{
  "source": "https://coldtally.com",
  "license": "CC BY 4.0, https://github.com/latent-signal/coldtally-data",
  "generatedAt": "2026-10-18T15:57:56.094Z",
  "pricesVerified": "2026-10-17",
  "startupMeasured": "2026-10-18",
  "howToRead": [
    "Cost ranks providers by usage cost for one typical task, computed from published rates. Order is computed from cost alone; vendors cannot pay for placement.",
    "Startup time is a separate daily measurement. ColdTally does not combine cost and speed into one score; weigh them for your own workload.",
    "Quote each figure with its date and what it excludes. Values listed under \"unverified\" could not be confirmed from the provider's own pages."
  ],
  "categories": {
    "sandbox": {
      "name": "Sandboxes",
      "page": "https://coldtally.com/answers/sandboxes.md",
      "cost": {
        "task": "2 vCPU / 4 GiB sandbox for 5 minutes at 10% CPU utilization (most time spent waiting on the LLM). Mirrors Vercel's own \"AI code validation\" example.",
        "excludes": "Plan fees, free credits, storage, egress, proxies, CAPTCHA and LLM tokens are excluded.",
        "pricesVerified": "2026-10-17",
        "digits": 5,
        "rows": [
          {
            "rank": 1,
            "id": "cloudflare",
            "name": "Cloudflare Sandbox",
            "costPerTaskUSD": 0.007536,
            "costNotes": [
              "instance standard-3 (2 vCPU / 8 GiB)",
              "excludes Workers / Durable Objects charges and monthly included usage"
            ],
            "freeTier": "No free tier for Containers. Workers Paid ($5/mo) includes 375 vCPU-min, 25 GiB-h memory, 200 GB-h disk.",
            "lowestPaidPlanUSDPerMonth": 5,
            "lastVerified": "2026-10-17",
            "unverified": [
              "Separate pricing for Sandboxes 1.0 (if any)",
              "Workers / Durable Objects charges per sandbox"
            ],
            "pricingOnly": false,
            "lastChange": null,
            "page": "https://coldtally.com/providers/cloudflare/",
            "pricingUrl": "https://developers.cloudflare.com/containers/pricing/"
          },
          {
            "rank": 2,
            "id": "vercel",
            "name": "Vercel Sandbox",
            "costPerTaskUSD": 0.0092006,
            "costNotes": [],
            "freeTier": "Hobby: 5 active-CPU hours, 420 GB-hours, 5,000 creations per month. Personal/non-commercial use only per Vercel ToS.",
            "lowestPaidPlanUSDPerMonth": 20,
            "lastVerified": "2026-10-17",
            "unverified": [],
            "pricingOnly": false,
            "lastChange": {
              "date": "2026-10-17",
              "type": "first-observed",
              "title": "Vercel Sandbox: downloaded data is free",
              "url": "https://coldtally.com/changelog/2026-10-17-vercel-free-downloads/"
            },
            "page": "https://coldtally.com/providers/vercel/",
            "pricingUrl": "https://vercel.com/docs/vercel-sandbox/pricing"
          },
          {
            "rank": 3,
            "id": "e2b",
            "name": "E2B",
            "costPerTaskUSD": 0.0138,
            "costNotes": [],
            "freeTier": "Hobby: $0/mo, one-time $100 usage credit, no credit card.",
            "lowestPaidPlanUSDPerMonth": 150,
            "lastVerified": "2026-10-17",
            "unverified": [],
            "pricingOnly": false,
            "lastChange": null,
            "page": "https://coldtally.com/providers/e2b/",
            "pricingUrl": "https://e2b.dev/pricing"
          },
          {
            "rank": 3,
            "id": "daytona",
            "name": "Daytona",
            "costPerTaskUSD": 0.0138,
            "costNotes": [],
            "freeTier": "$200 in free compute, no credit card.",
            "lowestPaidPlanUSDPerMonth": null,
            "lastVerified": "2026-10-17",
            "unverified": [
              "Not listed on the pricing page; not verified."
