# Northflank vs Runloop: Northflank is 79% cheaper per agent run Runtime Cloud (withruntime.com) is 42% cheaper than both for agents that wait. Runloop costs far more. ## Which is better, Northflank or Runloop? It depends on whether you need raw compute or a benchmarking service. For agents that spend their time on model calls, Runtime bills measured CPU, so the 1,000-run job costs $0.64 there, against $1.11 on Northflank and $5.33 on Runloop. Pick Northflank for sandboxes that keep every CPU busy, where it is cheapest, for GPUs billed by the second, or for your own cloud account. Pick Runloop for evaluation and RL rollouts on your own workload, with stated SOC 2, HIPAA and GDPR readiness. ## At a glance | | Northflank | Runloop | Runtime | | --------------------- | ----------------------------------------------------- | ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- | -------------------------------------------------------------- | | Isolation | microVMs for CPU workloads, gVisor for GPU workloads | 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 time limit; seconds to weeks | Billed while initializing, running, suspending, resuming | No time limit: runs while it works, or `persistent` | | Idle | Runs until you stop it | Suspend keeps the disk; processes restart; Pro plan | Pause keeps files, memory and processes while you have credit | | Plan fee | None published for compute | Basic free; Pro $250 a month plus usage | None; prepaid credit from $10 | | Free start | 2 services, 2 jobs and 1 database free | $50 of credit, no card; 3 devboxes running at the same time | 100 free hours of a 1 GB machine in the first 30 days, 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. Runloop's CPU rate is about six and a half times Northflank's ($0.108 against $0.01667), and its memory rate is 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 | $230.07 | | 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. ``` Northflank 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 $1.11 Runloop 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 $5.33 Runtime 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 not included. ## Which one to pick - **Northflank** for long-running sandboxes that keep every CPU busy, for L4, A100 and H100 GPUs billed by the second, or for sandboxes placed in your own cloud account alongside your other services. - **Runloop** for an evaluation platform: models evaluated on your own workload, RL rollouts, 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](/glossary/sandbox-fork) that keep memory, and guardrails such as a daily spending limit per key. Benchmarks run here too: [agent evals and SWE-bench](/use-cases/agent-evals-and-swe-bench). ## Moving a long-lived sandbox There is no direct import for either; follow [map the calls](/docs/migrate#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: ```ts check import { Sandbox } from "withruntime"; // Runs while credit lasts; restart() brings it back after a stop. const server = await Sandbox.create({ persistent: true, maxTotalCostMicros: 50_000_000, // at most $50 over its life }); await server.update({ persistent: false }); // back to an ordinary sandbox await server.stop(); ``` ```python check from withruntime import Sandbox server = Sandbox.create(persistent=True, max_total_cost_micros=50_000_000) server.update(persistent=False) # back to an ordinary sandbox server.stop() ``` To compare on your own numbers, run `npx withruntime compare --from northflank` or `--from runloop`. It reprices what you ran. The one instruction in [migration](/docs/migrate) lets a coding agent do the port on a branch and test it on the free usage. See also [Runtime vs Northflank](/docs/northflank-alternative) and [Runtime vs Runloop](/docs/runloop-alternative). ## Runtime Cloud 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 25 October 2026. A first sandbox is one `npx withruntime login` away, on the free usage. Long-lived sandboxes from Northflank or Runloop move with the [migration guide](/docs/migrate). ## Sources Rates checked 25 October 2026. Northflank's pricing and sandbox pages and Runloop's pricing page and devbox sizes reread 26 October 2026. - [Northflank pricing](https://northflank.com/pricing), [Northflank sandboxes](https://northflank.com/product/sandboxes), [Sandboxes on Northflank](https://northflank.com/docs/v1/application/sandboxes/sandboxes-on-northflank) - [Runloop pricing](https://www.runloop.ai/pricing), [Devbox sizes](https://docs.runloop.ai/docs/devboxes/configuration/sizes), [Devbox lifecycle](https://docs.runloop.ai/docs/devboxes/lifecycle) - Runtime [pricing](/docs/pricing) and [JavaScript SDK](/docs/javascript#keep-a-sandbox-running) Facts on this page were checked on 26 October 2026.