Runtime

Northflank vs Runloop: pricing, isolation and limits

Both bill allocated CPU and memory while a sandbox runs, at very different rates. A 2 vCPU, 4 GB job: $1.11 on Northflank, $5.33 on Runloop.

For an agent that waits on a model, Runtime is 42% cheaper than Northflank and 88% cheaper than Runloop. The benchmark job, 1,000 one-minute runs of a 2 vCPU, 4 GiB sandbox, costs $1.11 on Northflank, $5.33 on Runloop and $0.64 on Runtime. Both rivals bill the CPUs a sandbox holds; Runtime bills the CPU time it uses. Rates checked 23 September 2026.

Estimated compute cost

42% less than Northflank88% less than Runloop

2 vCPUs · 4 GiB · 60 s a run · 20 CPU-seconds busy

1,000

Compute only, at list rates checked 23 September 2026 (Northflank pricing, Runloop pricing). Plan fees, network, taxes and free credits are left out. The worked example below shows the arithmetic.

At a glance

Northflank Runloop Runtime
Isolation Kata Containers and gVisor microVM, with a container inside Firecracker microVM, own kernel, every sandbox
CPU $0.01667 per allocated vCPU-hour $0.108 per CPU-hour while the devbox runs $0.025 per vCPU-hour of measured CPU, with a small floor
Memory $0.00833 per GB-hour $0.0252 per GB-hour $0.0075 per reserved GiB-hour
2 vCPU, 4 GB, an hour $0.0667 $0.3195 (MEDIUM, with 8 GB disk) $0.03125 waiting, $0.08 fully busy
Running time No forced limit; seconds to weeks Billed while initializing, running, suspending, resuming Leases up to an hour, extended as needed, or persistent
Idle Runs until you stop it Suspend keeps the disk; processes restart; Pro plan Pause keeps files, memory and processes, 1 to 365 days
Plan fee None published for compute Basic free; Pro $250 a month plus usage None; prepaid credit from $10
Free start 2 free services and 1 free database $50 of credit, no card; 3 devboxes running at once 50 sandbox hours, no card
Where it runs Its regions, or AWS, GCP, Azure, Oracle, Civo, Nebius Deploys into your cloud account; VPC on Enterprise Dedicated servers Runtime operates

Which is cheaper for a sandbox that runs all day?

Northflank, by a wide margin. Both bill every allocated CPU and GB for as long as the sandbox runs, but Runloop's CPU rate is about six and a half times Northflank's ($0.108 against $0.01667) and its memory rate about three times ($0.0252 against $0.00833). For one 2 vCPU, 4 GB sandbox left running for a 30-day month of 720 hours:

Provider An hour 720 hours
Northflank $0.0667 $48.00
Runloop MEDIUM $0.3195 $230.04
Runtime, waiting on a model $0.03125 $22.50
Runtime, both CPUs busy $0.08 $57.60

Runloop's figure leaves out the $250-a-month Pro plan, which suspend and resume need. An agent sandbox spends most of its hours waiting, and there Runtime is the cheapest: it bills the floor of a twentieth of a vCPU rather than two whole vCPUs.

Cost for the same job

Short runs instead of an all-day box: 1,000 of them, 60 seconds each, with 20 CPU-seconds of work, on 2 vCPU and 4 GiB. Northflank is sized at 4 GB; Runloop's MEDIUM devbox has 2 CPUs, 4 GB and 8 GB of disk.

TextNorthflank  CPU    1,000 × 60 s / 3,600 × 2 × $0.01667     = $0.556            Memory 1,000 × 60 s / 3,600 × 4 × $0.00833     = $0.555            Total                                             $1.11Runloop     CPU    1,000 × 60 s / 3,600 × 2 × $0.108       = $3.60            Memory 1,000 × 60 s / 3,600 × 4 × $0.0252      = $1.68            Disk   1,000 × 60 s / 3,600 × 8 × $0.00034236 = $0.05            Total                                             $5.33Runtime     CPU    1,000 × 20 s / 3,600 × $0.025           = $0.14            Memory 1,000 × 60 s / 3,600 × 4 × $0.0075      = $0.50            Total                                             $0.64

At 100,000 runs a month the totals are $111.10 on Northflank, $532.56 on Runloop and $63.89 on Runtime. With both CPUs busy for the whole minute, the order at the top changes: $1.11 on Northflank, $1.33 on Runtime, $5.33 on Runloop. When every CPU works all the time, Northflank's low allocated rate is the cheapest way to pay. Plan fees, idle storage, network, taxes and free allowances are left aside.

Which one to pick

  • Northflank for long-running sandboxes that keep every CPU busy, for L4, A100 and H100 GPUs by the hour, or for sandboxes placed in your own cloud account alongside your other services.
  • Runloop for a benchmarking platform: public suites such as SWE-Bench run for you, custom benchmarks built from your data, and stated SOC 2, HIPAA and GDPR readiness.
  • Runtime for agents that spend their time on model calls: 42% below Northflank and 88% below Runloop on the typical run, a Firecracker microVM per sandbox, pause and forks that keep memory, and guardrails such as a daily spending limit per key. Benchmarks run here too: agent evals and SWE-bench.

Moving a long-lived sandbox

There is no drop-in import for either; follow map the calls. A Northflank service kept up for weeks, or a Runloop devbox that never goes away, maps to a persistent Runtime sandbox with a cap on its lifetime spend:

TypeScriptimport { Sandbox } from "withruntime";// Runs while credit lasts; restart() brings it back after a stop.const server = await Sandbox.create({  funding: "paid",  persistent: true,  maxTotalCostMicros: 50_000_000, // at most $50 over its life});await server.update({ persistent: false }); // back to an ordinary leaseawait server.stop();
Pythonfrom withruntime import Sandboxserver = Sandbox.create(funding="paid", persistent=True, max_total_cost_micros=50_000_000)server.update(persistent=False)  # back to an ordinary leaseserver.stop()

To compare on your own numbers, npx withruntime compare --from northflank or --from runloop reprices what you ran. The one instruction in migration lets a coding agent do the port on a branch and test it on the free trial. See also Runtime vs Northflank and Runtime vs Runloop.

Sources

Rates checked 23 September 2026. Northflank's pricing and sandbox pages and Runloop's pricing page and devbox sizes reread 25 September 2026.

Facts on this page were checked on 25 September 2026.

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