Modal

Runs code in a Modal cloud sandbox, providing fully isolated, on-demand containers with configurable images and secrets.

Each run_code call executes in a fresh python -c process, so state does not persist across calls (use a single multi-statement snippet if you need shared state). Configure the image with additional pip packages as needed.

Requirements: code-sandboxes[modal] (installs modal).
Parameters: app_name, image (a prebuilt modal.Image), pip_packages, python_executable.

Create a free account at modal.com.
Authenticate the CLI (opens a browser, writes ~/.modal.toml):
```
modal token new
```
This is enough for local use: the Modal SDK reads credentials from ~/.modal.toml automatically.
Alternatively, create a token in the Modal dashboard (Settings → API Tokens) and export MODAL_TOKEN_ID and MODAL_TOKEN_SECRET.

Do you need both MODAL_TOKEN_ID and MODAL_TOKEN_SECRET?

For environment-based auth (CI/CD, containers, hosted runners): yes, you need both values because Modal authenticates with a token pair (public id + secret).
For local development with modal token new: not necessarily. The SDK can authenticate directly from ~/.modal.toml.

If you need environment variables, you can export them from your local config:

python - <<'PY'
import pathlib
import tomllib

cfg = tomllib.loads(pathlib.Path("~/.modal.toml").expanduser().read_text())
profile = cfg.get("default", cfg)
token_id = profile.get("token_id")
token_secret = profile.get("token_secret")
if token_id and token_secret:
     print(f"export MODAL_TOKEN_ID={token_id}")
     print(f"export MODAL_TOKEN_SECRET={token_secret}")
else:
     raise SystemExit("Could not find token_id/token_secret in ~/.modal.toml")
PY

Usage

from code_sandboxes import Sandbox

with Sandbox.create(
    variant="modal",
    pip_packages=["numpy"],
) as sandbox:
    result = sandbox.run_code("import numpy as np; print(np.arange(3).sum())")
    print(result.stdout)  # "3"

How To Obtain Modal Credentials​

Usage​

How To Obtain Modal Credentials

Usage