HEAD-TO-HEAD · PRICES VERIFIED 2026-08-27
Self-Hosted Firecracker (Hetzner) vs E2B
The crossover pair: E2B meters $0.1656/sandbox-hour at the 2 vCPU / 4 GiB reference while the CPX62 self-host route costs a flat $153.59/mo — so E2B is far cheaper below ~925 hr/mo and the host wins outright above it ($153.59 vs $828.00 at 5,000 hr). What you trade: E2B's managed isolation, SDKs, and zero ops versus your own Firecracker pipeline, patching, and idle-time billing.
Monthly Cost Across Realistic Benchmarks
Rate Card Snapshot
| Vendor | $/vCPU-hr | $/GiB-hr | Billing granularity | Concurrency note |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Self-host Firecracker (Hetzner) | — | incl. | — | Bounded only by host capacity — the point of self-hosting. |
| E2B | $0.0504 | $0.0162 | per-second | Hobby ≤20 concurrent sandboxes; Pro ≤100 (extensible to 1,100). Session caps: ≤1h Hobby, ≤24h Pro. |
Fit Notes
- Self-host Firecracker (Hetzner) — Skip if usage is bursty or spiky — the host bills 24/7 whether sandboxes run or not; below roughly half utilization the managed providers win on total cost and you still own the pager.
- E2B — Skip if your agents need long-lived environments — Hobby sessions die at 1h and Pro at 24h; this is for short-lived code-running sandboxes.
Self-host Firecracker (Hetzner)
Strengths- Flat bill regardless of utilization spikes
- EU jurisdiction (German/Finnish operation)
- Host fits 8 concurrent reference sandboxes (min(16/2, 32/4))
- Ops labor excluded from the $153.59 — setup, images, patching are yours
- Idle time bills whether sandboxes run or not
E2B
Strengths- Zero ops below the crossover volume
- Managed microVM isolation with agent-ready SDKs
- Per-second billing keeps short bursts trivially cheap
- Session caps (≤1h Hobby / ≤24h Pro) break long-lived environments
- Premium rate: 2.5× the cheapest managed vendor
Run your own workload through the full interactive calculator, or browse all pairs on the comparisons hub.
Frequently Asked Questions
Which is cheaper, Self-host Firecracker (Hetzner) or E2B?
The crossover pair: E2B meters $0.1656/sandbox-hour at the 2 vCPU / 4 GiB reference while the CPX62 self-host route costs a flat $153.59/mo — so E2B is far cheaper below ~925 hr/mo and the host wins outright above it ($153.59 vs $828.00 at 5,000 hr). What you trade: E2B's managed isolation, SDKs, and zero ops versus your own Firecracker pipeline, patching, and idle-time billing.
How were these Self-host Firecracker (Hetzner) vs E2B costs computed?
Both vendors run identical workload profiles (sandbox-hours × vCPU/RAM) through the same engine using each vendor's captured USD list rates; the full methodology is on the agent-sandbox-pricing tool page.