GitHub Actions vs WarpBuild

WarpBuild does not replace GitHub Actions: your workflows stay on GitHub, and you change the runs-on label so jobs run on WarpBuild's machines instead of GitHub's. GitHub's runners come with included minutes, free public-repo runs and GPU options, while WarpBuild adds unlimited Linux and Windows concurrency, disk snapshots and runners in your own cloud.

The companies and products

GitHub Actions

GitHub Actions is GitHub's CI/CD service: workflows in your repository run as jobs on runners that GitHub hosts or that you host yourself.

GitHub Actions is a CI service, not a sandbox API. Each job on a GitHub-hosted runner gets a new VM, Linux and Windows on Azure and macOS on GitHub's own Mac fleet, with passwordless sudo, and the VM is gone when the job ends. It is built for building, testing and deploying the code in a repository, and GitHub's own Copilot cloud agent and the Claude and Codex agents on GitHub also run on Actions runners.

Kind of product: CI/CD service; jobs are defined in workflow files in a GitHub repository
Isolation: A new VM for each job; Linux and Windows on Azure, macOS on GitHub's own Mac cloud
Job length: Each job can run for up to 6 hours
Concurrency: 20 jobs on Free, 40 on Pro, 60 on Team, 500 on Enterprise; macOS 5, or 50 on Enterprise
Allowed use: GitHub-hosted runners are for work on the repository's software project; reselling Actions as a service is not allowed
Self-hosted runners: Open-source runner under MIT; usage on self-hosted runners is free
Compliance: SOC 1 and SOC 2 Type 2 reports, ISO/IEC 27001:2022

WarpBuild

WarpBuild sells hosted GitHub Actions runners: you change the runs-on label and your CI jobs run on its machines.

WarpBuild is a CI service, not an agent sandbox. Each GitHub Actions job runs in its own VM on Linux (x86-64 or arm64), Windows or macOS on Apple M4 Pro, and the VM and its disk are destroyed after the build. It also sells remote Docker builders, can run the same runners inside your own AWS, GCP or Azure account, and can host Claude Managed Agents sessions on its stock runners.

Kind of product: GitHub Actions runners and remote Docker builders, billed per minute
Isolation: Each runner runs in its own virtual machine, created on demand and destroyed after each build
Platforms: Ubuntu on x86-64 and arm64, Windows Server 2022 and 2025, macOS 14, 15 and 26 on Apple M4 Pro
Where it runs: WarpBuild's cloud, or BYOC in your own AWS, GCP or Azure account
Concurrency: Unlimited on Linux and Windows; high macOS concurrency through support
SSO: SAML SSO with Okta, Azure AD or Google Workspace, $250 a month
Compliance: Says it is SOC 2 Type 2 compliant

Which use cases each one fits

For each use case, Battleships prices every sandbox provider on the same workload and sorts them from the cheapest monthly bill up. “100th cheapest of 377” means 99 of the other 376 providers run that workload, with every feature it needs, for less. “With limits” means the provider runs it but misses something, so it is listed after every full match. Open a use case for its whole ranking and what each provider misses.

