- Prepare dependencies once and reuse them in later sandboxes.
- Save a known-good state before running risky or expensive work.
- Start multiple sandboxes from the same captured environment.
- Keep a reusable state after the original sandbox is no longer needed.
Snapshots vs Templates Snapshots and templates both let you spawn new sandboxes from a predefined starting point, but they differ in how that point is produced and what it captures. A template is built from a Docker image with declared steps (install packages, copy files, set environment variables) — a clean, reproducible blueprint you author up front. A snapshot is captured from a running sandbox at a moment in time, preserving its filesystem and live memory state, including anything created at runtime.
- Use a template for a clean, reproducible base environment built from a Docker image and declared setup steps.
- Use a snapshot when you want to preserve the exact state of a specific running sandbox, including files created at runtime and its live memory state.