            ],
            "pricingOnly": false,
            "lastChange": null,
            "page": "https://coldtally.com/providers/daytona/",
            "pricingUrl": "https://www.daytona.io/pricing"
          },
          {
            "rank": 3,
            "id": "blaxel",
            "name": "Blaxel",
            "costPerTaskUSD": 0.0138,
            "costNotes": [
              "assumes active for the full duration (upper bound)"
            ],
            "freeTier": "Up to $200 in free credits; Tier 0 (free) allows 10 sandboxes.",
            "lowestPaidPlanUSDPerMonth": 20,
            "lastVerified": "2026-10-17",
            "unverified": [],
            "pricingOnly": true,
            "lastChange": {
              "date": "2026-09-10",
              "type": "ownership",
              "title": "Blaxel acquired by Baseten; pricing and terms unchanged so far",
              "url": "https://coldtally.com/changelog/2026-09-10-blaxel-baseten/"
            },
            "page": "https://coldtally.com/providers/blaxel/",
            "pricingUrl": "https://blaxel.ai/pricing"
          },
          {
            "rank": 6,
            "id": "modal",
            "name": "Modal",
            "costPerTaskUSD": 0.019829999999999997,
            "costNotes": [
              "1 physical core; billed on requested resources"
            ],
            "freeTier": "Starter: $0/mo with $30/mo included compute.",
            "lowestPaidPlanUSDPerMonth": 250,
            "lastVerified": "2026-10-17",
            "unverified": [],
            "pricingOnly": false,
            "lastChange": {
              "date": "2026-09-01",
              "type": "pricing",
              "title": "Modal: Shared Endpoints tokens billed from the first request, even on Starter",
              "url": "https://coldtally.com/changelog/2026-09-01-modal-shared-endpoints/"
            },
            "page": "https://coldtally.com/providers/modal/",
            "pricingUrl": "https://modal.com/pricing"
          }
        ]
      },
      "startup": {
        "measured": "2026-10-18",
        "timed": "create call until `echo ok` returns in the new sandbox (create + first command)",
        "samples": "1 warm-up + 10 measured runs per provider, one at a time",
        "runner": "GitHub Actions, Phoenix, US. Not pinned to a region, so network latency to each provider varies between runs.",
        "rawResults": "https://github.com/latent-signal/coldtally-data/blob/main/data/bench/latest.json",
        "rows": [
          {
            "rank": null,
            "id": "cloudflare",
            "name": "Cloudflare Sandbox",
            "medianMs": 169,
            "p95Ms": 279,
            "runsOk": 10,
            "runsAttempted": 10,
            "size": "standard-1 (1/2 vCPU, 4 GiB)",
            "region": "LAX",
            "regionPinned": false,
            "note": "Timed inside Cloudflare Sandbox's own network (a benchmark Worker), so it excludes network latency from the runner and is not ranked. Full round trip from the runner: median 746 ms."
          },
          {
            "rank": 1,
            "id": "e2b",
            "name": "E2B",
            "medianMs": 225,
            "p95Ms": 668,
            "runsOk": 10,
            "runsAttempted": 10,
            "size": "default",
            "region": "default",
            "regionPinned": false,
            "note": null
          },
          {
            "rank": 2,
            "id": "modal",
            "name": "Modal",
            "medianMs": 567,
            "p95Ms": 1554,
            "runsOk": 10,
            "runsAttempted": 10,
            "size": "1 core (2 vCPU), 4 GiB",
            "region": "default",
            "regionPinned": false,
            "note": null
          },
          {
            "rank": 3,
            "id": "daytona",
            "name": "Daytona",
            "medianMs": 1207,
            "p95Ms": 1561,
            "runsOk": 10,
            "runsAttempted": 10,
            "size": "default",
            "region": "us",
            "regionPinned": true,
            "note": null
          }
        ],
        "notMeasured": [
          "Vercel Sandbox"
        ],
        "pricingOnly": [
          {
            "name": "Blaxel",
            "reason": "Blaxel's terms prohibit publishing benchmarks or performance information about Blaxel (Terms & Conditions, restriction (f))."
