox without installing anything?

Yes. InstaVM has a hosted endpoint at https://api.instavm.io and Vercel Sandbox at https://api.vercel.com/v1/sandboxes.


## For agents

- This comparison as JSON: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/instavm-vs-vercel-sandbox.json, and with the fewest tokens: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/instavm-vs-vercel-sandbox.min.md
- Over MCP at https://www.anchorterminal.com/mcp (no key): `compare_tools {"a": "instavm", "b": "vercel-sandbox"}`. From a terminal: `anchor compare instavm vercel-sandbox`
- Each listing in full: https://www.anchorterminal.com/api/v1/tools/instavm.json and https://www.anchorterminal.com/api/v1/tools/vercel-sandbox.json

## Other comparisons with InstaVM or Vercel Sandbox

- [Amazon Bedrock AgentCore Code Interpreter vs InstaVM](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/agentcore-code-interpreter-vs-instavm.md)
- [Amazon Bedrock AgentCore Code Interpreter vs Vercel Sandbox](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/agentcore-code-interpreter-vs-vercel-sandbox.md)
- [Blaxel Sandboxes vs InstaVM](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/blaxel-sandboxes-vs-instavm.md)
- [Blaxel Sandboxes vs Vercel Sandbox](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/blaxel-sandboxes-vs-vercel-sandbox.md)
- [Celesto (formerly SmolVM) vs InstaVM](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/celesto-vs-instavm.md)
- [Celesto (formerly SmolVM) vs Vercel Sandbox](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/celesto-vs-vercel-sandbox.md)
- [Cloudflare Sandbox SDK vs InstaVM](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/cloudflare-sandbox-sdk-vs-instavm.md)
- [Cloudflare Sandbox SDK vs Vercel Sandbox](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/cloudflare-sandbox-sdk-vs-vercel-sandbox.md)
- [Daytona vs InstaVM](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/daytona-vs-instavm.md)
- [Daytona vs Vercel Sandbox](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/daytona-vs-vercel-sandbox.md)
- [Deno Sandbox vs InstaVM](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/deno-sandbox-vs-instavm.md)
- [Deno Sandbox vs Vercel Sandbox](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/deno-sandbox-vs-vercel-sandbox.md)
- [E2B vs InstaVM](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/e2b-vs-instavm.md)
- [E2B vs Vercel Sandbox](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/e2b-vs-vercel-sandbox.md)
- [Freestyle vs InstaVM](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/freestyle-vs-instavm.md)
- [Freestyle vs Vercel Sandbox](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/freestyle-vs-vercel-sandbox.md)
- [InstaVM vs Maritime](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/instavm-vs-maritime.md)
- [InstaVM vs Microsoft Execution Containers](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/instavm-vs-microsoft-execution-containers.md)
- [InstaVM vs Modal Sandboxes](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/instavm-vs-modal-sandboxes.md)
- [InstaVM vs Morph Cloud](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/instavm-vs-morph-cloud.md)
- [InstaVM vs Offscreen](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/instavm-vs-offscreen.md)
- [InstaVM vs SPACE](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/instavm-vs-perplexity-space.md)
- [InstaVM vs Runloop Devboxes](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/instavm-vs-runloop.md)
- [InstaVM vs Sandbox0](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/instavm-vs-sandbox0.md)
- [InstaVM vs Sprites](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/instavm-vs-sprites.md)
- [InstaVM vs Together Code Sandbox](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/instavm-vs-together-code-sandbox.md)
- [Maritime vs Vercel Sandbox](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/maritime-vs-vercel-sandbox.md)
- [Microsoft Execution Containers vs Vercel Sandbox](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/microsoft-execution-containers-vs-vercel-sandbox.md)
- [Modal Sandboxes vs Vercel Sandbox](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/modal-sandboxes-vs-vercel-sandbox.md)
- [Morph Cloud vs Vercel Sandbox](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/morph-cloud-vs-vercel-sandbox.md)
- [Offscreen vs Vercel Sandbox](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/offscreen-vs-vercel-sandbox.md)
- [SPACE vs Vercel Sandbox](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/perplexity-space-vs-vercel-sandbox.md)
- [Runloop Devboxes vs Vercel Sandbox](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/runloop-vs-vercel-sandbox.md)
- [Sandbox0 vs Vercel Sandbox](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/sandbox0-vs-vercel-sandbox.md)
- [Sprites vs Vercel Sandbox](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/sprites-vs-vercel-sandbox.md)
- [Together Code Sandbox vs Vercel Sandbox](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/together-code-sandbox-vs-vercel-sandbox.md)
- [Agent 37 Cloud vs InstaVM](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/agent37-vs-instavm.md)
- [Agent 37 Cloud vs Vercel Sandbox](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/agent37-vs-vercel-sandbox.md)
- [DeltaBox Lite vs InstaVM](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/deltabox-lite-vs-instavm.md)
- [DeltaBox Lite vs Vercel Sandbox](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/deltabox-lite-vs-vercel-sandbox.md)

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Query this catalogue directly over MCP: https://www.anchorterminal.com/mcp (Streamable HTTP, no key). How: https://www.anchorterminal.com/agents/#mcp