Use case and its workload	GitHub Actions: price rank	WarpBuild: price rank	boat: price rank
Software factory 100 at once · 4 vCPU / 8 GB · 2,200 sessions of 8 h a month Neither keeps a machine between tasks: every job starts on a fresh VM, so an agent reclones and reinstalls each time, while a boat sandbox keeps its disk.	298th of 367, with limits $5,853 a month	269th of 367, with limits $4,343 a month	3rd cheapest of 367 $634 a month
Always-on AI employees 50 machines 24/7 · 2 vCPU / 4 GB A GitHub-hosted job ends after 6 hours and a WarpBuild job after GitHub's 5 day cap, and neither keeps its disk, so an assistant that lives all month fits only on boat.	333rd of 366, with limits $10,692 a month	285th of 366, with limits $5,650 a month	5th cheapest of 366 $657 a month
Code interpreter bursts 100 at once · 1 vCPU / 2 GB · 200,000 sessions of 1 min a month Both bill whole minutes per job and boot a fresh VM each time, which suits builds better than many tiny code runs.	294th of 345, with limits $721 a month	287th of 345, with limits $600 a month	186th of 345, with limits $2,000 a month
Sandboxes for your users 300 at once · 2 vCPU / 4 GB · 30,000 sessions of 23 min a month Both runners take no inbound traffic and only run GitHub Actions jobs, so neither can give your users a sandbox they can reach; boat gives each one HTTPS URLs.	308th of 361, with limits $2,892 a month	278th of 361, with limits $1,890 a month	Cheapest of 361 $209 a month
RL rollouts 1,000 at once · 2 vCPU / 4 GB · 1,000,000 sessions of 3 min a month	304th of 360, with limits $14,721 a month	281st of 360, with limits $9,000 a month	34th of 360, with limits $2,000 a month
Agent evals 250 at once · 4 vCPU / 8 GB · 15,000 sessions of 20 min a month	303rd of 364, with limits $1,962 a month	294th of 364, with limits $1,440 a month	10th cheapest of 364 $200 a month
CI runners 40 at once · 8 vCPU / 16 GB · 6,000 sessions of 12 min a month Both fit, and the workflow files are the same; WarpBuild charges less per minute in our CI scenario, while GitHub includes monthly minutes and runs public repos for free.	100th cheapest of 377 $1,012 a month	94th cheapest of 377 $864 a month	4th cheapest of 377 $86 a month
24/7 dev boxes 1 machine 24/7 · 4 vCPU / 8 GB Neither is a dev box: GitHub runners have no SSH, and WarpBuild allows SSH only into failed jobs for debugging, with the disk gone when the job ends.	279th of 368, with limits $159 a month	182nd of 368, with limits $226 a month	18th cheapest of 368 $26 a month
Computer-use agents 50 at once · 4 vCPU / 8 GB · 20,000 sessions of 15 min a month Both are headless CI runners with no desktop stream; boat streams a 60fps desktop with computer use on every machine.	292nd of 369, with limits $1,768 a month	264th of 369, with limits $1,320 a month	6th cheapest of 369 $200 a month
Browser-use agents 50 at once · 2 vCPU / 4 GB · 30,000 sessions of 10 min a month	135th of 367, with limits $942 a month	280th of 367, with limits $720 a month	7th cheapest of 367 $200 a month
Scraping & bots (startup scale) 50 at once · 1 vCPU / 2 GB · 100,000 sessions of 3 min a month	134th of 346, with limits $1,184 a month	306th of 346, with limits $878 a month	6th cheapest of 346 $90 a month
Mass scraping & bots (undetectable) 1,000 at once · 1 vCPU / 2 GB · 3,000,000 sessions of 2 min a month	301st of 338, with limits $28,971 a month	275th of 338, with limits $17,550 a month	71st of 338, with limits $1,800 a month
Parallel red teaming 200 at once · 2 vCPU / 4 GB · 5,000 sessions of 30 min a month	70th of 360, with limits $467 a month	264th of 360, with limits $435 a month	2nd cheapest of 360 $200 a month
GPU eval jobs 10 at once · 8 vCPU / 32 GB · 500 sessions of 30 min a month	Can't run it	Can't run it	Can't run it
macOS agents 5 at once · 4 vCPU / 8 GB · 1,000 sessions of 20 min a month Both have hosted macOS runners, GitHub on Apple silicon and Intel and WarpBuild on Apple M4 Pro; boat runs Linux only.	25th of 36, with limits $1,178 a month	29th of 36, with limits $1,520 a month	Can't run it