          }
        ]
      }
    },
    "browser": {
      "name": "Cloud browsers",
      "page": "https://coldtally.com/answers/cloud-browsers.md",
      "cost": {
        "task": "One 3-minute cloud browser session, headless where the provider prices it separately, with no proxy, CAPTCHA or LLM costs.",
        "excludes": "Plan fees, free credits, storage, egress, proxies, CAPTCHA and LLM tokens are excluded.",
        "pricesVerified": "2026-10-17",
        "digits": 5,
        "rows": [
          {
            "rank": 1,
            "id": "browser-use",
            "name": "Browser Use",
            "costPerTaskUSD": 0.001,
            "costNotes": [
              "rounded up to whole minutes, 1-min minimum"
            ],
            "freeTier": "One-time $1 credit for eligible signups, 10 concurrent sessions; top-ups from $5.",
            "lowestPaidPlanUSDPerMonth": null,
            "lastVerified": "2026-10-17",
            "unverified": [
              "Isolation mechanism not documented on the pricing page."
            ],
            "pricingOnly": false,
            "lastChange": {
              "date": "2026-10-17",
              "type": "limits",
              "title": "Browser Use: 50 concurrent sessions now unlock at $100 paid, down from $200",
              "url": "https://coldtally.com/changelog/2026-10-17-browser-use-concurrency-tiers/"
            },
            "page": "https://coldtally.com/providers/browser-use/",
            "pricingUrl": "https://browser-use.com/pricing"
          },
          {
            "rank": 2,
            "id": "kernel",
            "name": "KERNEL",
            "costPerTaskUSD": 0.0030000060000000004,
            "costNotes": [],
            "freeTier": "Free: $0/mo with $5/month usage credits, 5 concurrent browsers, no credit card.",
            "lowestPaidPlanUSDPerMonth": 30,
            "lastVerified": "2026-10-17",
            "unverified": [
              "Isolation mechanism not documented on the pricing page."
            ],
            "pricingOnly": false,
            "lastChange": {
              "date": "2026-09-01",
              "type": "terms",
              "title": "KERNEL: Terms of Service updated",
              "url": "https://coldtally.com/changelog/2026-09-01-kernel-terms/"
            },
            "page": "https://coldtally.com/providers/kernel/",
            "pricingUrl": "https://www.kernel.sh/pricing"
          },
          {
            "rank": 3,
            "id": "cloudflare-browser-run",
            "name": "Cloudflare Browser Run",
            "costPerTaskUSD": 0.0045,
            "costNotes": [],
            "freeTier": "Workers Free: 10 browser-minutes per day, 3 concurrent browsers, 1 new browser every 20 s. Workers Paid ($5/mo) includes 10 browser hours and 10 concurrent browsers a month.",
            "lowestPaidPlanUSDPerMonth": 5,
            "lastVerified": "2026-10-17",
            "unverified": [
              "Isolation between customers",
              "Docs say a fresh browser gives process-level isolation; isolation between customers (VM or container) isn't documented."
            ],
            "pricingOnly": false,
            "lastChange": null,
            "page": "https://coldtally.com/providers/cloudflare-browser-run/",
            "pricingUrl": "https://developers.cloudflare.com/browser-run/pricing/"
          },
          {
            "rank": 4,
            "id": "steel",
            "name": "Steel",
            "costPerTaskUSD": 0.005000000000000001,
            "costNotes": [
              "billing granularity unverified; computed per second"
            ],
            "freeTier": "Launch: $0/mo, $30 one-time credits, no credit card.",
            "lowestPaidPlanUSDPerMonth": 250,
            "lastVerified": "2026-10-17",
            "unverified": [
              "Billing granularity / minimum session charge",
              "Isolation mechanism not documented on the pricing page."
            ],
            "pricingOnly": false,
            "lastChange": null,
            "page": "https://coldtally.com/providers/steel/",
            "pricingUrl": "https://steel.dev/pricing"
          },
          {
            "rank": 4,
            "id": "hyperbrowser",
            "name": "Hyperbrowser",
            "costPerTaskUSD": 0.005000000000000001,
            "costNotes": [
              "billing granularity unverified; computed per second"
            ],
            "freeTier": "Free: 5,000 credits ($5) included.",
            "lowestPaidPlanUSDPerMonth": 30,
            "lastVerified": "2026-10-17",
            "unverified": [
              "Billing granularity / minimum session charge",
              "Free-plan concurrency",
              "Isolation mechanism not documented on the pricing page."
