machine.dev vs
Depot.
Depot pitches "30% faster CPUs at half the cost." machine.dev is 12.5× cheaper on spot and 26% cheaper on on-demand at every Linux CPU size — plus a public GPU catalog Depot doesn't ship outside Business plan.
Bigger surface, higher rate.
Depot is a broader product than machine.dev. They ship CI runners, Docker builders, container registry, Depot CI, and Agent Sandboxes for Claude Code. Their customer roster includes PostHog, Jane, and People Data Labs. They're the only competitor in the market that bills per-second with no 1-minute minimum.
Their Linux x64 GitHub Actions runners are $0.002/vCPU/min linear — the same flat rate as Blacksmith and WarpBuild managed. machine.dev's effective rate is ~$0.00149/vCPU/min on-demand, which works out to a clean 26% cheaper at every size.
Where the gap really opens is GPU. Depot's GPU runners are Business plan only, customer-managed via an AWS sub-account, with no public price catalog. machine.dev publishes T4G, T4, L4, A10G, L40S, RTX 6000, plus AWS Trainium and Inferentia2 on the public per-minute catalog — all on the same credit balance, all included in the $10 free trial.
Linear, Both Ways.
Per-minute USD. Depot prices verified from depot.dev/pricing April 9, 2026. Both providers scale linearly per vCPU.
[NOTE_SWEEP] machine.dev wins on both spot and on-demand at every CPU size against Depot. Both sides scale linearly: Depot at $0.002/vCPU/min, machine.dev at ~$0.00149/vCPU/min on-demand. The 26% on-demand gap and the 12.5× spot gap are uniform.
[NOTE_DEV_PLAN] Depot's $20/mo Developer plan includes 2,000 GHA minutes, which lowers the effective rate at very low volume. Above ~5,000 minutes/month the per-minute rate dominates and the 26% gap reasserts itself.
Public catalog vs sales call.
Depot's GPU runners are Business-plan only, customer-managed via AWS sub-account, with no public SKU pricing. machine.dev publishes T4G ARM, T4, L4, A10G, L40S, RTX 6000, plus Trainium and Inferentia2 on the public per-minute catalog.
Beyond price.
| SPEC | DEPOT | MACHINE_DEV |
|---|---|---|
| Pricing model | Linear $0.002/vCPU/min, per-second billing | Per-minute USD, ~$0.00149/vCPU/min OD |
| Spot tier | No | Yes (12.5× cheaper than Depot) |
| GPU runners | Business plan only (BYO-AWS sub-account) | Yes (T4G, T4, L4, A10G, L40S, RTX 6000) |
| GPU SKU catalog | No public catalog | Public, priced per-minute |
| AWS Trainium / Inferentia2 | No | Yes |
| ARM GPU (T4G) | No | Yes (only provider in market) |
| CUDA pre-installed | No (BYO image) | Yes (12.1 + cuDNN 9.2.1) |
| Per-second billing | Yes (only competitor with this) | Per-minute |
| Windows runners | Yes (Windows 2022/2025) | No (Linux only) |
| macOS runners | Yes (Apple Silicon) | No (Linux only) |
| Docker layer cache | Yes (first-class product) | actions/cache |
| Free tier | 7-day trial, no card | $10 free compute, no card |
| Setup | One runs-on change | One runs-on change |
The only line you touch.
Your workflow files, steps, secrets, caches, and Actions syntax stay exactly as they are. The only change is the runs-on label.
Three strengths.
Per-second billing
Depot is the only competitor in the market that bills per-second with no 1-minute minimum. For pipelines with lots of small fast jobs, this can be meaningful — though the savings are usually under 5% in practice.
Broader product surface
Depot is more than CI runners. They ship Docker builders, container registry, Depot CI, and Agent Sandboxes for Claude Code. If you want one vendor for all of those, Depot is consolidated. machine.dev is focused on runners.
Windows + Mac coverage
Depot offers Windows 2022/2025 and macOS Apple Silicon runners. machine.dev is Linux-only (x64 + ARM64). If you need cross-platform CI, Depot ships more platforms.
Five strengths.
12× cheaper on spot at every size
Depot has no spot tier — they run linear $0.002/vCPU/min on a single managed cloud. machine.dev's spot CPUs are 11.4-12.5× cheaper at every size from 2 to 64 vCPU. If your jobs tolerate retries, the math is unambiguous.
26% cheaper on every on-demand size
Both providers scale linearly per vCPU. Depot is $0.002/vCPU/min on Linux x64; machine.dev's effective rate is ~$0.00149/vCPU/min. The 26% gap holds at every size from 2 to 64 vCPU on x64 and ARM.
GPU runners with public pricing
Depot's GPU is Business-plan only, customer-managed via AWS sub-account, no public price catalog. machine.dev publishes T4G, T4, L4, A10G, L40S, RTX 6000, plus AWS Trainium and Inferentia2 — all on the public per-minute catalog, all on the same credit balance, all included in the $10 free trial.
The only ARM GPU runner anywhere
T4G ARM 8 vCPU spot is $0.00277/min — the cheapest GPU runner on the public internet. Depot's GPU stops at customer-managed AWS instance types and doesn't offer ARM GPU at all.
CUDA pre-installed on every GPU runner
Depot Business plan GPU runners are bring-your-own-AMI. machine.dev ships drivers 555.58, CUDA 12.1, and cuDNN 9.2.1 baked into every GPU image. torch.cuda.is_available() returns True on the first run.
Live per-minute rates
See what you'd actually pay. Compare with GitHub's $0.006/min for 2-core, $0.012/min for 4-core, and $0.052/min for GPU.
Get started free.
$10 free compute on signup. Enough to run real workloads and compare cost before committing.