Key features

Feature	GitHub Actions	WarpBuild	boat
Kind of product	GitHub's CI service, with runners that GitHub hosts	Hosted runners for GitHub Actions: change runs-on and jobs run on WarpBuild	Sandbox API: create, stop, fork and reach machines from your code
Isolation	A new VM per job on Azure, or on GitHub's Mac cloud for macOS	A new VM per job, destroyed after the build	Full VM with its own kernel on dedicated AMD Ryzen 9 9950X hosts, with root and systemd
How long a job can run	Up to 6 hours per job	Up to 5 days, the cap GitHub puts on self-hosted runner jobs	No session cap on paid plans; stop and start it when you like
Files between runs	Fresh VM each job; files carry over only through cache, artifacts or custom images	Disk destroyed after each build; cache and disk snapshots on Ubuntu runners, deleted after 15 days	The disk stays, saved every minute and on stop; a stopped sandbox costs nothing
Fork	No; custom images are a template for new runners	No; a later runner can boot from a saved snapshot in 45 to 60 seconds	Fork a running sandbox with its disk
Docker and nested virtualization	Docker; KVM on Linux runners after adding the runner user to the KVM group	Docker; /dev/kvm only on Linux x86-64, turned on with a label	Docker, root, systemd and /dev/kvm on every machine
Jobs at once	20 on Free, 40 on Pro, 60 on Team, 500 on Enterprise; macOS 5, or 50 on Enterprise	Advertised as unlimited on Linux and Windows; higher macOS limits through support	Many sandboxes at once; start rate limits queue very large bursts
Reaching the machine	No inbound connections and no SSH	Inbound traffic blocked; SSH into failed jobs for debugging	SSH, HTTPS URLs for up to 50 ports, raw TCP
Desktop and computer use	Headless; browsers preinstalled for tests	None; no desktop stream	Linux desktop streamed at 60fps, Chromium, computer use API
Coding agents	Copilot cloud agent, plus Claude and Codex in public preview, on issues and pull requests	Hosts Claude Managed Agents sessions on stock Linux and macOS runners	Claude Code, Codex and five more preinstalled, driven from outside with a prompt, steer and events API
Keeping API keys out of the machine	GitHub secrets enter the job as environment variables, hidden from logs	GitHub secrets are passed into the runner environment	Credentials proxy for model providers and any HTTPS API; real keys never enter the sandbox
Operating systems and chips	Linux and Windows on x64 and arm64, macOS on Apple silicon and Intel	Linux on x86-64 and arm64, Windows Server, macOS on Apple M4 Pro	Linux on x86-64
GPUs	Linux and Windows larger runners with an NVIDIA T4	None	None
Your own machines or cloud	Open-source runner on your own machines, free to use; larger runners can join your Azure network	BYOC runners in your AWS, GCP or Azure account, $0.002 a minute on top of your cloud bill	Hosted in the EU only (Germany, Finland, France)

Every feature Battleships tracks (43)

Feature	GitHub Actions	WarpBuild	boat
Full VM (own kernel)	Yes	Yes	Yes
Docker inside	Yes	Yes	Yes
Nested virtualization	Yes	Yes	Yes
Root	Yes	Yes	Yes
Systemd	No	Not published	Yes
Desktop GUI	No	No	Yes
Browser	Yes	No	Yes
Computer-use API	No	No	Yes
SSH	No	Yes	Yes
Persistent disk	No	No	Yes
Pause/resume	No	No	Yes
Automatic snapshots	No	No	Yes
Fork/clone	No	No	Yes
Live fork (no pause)	No	No	Yes
Memory fork	No	No	No
Custom image (Docker or snapshot)	Yes	Yes	Yes
≥24 h sessions	No	Yes	Yes
Idle auto-stop	Yes	Yes	No
Wake on request	No	Yes	No
HTTPS preview URLs	No	No	Yes
Raw TCP inbound	No	No	Yes
Public IPv4	No	No	No
Egress allowlist	Yes	Yes	No
Secret proxy	No	No	Yes
Secret proxy for any API	No	No	Yes
Preinstalled agents	Yes	Yes	Yes
Agent harness API	Yes	No	Yes
MCP server	Yes	Yes	No
GPU	Yes	No	No
Windows	Yes	Yes	No
Arm64	Yes	Yes	No
Self-hosting	Yes	No	No
BYOC	No	Yes	No
Open source	Yes	No	No
Scoped API keys	Not published	Yes	Yes
Spend limits	Yes	Not published	Yes
Usage per sandbox (API)	Yes	Yes	Yes
Audit logs	Yes	Not published	No
SSO	Yes	Yes	No
SOC 2	Yes	Yes	No
HIPAA	No	No	No
EU data residency	Yes	Yes	Yes
Zero data retention	Not published	Not published	Yes

Performance

GitHub ActionsNot measured

WarpBuildNot measured

boat26.69 runs/s

There is no comparable CPU measurement for GitHub Actions or WarpBuild runners in the hpc-sandbox-benchmarks test. boat did 26.69 runs per second on it at 4 vCPU / 8 GB, on dedicated AMD Ryzen 9 9950X hosts. WarpBuild's own speed claims compare its runners with GitHub's, not with boat.

