Programmatically spin up isolated sandboxes for instant code execution in your AI agents and code playgrounds.
CodeSandbox (codesandbox.io) is a powerful cloud-based online integrated development environment (IDE) that lets developers create, edit, run, share, and collaborate on web-focused code projects entirely in a browser—without needing to set up local development environments.
🧑💻 What CodeSandbox Is
- Online IDE for Web Development: A full-featured code editor in the cloud that supports modern web technologies like JavaScript, TypeScript, React, Vue.js, Node.js, and more.
- Instant Prototyping & Execution: You can write code and see a live preview in real time as you type, making prototyping and testing fast and seamless.
- Zero Local Setup: There’s no need to install compilers, runtimes, or dev toolchains locally—CodeSandbox handles bundling, dependencies, and build steps for you.
🛠 Key Features
✔ Cloud Development Environments
- Each project runs in an isolated sandbox (dev container), which can execute full-stack applications including frontend and backend processes.
- Fast cloud infrastructure using microVMs enables environments to start in ~2 seconds and resume context without loss.
- You can scale environments for teams, classrooms, or large projects.
✔ Project Collaboration
- Live collaborative editing allows multiple developers to work together in real time, similar to Google Docs.
- CodeSandboxes can be shared via URLs, and you can manage who can edit vs. view.
✔ GitHub Integration
- Import from GitHub and develop linked projects, with support for commits, branches, and pull requests.
- CodeSandbox can automatically fork repos and connect changes back to GitHub.
✔ Extended Tooling & Dev Features
- Built-in DevTools for running tasks, starting servers, linting, and building your projects without manual scripts.
- VS Code compatibility: works with VS Code keybindings and extensions via a browser interface or desktop integration.
- Templates for rapid project starts and robust support for dependencies and build processes.
✔ AI Assistance (Optional)
- With integrated AI tooling like Boxy and Codeium, CodeSandbox provides AI-powered code autocomplete, generation, refactoring, and real-time assistance (especially on Pro plans).
✔ Deployment & Embedding
- CodeSandbox makes it easy to deploy to platforms like Vercel with minimal configuration.
- You can generate embed URLs to include interactive sandboxes in blogs, docs, or presentations.
💡 Typical Use Cases
- Frontend and Full-Stack Prototyping: Rapidly test UI components or full applications without installing tools.
- Learning and Teaching: An accessible tool for students and educators to teach web development concepts.
- Team Development Workflows: Provides consistent environments for teams and integrates with version control and collaboration tools.
- Showcasing and Sharing Projects: Developers can easily share live examples or embed interactive code on sites.
Powerful APIs
Use our APIs to create isolated development environments (sandboxes) that can run any type of code you need.
Secure & isolated
Every environment runs in isolation, so you can safely run untrusted code without it affecting your system.
Ready for scale
We can handle millions of concurrent VMs and make it easy to provision, manage and decommission VMs.
Cloud
Continuous context
Resume development within the same sandbox after periods of inactivity. With no loss thanks to our snapshots.
Quick start & auto resume
Our microVM infrastructure allows us to spin up entire VMs, clone them and restore snapshots within 2 seconds.
Customizable hibernation
Gain total control over periods of inactivity before auto hibernation kicks in.
Built for AI agents and more
AI agents
Give agents a sandbox to resolve user prompts, or create autonomous agents running on sandboxes. You can run multiple agents in parallel without them interfering with each other. Using the forking mechanism, you can also A/B test different agents.
Development environments at scale
Create a sandbox for each developer or student, and run their code in the sandbox. This way, you can run multiple development environments in parallel without them interfering with each other.
Secure code interpretation & evals
Run code in a sandbox to interpret it. This way, you can run untrusted code without worrying about it affecting your system. You can also run popular evals on any piece of code.
CI/CD
Run tests inside a sandbox, and hibernate the sandbox when the tests are done. This way, you can quickly start the sandbox again when you need to run the tests again or evaluate the results.