# agent-substrate/substrate

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6,195 stars · 700 forks · Go · Apache-2.0

## Links

- GitHub: https://github.com/agent-substrate/substrate
- Homepage: https://ate.dev/
- awesome-repositories: https://awesome-repositories.com/repository/agent-substrate-substrate.md

## Topics

`agents` `cncf` `sandboxing`

## Description

Substrate is a Kubernetes-based platform for running AI agents as persistent actors. Each actor keeps its memory and filesystem state across idle periods: when it goes quiet, it is snapshotted to durable object storage and its worker is freed, and it is later restored onto any available worker when a request arrives. Agents built on any framework can run from standard container images without code changes, and each untrusted agent runs in its own gVisor or microVM sandbox with separate compute, network, and storage.

What sets it apart is the combination of density and containment. Because most agents are idle most of the time, many more agents than workers can be registered against a shared worker pool, with a router that resumes the target actor on demand and parks requests until a worker frees up. Actors can also start from golden snapshots instead of booting from scratch. On the security side, networking is default-deny, outbound traffic passes through a policy-enforcing egress gateway that filters DNS and destinations, and credentials are injected at the gateway so the sandbox never holds API keys. Each actor receives a short-lived certificate and signed identity tokens that external services, cloud providers, and CI systems can verify and federate with.

Beyond that core, the project covers actor and template definitions, namespace-style isolation through atespaces, snapshot fidelity levels, volumes, and a command-line client for inspecting actors, workers, and logs. Operations features include installing, upgrading, and rolling back a cluster, rolling worker pools to new images, key rotation, and metrics, traces, and logs. Benchmarking tools measure suspend and resume latency, spawn time, and actor density per unit of hardware.

## Tags

### Artificial Intelligence & ML

- [Persistent Agent Hosting](https://awesome-repositories.com/f/artificial-intelligence-ml/persistent-agent-hosting.md) — Running AI agents from any framework as persistent actors that keep their memory and filesystem state across idle periods, so long-lived sessions survive hibernation and resume quickly.
- [Stateful Agent Runtimes](https://awesome-repositories.com/f/artificial-intelligence-ml/stateful-agent-runtimes.md) — Runs AI agents as persistent actors on Kubernetes, preserving their memory and filesystem state across suspends and resumes.
- [MicroVM Agent Sandboxes](https://awesome-repositories.com/f/artificial-intelligence-ml/ai-execution-sandboxes/microvm-agent-sandboxes.md) — Runs each untrusted agent in its own gVisor or microVM sandbox with separate compute, network and storage, keeping secrets out of the sandbox.
- [Framework-Agnostic Agent Hosts](https://awesome-repositories.com/f/artificial-intelligence-ml/framework-agnostic-agent-hosts.md) — Runs agents and tool servers from standard container images without code changes, so any framework works inside isolated, stateful sandboxes. ([source](https://github.com/agent-substrate/substrate#readme))

### Software Engineering & Architecture

- [Snapshot-Based Suspend and Resume](https://awesome-repositories.com/f/software-engineering-architecture/fault-tolerance/actor-state-persistence/snapshot-based-suspend-and-resume.md) — Snapshots idle workloads to durable storage to free their workers, then restores them onto any available worker so work continues from saved state. ([source](https://github.com/agent-substrate/substrate/blob/main/docs/reference/glossary.md))
- [Actor State Persistence](https://awesome-repositories.com/f/software-engineering-architecture/fault-tolerance/actor-state-persistence.md) — Captures actor volumes, root filesystem, and memory at selectable fidelity levels and stores them durably in object storage for later restore. ([source](https://github.com/agent-substrate/substrate/blob/main/docs/concepts/architecture.md))
- [Idle Actor Hibernation](https://awesome-repositories.com/f/software-engineering-architecture/stateful-distributed-actors/actor-state-migration/idle-actor-hibernation.md) — Snapshots idle actors to object storage to free their workers, then restores them onto a ready worker when a request arrives. ([source](https://github.com/agent-substrate/substrate/blob/main/docs/concepts/architecture.md))
- [Shared Worker Pools Across Namespaces](https://awesome-repositories.com/f/software-engineering-architecture/multi-tenancy-isolation/shared-worker-pools-across-namespaces.md) — Allows templates in different atespaces to use the same worker pool, keeping logical separation between teams while sharing infrastructure. ([source](https://github.com/agent-substrate/substrate/blob/main/demos/multi-template/README.md))
- [Snapshot Fidelity Levels](https://awesome-repositories.com/f/software-engineering-architecture/snapshot-fidelity-levels.md) — Lets suspend capture memory, root filesystem, or only durable volumes, determining which state survives resume and which resets. ([source](https://github.com/agent-substrate/substrate/blob/main/demos/counter/README.md))