Node.js build-and-test loop at 4 vCPU / 8 GB, higher is better. Measured with the open hpc-sandbox-benchmarks suite. GitHub Actions and WarpBuild have no published run in this suite yet, so there is no like-for-like number to compare.

Pricing in five scenarios

Each bill is priced from the providers' public price lists by the open Battleships engine, with the cheapest plan that runs the scenario.

Scenario	GitHub Actions, a month	WarpBuild, a month	boat, a month
One coding agent, workdays 4 vCPU / 8 GB, 50 GB disk, 8 hours a day, 22 days a month, files kept between days	$80 · Team · with limits	$57 · Pay as you go · with limits	$20 · $20/mo
One agent that never stops 4 vCPU / 8 GB, 50 GB disk, running 24/7 all month	$354 · Team · with limits	$237 · Pay as you go · with limits	$26 · $20/mo
50 agents in parallel 50 machines of 4 vCPU / 8 GB at once, 8-hour sessions, 1,100 sessions a month, Docker inside	$3,814 · Team · with limits	$2,851 · Pay as you go · with limits	$317 · $20/mo × 3 seats
Sandboxes for your users 2 vCPU / 4 GB, 30,000 sessions of 10 minutes a month, up to 300 at once	$1,092 · Enterprise Cloud · with limits	$810 · Pay as you go · with limits	$200 · $100/mo × 2 seats
1,000 short jobs at once 2 vCPU / 4 GB, 1,000 at once, 3 minutes each, 200,000 jobs a month	$2,721 · Enterprise Cloud · with limits	$1,800 · Pay as you go · with limits	$2,000 · $2000/mo · with limits

GitHub Actions: GitHub bills per minute per job, rounding each job up to the next whole minute, from $0.006 a minute for 2-core Linux. Plans include monthly minutes for standard runners only, and larger and GPU runners are always billed.

WarpBuild: WarpBuild bills per minute while a job runs, with no plan fee, from $0.003 a minute for 2 vCPU on arm64; macOS is $0.08 a minute. Cache, snapshot storage and snapshot restores cost extra, and BYOC runners add $0.002 a minute to your own cloud bill.

WarpBuild: Plans start at $20 a month, and the whole fee is usage credit spent per second while a sandbox runs. A stopped sandbox costs nothing and keeps its disk.

Limits in those scenarios

Neither GitHub Actions nor WarpBuild fits any of the five agent scenarios, because both are CI runners whose disk is gone when the job ends. GitHub stops each job after 6 hours, and WarpBuild jobs run under GitHub's 5 day cap, so an agent that never stops needs restarts on both. GitHub's Enterprise Cloud tops out at 500 jobs at once, while WarpBuild's limits for 300 or 1,000 machines are not confirmed and its egress price is not published. On boat, the 1,000-job burst is queued by start limits even on the $2,000 plan.

Scenario	GitHub Actions	WarpBuild	boat
One coding agent, workdays	Team: sessions capped at 6 h missing persistent disk different kind of product: CI runner	missing persistent disk different kind of product: CI runner egress price not published	None that bite
One agent that never stops	Team: sessions capped at 6 h missing persistent disk different kind of product: CI runner	missing persistent disk different kind of product: CI runner sessions end after 120 h: needs restarts to run 24/7 egress price not published	None that bite
50 agents in parallel	Team: sessions capped at 6 h missing persistent disk different kind of product: CI runner	missing persistent disk different kind of product: CI runner egress price not published how many machines can run at once: limit not published, probably fine at 50 (the typical published limit is 50)	None that bite
Sandboxes for your users	different kind of product: CI runner	different kind of product: CI runner not confirmed: how many machines can run at once (you need 300; the typical published limit is 50) egress price not published	None that bite
1,000 short jobs at once	Enterprise Cloud: max 500 concurrent different kind of product: CI runner	different kind of product: CI runner not confirmed: how many machines can run at once (you need 1,000; the typical published limit is 50) egress price not published	max 2,400 starts/day (needs ~6,667) max 600 starts/hour (needs ~1,000) bursts above 90 starts/min are queued (a burst of 333 takes ~4 min to start)

Which one should you use?

