Machines
Last updated 2 November 2026
Machines are not open yet. These pages describe Machines as they will open; until then, a create answers region_not_offered (422), “Machines are not offered in any region yet.”
A Machine runs your container image (linux/arm64) as an HTTPS service for your agents and their tools: it sleeps when nobody calls it, costs nothing for compute while asleep, wakes on the next request, and keeps its state in a database of its own and its files on a Volume.
What people build with it
- A webhook receiver
It records each event before it answers (see Receive webhooks).
- An agent with its own API
Its memory and tasks live in its database (see Keep data in its database and Volume).
- A Machine per agent, task or tenant
Asleep, each costs nothing for compute (see the example).
- An internal tool or an MCP server
On a port only your account’s keys can call (see Private ports).
A good fit, and not
A good fit:
- HTTP and WebSocket services from your own arm64 image, in any language.
- Use in bursts, with idle time between.
- State in a SQLite database the Machine writes from Node.js, or files on its Volume (see Keep data in its database and Volume).
Not a good fit:
- Running a command in a Machine, reading or writing its files from outside, or connecting with SSH: a Machine takes none of them.
- Work that goes on long after the last request (see When it sleeps).
- Memory that must last from one wake to the next (see Sleep guarantees).
What a Machine does not offer lists the rest.
Compared with other ways to run a service
| Tonbo Machines | A server or VM you run all the time | A serverless function | |
|---|---|---|---|
| When it runs | From a request until it has been idle a while | All the time | For each invocation, up to a time limit |
| What lasts | Its database and its Volume | Its disks, until the machine is lost | Nothing; state lives in another service |
| You pay for | CPU, memory and disk while awake | The machine by the hour | Each invocation and its duration |
What it costs
Awake, a Machine pays for the CPU time, memory and scratch disk it uses, at most $0.0861 an hour for s-1, the smallest shape. Asleep it pays no compute, only storage for its database and its Volume. See Pricing.
Where it runs
On Tonbo’s hosts in us-east-1 and ap-southeast-1, each Machine in a virtual machine of its own (see Isolation guarantees), at the same prices in each. Callers reach it over HTTPS from anywhere.
Get started
Next steps
- ConceptsThe words the other pages use: a wake, a shape, its database, its Volume.
- Run your own imagePackage your own program, and what it finds inside a Machine.
- Keep data in its database and VolumeKeep what must last in its database or on its Volume.
- Rules for MachinesWhat to do and what not to, before you rely on a Machine.
- GuaranteesWhat you can rely on: your data, a sleep, requests, isolation, the network.
- LimitsHow much one Machine, one wake and one account can take.
- PricingWhat an awake Machine costs, with worked examples.