### Data & Databases

- [Agent State Snapshots](https://awesome-repositories.com/f/data-databases/consistency-tuning/point-in-time-snapshots/in-memory-state-snapshots/agent-state-snapshots.md) — Captures an agent's memory and filesystem state in snapshots and restores it intact after hibernation so sessions and tool state survive resume. ([source](https://github.com/agent-substrate/substrate#readme))

### DevOps & Infrastructure

- [Snapshot Capture and Restoration Managers](https://awesome-repositories.com/f/devops-infrastructure/sandbox-lifecycle-management/snapshot-capture-and-restoration-managers.md) — Captures an actor's memory and disk state into a snapshot on suspend and restores it onto any worker on resume. ([source](https://github.com/agent-substrate/substrate/blob/main/docs/reference/api-guide.md))
- [Stateful Agent Hosting](https://awesome-repositories.com/f/devops-infrastructure/stateful-agent-hosting.md) — Hosts long-running AI agents built with any framework as persistent actors that keep memory and filesystem state across idle periods. ([source](https://github.com/agent-substrate/substrate/blob/main/docs/reference/api-guide.md))
- [Oversubscribed Agent Sharing](https://awesome-repositories.com/f/devops-infrastructure/worker-pool-management/local-worker-pools/named-worker-pools/oversubscribed-agent-sharing.md) — Registers many more agents than workers against a shared pool, running only as many at once as capacity allows while others wait. ([source](https://github.com/agent-substrate/substrate/blob/main/demos/claude-code-multiplex/README.md))
- [Snapshot-Based Agent Multiplexing](https://awesome-repositories.com/f/devops-infrastructure/worker-pool-management/snapshot-based-agent-multiplexing.md) — Snapshots idle agents out of memory and restores them onto any free worker when a request arrives, running many stateful agents on few machines. ([source](https://github.com/agent-substrate/substrate#readme))
- [Actor Lifecycle Management](https://awesome-repositories.com/f/devops-infrastructure/custom-resource-definitions/lazy-resource-activation/actor-lifecycle-management.md) — Creates, updates, suspends, resumes, and reverts actors through API calls, including rolling a crashed actor back to its last snapshot. ([source](https://github.com/agent-substrate/substrate/blob/main/docs/reference/api-guide.md))
- [Eviction-Safe State Preservation](https://awesome-repositories.com/f/devops-infrastructure/eviction-safe-state-preservation.md) — Signals actors when their worker pod is removed and allows a synchronous suspend within a grace window so state survives drains and upgrades. ([source](https://github.com/agent-substrate/substrate/blob/main/docs/reference/api-guide.md))
- [Golden Snapshot Seeding](https://awesome-repositories.com/f/devops-infrastructure/golden-snapshot-seeding.md) — Boots a template once, snapshots it as a tagged baseline, and starts new actors from that warm state to skip cold-start initialization. ([source](https://github.com/agent-substrate/substrate/blob/main/docs/reference/api-guide.md))
- [Golden Snapshot Starts](https://awesome-repositories.com/f/devops-infrastructure/golden-snapshot-starts.md) — Captures a shared starting checkpoint at template creation so new workers restore from that saved state instead of booting from scratch. ([source](https://github.com/agent-substrate/substrate/blob/main/docs/reference/glossary.md))
- [Actor Worker Routing](https://awesome-repositories.com/f/devops-infrastructure/message-queue-workers/actor-worker-routing.md) — Maps a large set of mostly idle workloads onto a smaller pool of pre-started workers, assigning them in real time to raise density. ([source](https://github.com/agent-substrate/substrate/blob/main/docs/concepts/architecture.md))
- [Shared Worker Pools](https://awesome-repositories.com/f/devops-infrastructure/worker-pool-management/shared-worker-pools.md) — Lets multiple templates running different binaries draw from one shared worker pool so compute capacity is reused rather than duplicated per template. ([source](https://github.com/agent-substrate/substrate/blob/main/demos/multi-template/README.md))
- [Warm Worker Pools](https://awesome-repositories.com/f/devops-infrastructure/worker-pool-management/warm-worker-pools.md) — Defines a pool of standby worker pods ready to receive actor state so workloads start without waiting for fresh compute. ([source](https://github.com/agent-substrate/substrate/blob/main/docs/reference/api-guide.md))
- [Agent Workload Templates](https://awesome-repositories.com/f/devops-infrastructure/workload-orchestration/declarative-workload-descriptions/agent-workload-templates.md) — Declares the code, environment, resource limits, and state policies for a type of agent in one immutable blueprint that new actors are created from. ([source](https://github.com/agent-substrate/substrate/blob/main/docs/reference/api-guide.md))