Use GitHub Actions when

you want CI with nothing extra to set up, free runs for public repos, GPU runners, or free self-hosted runners on your own machines.

Nothing extra to sign up for. Teams happy with their CI speed get runners built into GitHub, with monthly minutes included and free standard runners for public repos.
GPU runners. If your tests need a GPU, GitHub has larger Linux and Windows runners with an NVIDIA T4, which WarpBuild does not offer.
Free self-hosted runners. Teams with their own machines can run GitHub's open-source runner on them and pay no platform fee for those minutes.

Use WarpBuild when

your GitHub Actions bill or queue is the problem and you want cheaper per-minute runners, more jobs at once, snapshots or runners in your own cloud, without changing your workflows.

Lower per-minute rates. Teams with heavy private CI pay less per minute on WarpBuild, with no plan fee, while keeping the same workflow files.
More jobs at once, and longer ones. Busy repos that hit GitHub's concurrency limits get unlimited Linux and Windows jobs, and each job can run past 6 hours.
Snapshots and your own cloud. Teams with slow setup steps can boot runners from disk snapshots, or run them in their own AWS, GCP or Azure account.

Where boat fits

Both GitHub Actions and WarpBuild run CI jobs: a fresh VM starts, the job runs, and the VM is thrown away. If what you are really running is agents that need to keep their work, be reached from outside and run for days, look at boat. For plain CI on a GitHub repo, either of the two is the more natural fit.

A machine that keeps its work

Both wipe the disk after every job, and jobs stop after 6 hours on GitHub or 5 days on WarpBuild. The workarounds are caches, artifacts or WarpBuild snapshots billed per hour that expire after 15 days. boat keeps the disk, with no session cap on paid plans.

Reach it from outside

Neither runner takes inbound traffic, so nobody can open the app an agent built or watch its browser, and WarpBuild's SSH is only for debugging failed jobs. boat gives HTTPS URLs on up to 50 ports, raw TCP, SSH and a 60fps desktop.

Agents you drive from outside, keys kept out

On both, agents start from issues, pull requests or Anthropic's API, and GitHub secrets sit inside the runner where agent-written code can read them. boat lets you drive agents inside from outside through one API, with real keys held in a credentials proxy.

Use boat when what you run is agents that need their own machine: one that keeps its disk, runs with no session cap, serves the apps it builds, shows a desktop and keeps real API keys out of reach. Compare it one to one: boat vs GitHub Actions and boat vs WarpBuild.

Questions people ask

Is WarpBuild cheaper than GitHub Actions?

Per minute, usually yes: in our CI runners scenario WarpBuild comes to $864 a month against $1,012 on GitHub Actions, and one 4 vCPU machine on workdays is $57 against $80. GitHub's included minutes and free public-repo runners can still make it cheaper for small or open-source projects.

Does WarpBuild replace GitHub Actions?

No. It replaces GitHub's hosted runners. Your workflows stay on GitHub, and you change the runs-on label so jobs run on WarpBuild's machines, which register with GitHub as self-hosted runners.

Which is faster?

We have no comparable CPU measurement for either. WarpBuild publishes its own speed claims against GitHub's runners, but they are not part of the benchmark we use, where boat did 26.69 runs per second at 4 vCPU / 8 GB.

How long can a job run on each?

Up to 6 hours on GitHub-hosted runners. WarpBuild runners count as self-hosted, so GitHub's 5 day cap applies instead. A boat sandbox has no session cap on paid plans.

Can both run Docker and Android emulators?

Both run Docker. GitHub exposes KVM on Linux runners once you add the runner user to the KVM group, and WarpBuild offers /dev/kvm on Linux x86-64 runners through a label. boat has Docker, systemd and /dev/kvm on every machine.

Can I use either as a sandbox for AI agents?

Only for agent work inside a CI job. GitHub runs its Copilot cloud agent and the Claude and Codex agents on Actions runners, and WarpBuild can host Claude Managed Agents sessions, but each session is a fresh VM that takes no inbound traffic and is thrown away at the end.

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