Features

Differently is an orchestration and resource-management layer. It does not run sandboxes itself: it decides where each one runs and keeps account of it. Its default private runtime is OpenSandbox, run by the operator; other pools can be any of the built-in provider adapters, from E2B and Daytona to the cloud providers’ sandbox services, or any service that speaks the adapter protocol.

What OpenSandbox provides

These come from the runtime. Differently exposes them through its own API when the pool behind a sandbox supports them.

Feature	Notes
Runtimes	Docker, Kubernetes, and Fast Sandbox (Firecracker microVMs managed by a per-node agent)
Lifecycle	Create and delete everywhere. Pause and resume keep memory on Docker and Fast Sandbox (a Fast Sandbox pause uploads a full checkpoint and takes minutes); stop and start keep the disk on Kubernetes, through a snapshot registry
Exec	Commands with env, cwd, timeouts, exit codes and streamed output; stdin is staged in a file the command reads
Files	Upload, download and list
Snapshots and fork	Disk snapshots and fork on Docker, on Fast Sandbox, and on Kubernetes through a snapshot registry; memory snapshots are not exposed yet
Port URLs and egress	Signed, time-limited port URLs through its ingress gateway, and per-pool egress (`none` or an allowlist) through its egress sidecar, both checked on Kubernetes
TTL backstop	OpenSandbox’s own timeout is set from the sandbox TTL at creation
Isolation	Containers on Docker and Kubernetes (shared kernel); a microVM per sandbox only on Fast Sandbox
License	Apache-2.0, self-hostable

Details, including what OpenSandbox does not offer: OpenSandbox pools and the OpenSandbox spike.

What Differently adds

OpenSandbox is a single-trust-domain runtime: one server-wide API key, no organizations, projects or quotas. Differently supplies the platform around it.

Feature	What it does
Multi-tenancy	Organizations, projects and scoped API keys; the OpenSandbox key stays in the control plane and never reaches tenants or sandboxes
Quotas and fair queueing	Usage derived from sandbox state, enforced atomically at admission, queued fairly across tenants
Policy-gated placement	Global, organization and project policies plus data classification decide which pools may run each sandbox; a request can only narrow them
Fail-closed external capacity	Registering an external provider authorizes nothing until policy explicitly allows it
One API across backends	OpenSandbox pools, 15 more provider adapters and custom plugins behind one HTTP contract, CLI and TypeScript, Python and Go SDKs
Idle auto-stop	Sandboxes left idle are stopped or paused and wake on the next call
Placement explanations	`GET /v1/sandboxes/{id}/placement` lists the pools considered, the ones rejected and why
Tamper-evident audit	Hash-chained audit events with a verify endpoint and JSON-lines export
Trust report	Endpoints, credentials by reference, external placements, admin actions, audit chain status and what Differently cannot prove
Reconciliation	The control plane reconciles its state against every backend
Self-hosted end to end	No hosted service, license server or telemetry; Postgres is the only production dependency

Compared to a single provider

Using one sandbox provider or one runtime directly is simpler to start with. These are the limits Differently is built to remove.

	Single provider or runtime	Differently
Where sandboxes can run	One runtime or one vendor’s cloud	Every pool you register, chosen per request
When that pool is full or down	Wait, fail, or change application code	Queue under quota, or overflow to another pool where policy allows
Switching providers	New SDK, new API, code changes	Change placement policy; application code stays the same
Who may use external capacity	Anyone holding the key	Only the tenants, classifications and requests policy allows
Tenancy and quotas	Per vendor account, or none (OpenSandbox: one key)	Organizations, projects, scoped keys and quotas across all pools
Data residency	Wherever the provider runs	`private-only` classification keeps work on your own pools
Knowing where work ran	Each provider’s own logs	One placement record, audit chain and trust report
Lock-in	The provider’s API and pricing	Apache-2.0 control plane you run, adapters you can write

What Differently does not do: it does not enforce isolation or egress itself. Those belong to the runtime behind each pool, and Differently reports what each pool declares. For the endpoint-by-endpoint comparison with other products, see feature parity and the competitive landscape.