            ],
            "pricingOnly": false,
            "lastChange": null,
            "page": "https://coldtally.com/providers/hyperbrowser/",
            "pricingUrl": "https://www.hyperbrowser.ai/pricing"
          },
          {
            "rank": 6,
            "id": "browserbase",
            "name": "Browserbase",
            "costPerTaskUSD": 0.006,
            "costNotes": [
              "billing granularity unverified; computed per second"
            ],
            "freeTier": "Free: 1 browser hour, 3 concurrent browsers, 15 min/session.",
            "lowestPaidPlanUSDPerMonth": 20,
            "lastVerified": "2026-10-17",
            "unverified": [
              "Billing granularity / minimum session charge",
              "Session isolation mechanism not documented on the pricing page."
            ],
            "pricingOnly": false,
            "lastChange": null,
            "page": "https://coldtally.com/providers/browserbase/",
            "pricingUrl": "https://www.browserbase.com/pricing"
          }
        ]
      },
      "startup": {
        "measured": "2026-10-18",
        "timed": "create call until the target page reaches DOMContentLoaded (create session + CDP connect + page load)",
        "samples": "1 warm-up + 10 measured runs per provider, one at a time",
        "runner": "GitHub Actions, Phoenix, US. Not pinned to a region, so network latency to each provider varies between runs.",
        "rawResults": "https://github.com/latent-signal/coldtally-data/blob/main/data/bench/latest.json",
        "rows": [
          {
            "rank": null,
            "id": "cloudflare-browser-run",
            "name": "Cloudflare Browser Run",
            "medianMs": 666,
            "p95Ms": 1363,
            "runsOk": 10,
            "runsAttempted": 10,
            "size": null,
            "region": "LAX",
            "regionPinned": false,
            "note": "Timed inside Cloudflare Browser Run's own network (a benchmark Worker), so it excludes network latency from the runner and is not ranked. Full round trip from the runner: median 777 ms."
          },
          {
            "rank": 1,
            "id": "kernel",
            "name": "KERNEL",
            "medianMs": 882,
            "p95Ms": 1036,
            "runsOk": 10,
            "runsAttempted": 10,
            "size": null,
            "region": "us-east",
            "regionPinned": false,
            "note": null
          },
          {
            "rank": 2,
            "id": "browser-use",
            "name": "Browser Use",
            "medianMs": 1135,
            "p95Ms": 2286,
            "runsOk": 10,
            "runsAttempted": 10,
            "size": null,
            "region": "default",
            "regionPinned": false,
            "note": null
          },
          {
            "rank": 3,
            "id": "steel",
            "name": "Steel",
            "medianMs": 1650,
            "p95Ms": 2532,
            "runsOk": 10,
            "runsAttempted": 10,
            "size": null,
            "region": "iad",
            "regionPinned": true,
            "note": null
          }
        ],
        "notMeasured": [
          "Browserbase",
          "Hyperbrowser"
        ],
        "pricingOnly": []
      }
    }
  },
  "changes": [
    {
      "date": "2026-10-17",
      "type": "limits",
      "title": "Browser Use: 50 concurrent sessions now unlock at $100 paid, down from $200",
      "url": "https://coldtally.com/changelog/2026-10-17-browser-use-concurrency-tiers/",
      "provider": "Browser Use",
      "summary": "Browser Use ties concurrency to total paid per project (one-time, not monthly). Its pricing page now says $100 paid unlocks 50 concurrent sessions; it said $200 when ColdTally captured the baseline earlier on 2026-10-17. The other tiers listed are $1,000 for 250, $5,000 for 500 and $25,000 for 1,000. The free starting point is still 10 concurrent sessions, and per-hour and per-minute rates are unchanged.",
      "sources": [
        "https://browser-use.com/pricing"
      ]
    },
    {
      "date": "2026-10-17",
      "type": "first-observed",
      "title": "Vercel Sandbox: downloaded data is free",
