--- title: DigitalOcean MicroVMs: the compute foundation for... description: DigitalOcean launched MicroVMs in private preview, a compute layer built on Firecracker that provides isolated, hardware-virtualized VMs designed for AI agent... canonical: https://daily.dev/posts/digitalocean-microvms-the-compute-foundation-for-building-your-ai-agent-infrastructure-private-pre-weodqvgje twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:site: @dailydotdev og:type: website og:site_name: daily.dev og:title: DigitalOcean MicroVMs: the compute foundation for building your AI agent infrastructure (private preview) | daily.dev og:description: DigitalOcean launched MicroVMs in private preview, a compute layer built on Firecracker that provides isolated, hardware-virtualized VMs designed for AI agent... og:url: https://daily.dev/posts/digitalocean-microvms-the-compute-foundation-for-building-your-ai-agent-infrastructure-private-pre-weodqvgje og:image: https://api.daily.dev/og/posts/WeODQvgJE.png og:image:alt: DigitalOcean MicroVMs: the compute foundation for building your AI agent infrastructure (private preview) og:image:width: 1200 og:image:height: 630 og:locale: en --- > ## Documentation Index > Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://daily.dev/llms.txt > Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further. # DigitalOcean MicroVMs: the compute foundation for building your AI agent infrastructure (private preview) **[DigitalOcean](https://daily.dev/sources/do)** · 5 min read · 0 upvotes · 0 comments ## Summary DigitalOcean launched MicroVMs in private preview, a compute layer built on Firecracker that provides isolated, hardware-virtualized VMs designed for AI agent infrastructure, sandboxes, and short-lived workloads. MicroVMs pause automatically when idle and resume with memory, files, and processes intact, avoiding the cost of always-on servers while providing stronger isolation than containers. They already power DigitalOcean Managed Agents, used by teams like OpenHands, Qencode, and Amplitude, and are now being offered directly to teams building their own agent platforms, sandboxing products, CI/CD runners, RL training environments, or per-tenant tool execution. ## Full article daily.dev links to this article rather than hosting it. Read it at the original source: ## Questions this post answers ### What are DigitalOcean MicroVMs and how do they work for AI agent infrastructure? DigitalOcean MicroVMs are lightweight, isolated virtual machines built on open-source Firecracker technology, each running a container image with its own kernel for hardware-level isolation. They pause automatically after a configurable idle timeout and resume with memory, files, and running processes intact, so compute is only consumed while actively running. They power DigitalOcean Managed Agents and are now available directly in private preview for teams building their own agent platforms. _Developers evaluating isolated compute options for agent workloads can track releases like this on daily.dev._ ### How is a MicroVM different from a regular container for running untrusted or agent-generated code? A MicroVM gives each workload its own kernel through hardware virtualization via Firecracker, unlike containers which share a kernel with neighboring workloads. This hard isolation boundary matters for untrusted or agent-generated code, since a container compromise could spread to the host or other tenants, while a MicroVM contains the blast radius to that single VM. _Teams weighing containers against VM-level isolation for sandboxing can follow this kind of comparison on daily.dev._ ## Similar posts on daily.dev - [AWS introduces Lambda MicroVMs for isolated execution of user and AI-generated code](https://daily.dev/posts/aws-introduces-lambda-microvms-for-isolated-execution-of-user-and-ai-generated-code-x2cyrnpdz) · AWS · 11 upvotes · 0 comments - [AWS Launches Lambda MicroVMs for Isolated Agent and User Code Execution](https://daily.dev/posts/aws-launches-lambda-microvms-for-isolated-agent-and-user-code-execution-gmabbyzxq) · InfoQ · 2 upvotes · 0 comments - [Powering the Inference Era: Inside the DigitalOcean AI-Native Cloud](https://daily.dev/posts/powering-the-inference-era-inside-the-digitalocean-ai-native-cloud-7k9ysjzqn) · DigitalOcean · 0 upvotes · 0 comments - [Why MicroVMs: The Architecture Behind Docker Sandboxes](https://daily.dev/posts/why-microvms-the-architecture-behind-docker-sandboxes-qzo1tfme1) · Docker · 10 upvotes · 0 comments --- Tags: [#ai-agents](https://daily.dev/tags/ai-agents), [#infrastructure](https://daily.dev/tags/infrastructure), [#digitalocean](https://daily.dev/tags/digitalocean) [View this post on daily.dev](https://daily.dev/posts/digitalocean-microvms-the-compute-foundation-for-building-your-ai-agent-infrastructure-private-pre-weodqvgje) ```json {"@context":"https://schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"Organization","@id":"https://daily.dev/#organization","name":"daily.dev","url":"https://daily.dev","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://daily.dev/apple-touch-icon.png","width":180,"height":180},"sameAs":["https://twitter.com/dailydotdev","https://github.com/dailydotdev","https://www.linkedin.com/company/daily-dev-ltd"]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https://daily.dev/#website","url":"https://daily.dev","name":"daily.dev","publisher":{"@id":"https://daily.dev/#organization"},"potentialAction":{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https://daily.dev/search?q={search_term_string}"},"query-input":"required name=search_term_string"}}]} {"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"TechArticle","headline":"DigitalOcean MicroVMs: the compute foundation for building your AI agent infrastructure (private preview)","url":"https://daily.dev/posts/digitalocean-microvms-the-compute-foundation-for-building-your-ai-agent-infrastructure-private-pre-weodqvgje","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://daily.dev/posts/digitalocean-microvms-the-compute-foundation-for-building-your-ai-agent-infrastructure-private-pre-weodqvgje"},"datePublished":"2026-10-01T01:47:30.554Z","dateModified":"2026-10-02T09:08:45.232Z","description":"DigitalOcean launched MicroVMs in private preview, a compute layer built on Firecracker that provides isolated, hardware-virtualized VMs designed for AI agent...","image":"https://media.daily.dev/image/upload/f_auto,q_auto/v1/posts/38a701bf830380e4e9192e46d13aa224?_a=AQAEuop","thumbnailUrl":"https://media.daily.dev/image/upload/f_auto,q_auto/v1/posts/38a701bf830380e4e9192e46d13aa224?_a=AQAEuop","isAccessibleForFree":true,"articleSection":"DigitalOcean","inLanguage":"en","publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"daily.dev","url":"https://daily.dev","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://daily.dev/apple-touch-icon.png","width":180,"height":180}},"author":{"@type":"Organization","name":"DigitalOcean","logo":"https://media.daily.dev/image/upload/t_logo,f_auto/v1/logos/6e35e88c18054e53b548b4795beb6167","url":"https://daily.dev/sources/do"},"commentCount":0,"discussionUrl":"https://daily.dev/posts/digitalocean-microvms-the-compute-foundation-for-building-your-ai-agent-infrastructure-private-pre-weodqvgje","interactionStatistic":[{"@type":"InteractionCounter","interactionType":{"@type":"LikeAction"},"userInteractionCount":0},{"@type":"InteractionCounter","interactionType":{"@type":"CommentAction"},"userInteractionCount":0}],"keywords":"ai-agents,infrastructure,digitalocean","timeRequired":"PT5M"} {"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https://daily.dev"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"DigitalOcean","item":"https://daily.dev/sources/do"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":3,"name":"DigitalOcean MicroVMs: the compute foundation for building your AI agent infrastructure (private preview)"}]} {"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"FAQPage","@id":"https://daily.dev/posts/digitalocean-microvms-the-compute-foundation-for-building-your-ai-agent-infrastructure-private-pre-weodqvgje#faq","mainEntity":[{"@type":"Question","name":"What are DigitalOcean MicroVMs and how do they work for AI agent infrastructure?","acceptedAnswer":{"@type":"Answer","text":"DigitalOcean MicroVMs are lightweight, isolated virtual machines built on open-source Firecracker technology, each running a container image with its own kernel for hardware-level isolation. 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