Archal’s current offering is a service-testing platform. Its pricing guide says paid continuation is not yet available to self-service workspaces. Read the source ↗

Agent testing / Archal alternative

Evaluating an Archal alternative starts with the testing boundary

Archal’s current product creates isolated, stateful versions of external services for tests. It supplies provider-shaped interfaces and controlled state while your agent harness, model, evaluator, and CI remain yours. Sandbox0 supplies a Linux execution environment; replacing one does not automatically replace the other.

Start building Compare capabilities ↓

Reviewed 2026-10-18 · Published by the Sandbox0 team

When Archal fits

Choose Archal when the requirement is repeatable testing against isolated GitHub, Slack, Datadog, or other supported service interfaces, with seeded state, inspection, diffs, and reset. Check each provider’s supported surface rather than assuming complete upstream fidelity.

When to consider Sandbox0

Choose Sandbox0 for the machine that runs an agent, its tools, dependencies, and files over repeated tasks. A persistent RootFS does not supply Archal’s provider simulations or test-state catalog; the two services can occupy different parts of the same test system.

Capabilities

Archal and Sandbox0: what persists?

Feature comparison with documentation and verification status
Capability	Archal	Sandbox0
Environment and runtime lifetime	ArchalA returned lease sets ordinary, idle and absolute expiry; renewal cannot cross its hard boundary. Enforcement and effective limits depend on the product surface.View evidence ↗	Sandbox0ttl and hard_ttl default to 0 (disabled). Configure idle pause and deletion policies for the same persistent sandbox identity; an idle running sandbox still accrues compute charges.Read documentation →
Persistent files	ArchalProvider state across test API calls does not establish a customer-managed persistent filesystem.View evidence ↗	Sandbox0The writable RootFS survives successful checkpoints, including software, system configuration, dependencies, and user data.Read documentation →
Whole RootFS	ArchalThe reviewed product exposes provider-shaped testing environments, not a documented complete writable RootFS.View evidence ↗	Sandbox0Persistence extends beyond /workspace to paths such as /usr/local, /etc, and /home. Runtime tmpfs and virtual filesystems are excluded.Read documentation →
Release compute, keep state	ArchalRenew, reset, and destroy are service-test lifecycle operations, not a documented compute pause contract.View evidence ↗	Sandbox0Pause compute between tasks; resume on available capacity. Default resume starts fresh processes from the saved filesystem.Read documentation →
Memory and process state	ArchalState inspection and reset do not establish retained agent process memory.View evidence ↗	Sandbox0Experimental memory checkpoints can preserve compatible process state. Use memory: true on both pause and resume on a compatible deployment. A filesystem checkpoint alone does not preserve running processes.Read documentation →

Online RootFS growth

On growth-enabled images, Sandbox0 automatically expands the writable RootFS as free space runs low, within a configured sparse logical ceiling up to 64 TiB. Agent processes keep running. Growth is enabled in the qualified Cloud region; confirm activation for other regions. Existing images and snapshots retain their captured storage geometry. The ceiling is logical capacity, not preallocated host disk.

Archal’s service-state reset is a testing primitive, not a RootFS capacity feature. Sandbox0’s automatic online RootFS growth addresses the agent execution machine; it does not replace provider behavior simulation.

Files while compute is paused

Sandbox0's Files API reads persistent files without resuming compute. Filesystem-only pauses also permit edits; retained-memory pauses are read-only and reject mutations with 409. SSH, SFTP, file watching, and runtime-only mounts require running compute.

See paused file operations →

Stateful service data is different from a persistent Linux machine

An Archal sandbox groups one or more provider-shaped environments. State changes across API calls and can be inspected or reset to a declared baseline. That controlled service state is not evidence of a user-visible complete RootFS, general shell, or running-process checkpoint. Use Sandbox0 for execution only if you also retain or implement the service-testing layer your tests need.

Source 1 ↗

The returned lease governs renewal and expiry

Archal distinguishes ordinary expiry, idle expiry, and an absolute lifetime boundary in a returned lease. Renewal may rotate scoped credentials and cannot pass the hard boundary. Its guide warns that enforcement is not yet uniform across API and web surfaces, so a single fixed plan-wide maximum cannot be inferred from an example.

Source 1 ↗

Each ready environment has its own meter

Archal charges $0.10 per ready environment-minute, prorated by the second, from readiness to accepted teardown. A test with several environments accrues several meters; this is not a CPU-hour or whole-sandbox rate. Initial credit is one-time, and the current guide says self-service paid continuation is not yet enabled.

Source 1 ↗Source 2 ↗

Pricing

Compare billing models, then price your workload

CPU allocation, memory, billing minimums, disk, plan fees, and supported workload differ. These meters are not equal-performance machine quotes. Confirm region, resource units, and included allowances before estimating a total.

Archal

Pricing reviewed 2026-10-18

Base offering: $0 base price; Rate source ↗
Ready testing environment: $0.10 per environment-minute, prorated by the billed second; Each ready environment is billed separately; failed provisioning and cold start are free.; Rate source ↗
Initial trial credit: $20 one-time: $5 after signup and $15 after first ready sandbox; Not a recurring monthly allowance; verify eligibility.; Rate source ↗

Current primary pricing says paid continuation is disabled for self-service workspaces during rollout. Confirm available continuation before a production test plan. The meter pays for stateful service replicas, so it cannot be compared with raw CPU or RAM as an equivalent-compute price.

Check current Archal pricing ↗

Sandbox0

$0.015/GiB-hour compute (billed by the second at approximately $0.000004167/GiB-second), plus $0.02/GiB-month of retained incremental RootFS and memory checkpoint data. Shared base images and platform recovery retention are excluded; paused sandboxes accrue storage charges only.

Compute / GiB-hour: $0.015
Retained data / GiB-month: $0.02
Paused compute: $0.00

A 4 GiB agent, 100 running hours

$6.00 compute

4 GiB × 100 hours, billed by the second. Keeping 20 GiB of billable incremental data for a full billing month adds $0.40. CPU is derived from memory by the platform; choose a tier that fits your workload.

Understand storage billing →

Before migrating from Archal

Separate the agent execution machine from Archal’s service environments, baseline data, scoped credentials, diffs, and reset assertions.
If moving the runner, package its tools in a Sandbox0 template and keep required provider-test integrations or build an appropriate substitute.
Validate identical seeded tests and cleanup, then separately check runtime persistence, RootFS growth, paused file access, and per-environment testing spend.

Common questions

Is Sandbox0 a drop-in Archal replacement?

Evaluate API compatibility and product scope. These products serve different core workflows, so a change may require a different architecture.

Does keeping files also keep a running agent?

Filesystem state and volatile process state are separate. Sandbox0 requires explicit compatible memory checkpoints to preserve running processes; its default filesystem resume starts fresh processes.

Sources and review scope

The Boat team's Battleships directory is the discovery source. References below describe the product and plan discussed on this page. Check current availability, regional terms and billing units before migrating. Where the cited material does not establish a capability or price, the comparison identifies that uncertainty.

Battleships research record ↗docs.archal.ai/introduction ↗docs.archal.ai/sandboxes/lifecycle-usage ↗docs.archal.ai/pricing-usage ↗Sandbox0 RootFS capacity →

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