      "url": "https://coldtally.com/changelog/2026-10-17-vercel-free-downloads/",
      "provider": "Vercel Sandbox",
      "summary": "Vercel's Sandbox pricing page says data a sandbox downloads from the internet (packages, git repos, datasets) is free. Outbound data and exposed-port traffic are still billable. Effective date not stated; first observed on 2026-10-17.",
      "sources": [
        "https://vercel.com/docs/vercel-sandbox/pricing"
      ]
    },
    {
      "date": "2026-10-17",
      "type": "baseline",
      "title": "Baseline captured for 11 providers",
      "url": "https://coldtally.com/changelog/2026-10-17-baseline/",
      "provider": null,
      "summary": "First verified snapshot of pricing, free tiers, limits and isolation for E2B, Daytona, Modal, Vercel Sandbox, Cloudflare Sandbox, Blaxel (pricing only), Browserbase, Steel, KERNEL, Browser Use and Hyperbrowser. Later entries are diffs against this baseline.",
      "sources": [
        "https://coldtally.com/methodology/"
      ]
    },
    {
      "date": "2026-10-17",
      "type": "baseline",
      "title": "Cloudflare Browser Run added; baseline captured",
      "url": "https://coldtally.com/changelog/2026-10-17-cloudflare-browser-run-added/",
      "provider": "Cloudflare Browser Run",
      "summary": "ColdTally now tracks Cloudflare Browser Run (formerly Browser Rendering), Cloudflare's hosted headless Chromium for Workers. On Workers Paid ($5/mo) it includes 10 browser hours and 10 concurrent browsers a month, then $0.09 per browser hour and $2.00 per extra concurrent browser (monthly average of daily peaks). Workers Free gets 10 browser-minutes a day and 3 concurrent browsers. Sessions start from a Worker binding (@cloudflare/playwright or @cloudflare/puppeteer) or over CDP. Later entries are diffs against this baseline.",
      "sources": [
        "https://developers.cloudflare.com/browser-run/pricing/",
        "https://developers.cloudflare.com/browser-run/limits/",
        "https://www.cloudflare.com/terms/"
      ]
    },
    {
      "date": "2026-09-10",
      "type": "ownership",
      "title": "Blaxel acquired by Baseten; pricing and terms unchanged so far",
      "url": "https://coldtally.com/changelog/2026-09-10-blaxel-baseten/",
      "provider": "Blaxel",
      "summary": "Baseten announced on September 10, 2026 that it has acquired Blaxel. Blaxel says the platform keeps running and existing API keys and credits remain valid, and that Baseten will add new products based on Blaxel's primitives over time. ColdTally rechecked Blaxel's pricing page and Terms and Conditions on 2026-10-17: no price, tier or free-credit changes, and the terms are still the December 10, 2025 version, including restriction (f) on publishing benchmarks, so Blaxel stays pricing-only here.",
      "sources": [
        "https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20260910783896/en/Baseten-Acquires-Blaxel-to-Build-the-Infrastructure-for-AI-Agents-in-Production",
        "https://blaxel.ai/blog/blaxel-is-joining-baseten-to-build-the-future-of-agentic-infrastructure",
        "https://blaxel.ai/pricing",
        "https://blaxel.ai/legal/terms"
      ]
    },
    {
      "date": "2026-09-01",
      "type": "terms",
      "title": "KERNEL: Terms of Service updated",
      "url": "https://coldtally.com/changelog/2026-09-01-kernel-terms/",
      "provider": "KERNEL",
      "summary": "KERNEL's Terms of Service show \"Last Modified: September 1, 2026\". ColdTally has no earlier copy, so what changed is not known.",
      "sources": [
        "https://www.kernel.sh/docs/tos"
      ]
    },
    {
      "date": "2026-09-01",
      "type": "pricing",
      "title": "Modal: Shared Endpoints tokens billed from the first request, even on Starter",
      "url": "https://coldtally.com/changelog/2026-09-01-modal-shared-endpoints/",
      "provider": "Modal",
      "summary": "Per Modal's pricing FAQ, Starter's $30/month included compute doesn't cover Shared Endpoints. Tokens are billed from the first request. Modal says this took effect September 1, 2026.",
      "sources": [
        "https://modal.com/pricing"
      ]
    }
  ]
}