Agent Computer platform
Give your agent a real computer.
ArcBox runs each agent on its own isolated machine — a full operating system with its own kernel, filesystem, and network — on a runtime built for it. Keep it for months, throw it away in seconds, or hand one to every CI job.
- Linux
- Windows
- macOS
- iOS
- Android
- ~22 ms
- snapshot restore
- ~50 ms
- warm create
- 1 kernel
- per environment
- 5
- operating systems
One machine, three lifetimes. Computer, Sandbox, and Runner are the same isolated environment kept for different lengths of time.
$ abctl computer create --os ubuntu-24.04 --cpus 4
cmp_7f3a ready in 612 ms
$ abctl computer snapshot cmp_7f3a --name before-migration
snap_04 disk 4.1 GiB · memory 1.2 GiB
$ abctl computer stop cmp_7f3a
stopped disk kept · no compute billed
$ abctl computer resume cmp_7f3a # nine days later
running same disk, same address
One control plane, thousands of machines. Every environment is a row in the same event stream, whichever form and whichever OS it runs.
- Changing state
- Running
- Stopped · disk kept
- Free capacity
Schematic — one cell per environment. 3 forms · 5 operating systems · 1 event stream · no polling.
$ abctl events --follow
- +00.000sbx_9c04created from snap_01 · 124 ms
- +00.118sbx_9c04ready agent attached
- +00.402cmp_7f3aexec make test
- +01.219sbx_2ab7destroyed ttl reached
- +01.640run_8123queued arcbox-ubuntu-24.04
- +02.005run_8123booted fresh image · 0.9 s
- +02.311cmp_41desnapshot disk 4.1 GiB · memory 1.2 GiB
- +02.884sbx_5f11created from python:3.12 · 48 ms
Five operating systems, stated plainly. Linux and Windows open in waves; macOS, iOS, and Android start with a conversation.
Open in waves — leave an address, then create them from the API and pay by the second.
Leased hardware and mobile capacity, planned with you before you build on it.
- --os macos-14macOSApple silicon hostsmacOS runs only on Apple hardware and each VM must be leased for at least 24 hours, so capacity is planned with you.Contact sales
- --os ios-17iOSSimulator · device labiOS environments are provisioned as long-lived Computers on macOS hosts; there is no disposable form.Contact sales
- --os android-14AndroidEmulator · x86-64 imagesAndroid environments run as emulators with snapshot restore; CI runners are not offered.Contact sales
Status reflects the track each OS is on, not a roadmap.
Every form, on every OSBuilt for agents
A machine, not a container. Every environment boots its own kernel, so the boundary is the hypervisor and not a permission prompt.
Integrate
Three lines to a machine.
The CLI, the SDKs, and the API expose the same four verbs on every OS.
- create
- from an OS, an image, or a snapshot
- exec
- run a command, stream the output
- snapshot
- disk and memory, named
- destroy
- now, or on a TTL
# a computer the agent keeps
abctl computer create --os ubuntu-24.04 --cpus 4
# cmp_7f3a ready in 612 ms
abctl computer exec cmp_7f3a -- \
git clone [email protected]:acme/api
abctl computer snapshot cmp_7f3a --name after-clone
# a sandbox that disappears
abctl sandbox create --from-image python:3.12 --ttl 900
# sbx_c21e ready in 48 ms
abctl sandbox run sbx_c21e -- python eval.pyWorks with
what you run
From the engineering blog
We publish the measurements. The claims on this page come from work we wrote up, numbers included.
The Balloon Is a Placebo: No Container Runtime Can Give Your Mac's RAM Back
We measured what actually happens when a Linux VM on macOS frees memory: nothing. Apple's balloon device doesn't release pages host-side, Apple's own container tool tells you to restart containers instead, and every serious runtime — Docker, Podman, OrbStack — is quietly engineering its way off Virtualization.framework because of it.
Read itWe Fixed UniFi's Slow PPPoE Performance by Offloading PPPoE to a Separate Device with Half-Bridge
UniFi gateways (UDM Pro/SE/Pro Max/Beast/EFG) ship with notoriously underpowered CPUs and has no hardware acceleration for PPPoE. Paired with a PPPoE-based ISP connection, the performance is dismal. So why not hand the PPPoE dialing off to a dedicated device and let the UniFi gateway focus on routing, IDS/IPS, and NAT while breaking past 5500 Mbps of throughput?
Read itArcBox Desktop public beta: the open-source alternative to OrbStack and Docker Desktop
ArcBox Desktop is an open-source Docker Desktop alternative for macOS, built with a Rust runtime and native SwiftUI.
Read itGive your agent a computer.
Linux and Windows open in waves — leave an address. For macOS, iOS, and Android, tell us what you are building.