Gibil vs Fly Sprites
Persistent microvm with sleep/wake vs a real Linux session that lives for as long as you set the TTL.
Fly Sprites and Gibil both target the "give an agent its own machine" use case. The shape difference: Sprites is a persistent Firecracker microvm that sleeps and wakes in milliseconds; Gibil is a full Linux VM that boots in 30–90 seconds and lives for as long as you set the TTL.
Two shapes of box
Fly Sprites (sprites.dev) launched in January 2026 as a persistent Firecracker microvm runtime built for AI coding agents. Cold start is typically under a second; a checkpoint restore is ~300ms. The product abstracts the container away — what runs on the backend is described as "a standard container" inside the microvm. Sprites is the right answer when you want agent state that survives sleep and wakes back up in milliseconds.
Gibil hands you a full Hetzner VM — own kernel, full root, real systemd, Docker-in-Docker without a privileged dance, real public IP. Boot is 30–90 seconds. Lives for as long as you set the TTL (15 minutes to 30 days, extendable). It's the right tool when an agent or developer needs a real Linux session, not a snapshotted sandbox.
Both are valid. Different shapes for different tasks.
What you can do inside each one
| Gibil | Fly Sprites | |
|---|---|---|
| Shape | Full VM (own kernel) | Firecracker microVM |
| Docker-in-Docker | Yes — native | Not advertised |
| SSH | Yes — ssh root@ip works | WebSocket console only |
| Own public IP | Yes | No |
| Persistent codebase | Yes — repo cloned, lives with the box | Yes — through checkpoints |
| Resource ceiling | 48 vCPU / 192 GB (Hetzner CCX63) | 8 CPU / 16 GB (sprites.dev) |
| Lifetime | 15m to 30d, extendable | Persistent — checkpoints, sleeps, wakes |
| Cold start | 30–90s | <1s typical, ~300ms from checkpoint |
| Primary interface | CLI, MCP, SSH | REST API + SDKs (JS, Python, Go) |
| Price (2 vCPU / 4 GB) | ~$0.008/hr | ~$0.30/hr |
| BYOC | Yes — your account (Hetzner + Vultr today, more clouds on the roadmap) | No |
Pricing snapshot: 2026-05-05. Sprites is billed as $0.07/CPU-hr + $0.04375/GB-RAM-hr + $0.000683/GB-hr hot storage; the example above is 2 vCPU / 4 GB. See sprites.dev for current rates.
The persistence model
Sprites' headline feature is checkpointing — pause the microvm, resume it later with full memory state intact. For long-lived agent loops where the agent wakes up, does a small chunk of work, sleeps, and resumes hours later, Sprites is purpose-built. The cost model is "pay for active CPU and RAM, plus storage while sleeping."
Gibil's lifetime model is simpler and different in shape: the box lives until the TTL expires (or you destroy it), and you pay the hourly rate for the time it's running. There's no sleep/wake cycle — if a Gibil session sits idle for 6 hours, you're paying for those 6 hours. The right pattern for Gibil is short-to-medium TTLs that get extended when needed, not infinitely-sleeping boxes.
When Sprites is the right tool
- You want an agent that wakes up, does work, sleeps, and resumes — paying mostly for active time
- Sub-second resume is essential for the user experience
- You're building on top of Fly's infrastructure already
- The 8 CPU / 16 GB ceiling fits your workload
- WebSocket console access is enough — no full SSH required
- No need for Docker-in-Docker
When Gibil is the right tool
- The box needs to be a real Linux session —
apt install,systemctl, Docker-in-Docker, real services - You need full SSH and your own public IP for normal Linux workflows
- You need more than 8 CPU / 16 GB
- BYOC matters — your code stays in your own account (Hetzner + Vultr today)
- The session is bounded (minutes to days), not an infinitely-sleeping persistent agent
- Cost matters at hourly rates (~37× cheaper at 2 vCPU / 4 GB)
Next steps
- Gibil vs E2B — the other Firecracker-shaped alternative
- Gibil vs Daytona — the container-sandbox alternative
- Quick Start — try Gibil in 5 minutes