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Developer Tools · head to head

Daytona vs Garden

Daytona logo

Daytona

Developer Tools

Infrastructure for spinning up secure, sub-second sandboxes to run AI-generated code

From
Free
Rated
-
Full reviewWebsite
Garden logo

Garden

Developer Tools

Kubernetes development and testing automation with shared caching, now owned by Incredibuild

From
Free
Rated
-
Full reviewWebsite

The short version

  • Each has a real cost: Daytona pricing is purely usage-based with no flat monthly plan, which can make costs harder to predict for steady workloads.; Garden incredibuild acquired Garden in November 2024 and the pricing page now redirects to documentation, so there is no public commercial offer and no published roadmap for a team betting a platform on it.
  • They diverge on capability: Daytona covers Sub-second sandbox creation, Garden covers Action graph.
  • Prices and features above were last checked on 31 August 2026.

Where they differ

Only the attributes on which Daytona and Garden actually diverge.

Attributes where Daytona and Garden differ
AttributeDaytonaGarden
Pricing modelusage-basedOpen source, no licence fee
Platformsweb, linux, windows, apiLinux, macOS, Windows, Kubernetes

Identical on both: starting price (Free), free tier (Yes), user rating (Not yet rated), category (Developer Tools).

What each one covers

Drawn from each product's published feature list. An absence here means we hold no record of it - not that the product lacks it.

Only in Daytona

  • Sub-second sandbox creation
  • Per-second billing
  • GPU instances
  • Windows OS support
  • Enterprise BYOC

Only in Garden

  • Action graph
  • Shared result caching
  • Remote Kubernetes environments
  • In-cluster builds
  • Same config everywhere
  • Hot reload sync
  • Helm and Kustomize support
  • Templating

What people use each for

The jobs each tool is most often brought in to do.

Daytona

  • Running AI agent-generated code in a disposable, isolated sandboxnot Garden
  • Executing untrusted user code for a coding platformnot Garden
  • Running GPU workloads on demand without provisioning dedicated serversnot Garden
  • Testing Windows-specific code paths in a sandboxnot Garden

Garden

  • A platform team whose integration test suite takes longer than the coffee break and needs caching to cut the loopnot Daytona
  • An organisation with thirty or more services on Kubernetes where docker-compose no longer approximates productionnot Daytona
  • Giving every developer an ephemeral namespace instead of queuing for one shared staging environmentnot Daytona
  • Running the identical build and test definition locally and in CI so failures reproduce on a laptopnot Daytona

Where each one falls short

Documented limitations, not opinions. Every one is a constraint you would hit in normal use.

Daytona

  • Pricing is purely usage-based with no flat monthly plan, which can make costs harder to predict for steady workloads.
  • GPU instances are priced separately and can be significantly more expensive than standard compute for AI-heavy use cases.
  • Enterprise features like SSO, audit logs, and BYOC are only available by contacting sales rather than self-serve.

Garden

  • Incredibuild acquired Garden in November 2024 and the pricing page now redirects to documentation, so there is no public commercial offer and no published roadmap for a team betting a platform on it.
  • It is tightly bound to Kubernetes, so teams running on ECS, Nomad, plain VMs or serverless get little from it and would need a different tool entirely.
  • The YAML action graph is a real configuration surface: a large monorepo needs someone to own and maintain Garden config as a first-class artefact, which is a standing platform-engineering cost.
  • Shared remote environments mean every developer needs cluster access and a cost allocation model, so cloud spend rises and namespace sprawl becomes a thing you have to police.
  • Caching correctness depends on declaring dependencies accurately; an under-declared action will serve a stale cached pass and hide a genuine test failure, which is a hard class of bug to notice.

Pricing, plan by plan

Daytona

Free
  • Pay-as-you-go$undefined/mo
    • $0.0504 per vCPU/hour
    • $0.0162 per GiB memory/hour
    • $0.000108 per GiB storage/hour after 5 free GiB
  • Startup Program$undefined/mo
    • Up to $50,000 in free credits for qualifying startups
  • Enterprise$undefined/mo
    • Custom usage limits
    • SSO
    • Audit logs

Garden

Free
  • Garden open sourceFree
    • Apache 2.0 licensed CLI
    • Full action graph and caching
    • Self-managed clusters
  • Commercial tier$undefined/year
    • Hosted caching and team features
    • Support and onboarding
    • Pricing no longer published since the Incredibuild acquisition

Which should you pick?

Choose Daytona if

  • You need sub-second sandbox creation.
  • You want to start without paying.
  • You work on web, linux, windows, api.
  • You also want per-second billing.
Daytona review

Choose Garden if

  • You need action graph.
  • You want to start without paying.
  • You work on Linux, macOS, Windows, Kubernetes.
  • You also want shared result caching.
Garden review

Questions people ask

Is Daytona or Garden better?
Neither clearly leads. Daytona starts at Free and Garden at Free, and user ratings are close enough to be indistinguishable. Choose on capability and platform support.
Which is cheaper, Daytona or Garden?
Daytona starts at Free and Garden at Free.
Does Daytona or Garden run on more platforms?
Daytona runs on web, linux, windows, api. Garden runs on Linux, macOS, Windows, Kubernetes.
Can I use Daytona for free?
Both have a free tier, so you can try either at no cost before committing.
What is Daytona best used for?
Daytona is most often used for running ai agent-generated code in a disposable, isolated sandbox, executing untrusted user code for a coding platform, running gpu workloads on demand without provisioning dedicated servers, testing windows-specific code paths in a sandbox. Of those, running ai agent-generated code in a disposable, isolated sandbox and executing untrusted user code for a coding platform are not what Garden is typically brought in for.
What can Daytona do that Garden cannot?
Daytona covers Sub-second sandbox creation, Per-second billing, GPU instances, Windows OS support. Garden covers Action graph, Shared result caching, Remote Kubernetes environments, In-cluster builds.

Answered from the vendors’ own pages

Daytona: How is Daytona usage metered?

Usage is billed per second across vCPU, memory, and storage consumed, with separate per-hour rates for GPU and Windows instances.

Source
Garden: Is Garden still maintained?

The open source project remains on GitHub under Incredibuild ownership, but the commercial pricing page redirects to the docs and there is no public paid offer.

Daytona: Is there a free plan, and what are its limits?

There is no flat free plan, but new signups receive $200 in free compute credit with no credit card required to start.

Source
Garden: Do I need Kubernetes?

Effectively yes. Garden is built around Kubernetes environments and offers little to teams on other runtimes.

Daytona: Are discounts available for startups?

Yes, the Startup Program offers up to $50,000 in free credits for qualifying companies.

Source
Garden: Does it replace my CI system?

No. It runs inside GitHub Actions, GitLab CI or similar and speeds up what those pipelines execute.

Garden: What is the actual saving?

It comes from skipping builds and tests whose inputs have not changed, so the benefit scales with how many services you have and how often only a few change.

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