Daytona vs ellul
A primitive, or the product built on it.
Daytona's docs target platform engineers building developer environments. Ellul is the assembled product an engineer signs up for. Different audiences.
Updated
The fundamental difference
Daytona is to dev environments what Kubernetes is to containers: a powerful primitive that requires assembly. Ellul is the assembled experience: chat, gates, peering, integrations. If you have a platform team and want to build your own internal agent platform, Daytona is sensible. If you want to use an agent today, Ellul is the answer.
Where Daytona is strong
Stateful workspaces with unlimited persistence and a clean SDK. Strong primitive for platform engineers. Open-source posture is honest.
Where ellul is stronger
Daytona has a solid foundation but no agent-specific UX, no passkey gating, no peering primitive, no integrations. We've built the layer above. A senior engineer signs up for Ellul and is productive in five minutes.
Feature comparison
| Capability | Daytona | ellul | Advantage |
|---|---|---|---|
| Target audience | Platform engineers building dev envs | Senior engineers using agents | |
| Stateful persistence | Yes (unlimited) | Yes (unlimited) | |
| Built-in agent chat | no | yes | |
| Passkey gating (FIDO2) | no | yes | |
| Read-only peering between agents | no | yes | |
| GitHub / Vercel / Neon integrations | Generic SDK access | Built-in, gated | |
| Open source | Yes (workspace primitive) | Partial (agent runtime, sandbox primitives) | |
| Time to first agent run | Hours-days (build the product) | 5 minutes (sign up) |
Pricing
| Tier | Daytona | ellul |
|---|---|---|
| Hobby | Free (self-host) + cloud cost | $20/mo flat |
| Pro | Self-host + ops cost | $50/mo flat |
| Total cost (individual) | Cloud + ops time, typically more for individuals | $20 to $50/mo |
Verdict
Daytona for platform teams; Ellul for individual senior engineers.
If your job is to build a developer platform, Daytona is a sensible primitive. If your job is to ship code with an agent, Ellul is the assembled product you sign up for.
When to use each
Use Daytona when
- You have a platform team and you want to build an internal developer platform.
- You need workspace primitives you can extend yourself.
- Your priority is open source and you'll trade time for control.
Use ellul when
- You want to use an agent, not build a platform.
- You want passkey gates, peering, and integrations out of the box.
- You want to be productive in minutes, not weeks.
Common questions
Could I build Ellul on Daytona?
In principle, yes. Daytona provides the workspace primitive. Ellul is roughly 18 months of additional product engineering: chat, gates, peering, integrations, identity, billing. We've already built it.
Does Ellul use Daytona under the hood?
No. Our sandboxes use a different stack with a security model that requires the gate to be enforced outside the agent process, which off-the-shelf workspace primitives don't ship with.
What about Daytona's open-source story?
We respect it. Open-source workspace primitives are valuable. They live one layer below where Ellul operates. The full product Ellul ships is not yet open source.
Is Daytona cheaper?
Daytona is free if you self-host, plus the cost of the cloud you run it on. The total cost of operating a self-hosted Daytona workspace plus building the agent product on top usually exceeds Ellul's $20 to $50 per month for individual engineers.
Does Daytona have a passkey gate?
No. Daytona provides workspace primitives. Authorization and gating are something you assemble on top. Ellul ships an opinionated FIDO2-enforced gate that's part of the product.
Topics
Try it
Move your agent off your laptop.
Hobby is $20/month. Pro is $50/month. Bring any agent: Claude Code, Codex, Cursor, OpenCode.
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