### Networking & Communication

- [On-Demand Resume Routing](https://awesome-repositories.com/f/networking-communication/on-demand-resume-routing.md) — Directs inbound requests through a router that resumes the target agent on demand and can hold requests until a worker frees up instead of failing. ([source](https://github.com/agent-substrate/substrate/blob/main/README.md))
- [Header-Based Actor Routing](https://awesome-repositories.com/f/networking-communication/protocol-to-actor-bridging/header-based-actor-routing.md) — Routes HTTP, WebSocket and gRPC requests to a specific actor through a router using a target header, with a local proxy for development. ([source](https://github.com/agent-substrate/substrate/blob/main/docs/reference/api-guide.md))
- [Authenticated Edge Routers](https://awesome-repositories.com/f/networking-communication/authenticated-edge-routers.md) — Terminates inbound invocations at an edge router that authenticates callers and verifies policy before cold-starting or resuming an actor. ([source](https://github.com/agent-substrate/substrate/blob/main/docs/security/security.md))
- [Parked Request Holding](https://awesome-repositories.com/f/networking-communication/network-request-tools/request-prioritization-queues/runtime-request-queues/parked-request-holding.md) — Parks inbound requests at the router on an oversubscribed pool until a worker becomes available, instead of rejecting them with an error. ([source](https://github.com/agent-substrate/substrate#readme))
- [Default Deny Egress Policies](https://awesome-repositories.com/f/networking-communication/network-traffic-controllers/egress-controllers/default-deny-egress-policies.md) — Redirects an actor's outbound TCP through a tunnel to an egress gateway that allows or refuses each connection per the actor's egress policy. ([source](https://github.com/agent-substrate/substrate/blob/main/docs/guides/egress-traffic.md))
- [Default-Deny Postures](https://awesome-repositories.com/f/networking-communication/network-traffic-controllers/egress-controllers/default-deny-egress-policies/default-deny-ingress-policies/default-deny-postures.md) — Launches sandboxes and workers with default-deny networking, cutting off control plane paths and denying ingress to control plane pods except required flows. ([source](https://github.com/agent-substrate/substrate/blob/main/docs/security/security.md))
- [Egress Traffic Firewalls](https://awesome-repositories.com/f/networking-communication/network-traffic-controllers/egress-controllers/egress-traffic-firewalls.md) — Tunnels outbound actor traffic through an egress proxy that enforces destination policy and substitutes credentials so no ambient secrets live in the sandbox. ([source](https://github.com/agent-substrate/substrate/blob/main/docs/concepts/architecture.md))

### Operating Systems & Systems Programming

- [Snapshot-Based State Persistence](https://awesome-repositories.com/f/operating-systems-systems-programming/snapshot-based-state-persistence.md) — Snapshots a sandbox's memory and filesystem on suspend and restores them on resume, so files written earlier remain available in later sessions. ([source](https://github.com/agent-substrate/substrate/blob/main/demos/sandbox/README.md))

### Security & Cryptography

- [Credential Injection](https://awesome-repositories.com/f/security-cryptography/identity-based-access-brokers/credential-injection.md) — Adds API keys and tokens to approved outbound requests at an egress gateway, so a compromised agent never holds secrets it could exfiltrate. ([source](https://github.com/agent-substrate/substrate/blob/main/README.md))
- [Secure Sandboxing](https://awesome-repositories.com/f/security-cryptography/secure-sandboxing.md) — Runs each untrusted agent or tool in a dedicated gVisor or microVM sandbox so tenants share nodes without sharing a security boundary. ([source](https://github.com/agent-substrate/substrate/blob/main/docs/concepts/architecture.md))
- [Traffic Filtering](https://awesome-repositories.com/f/security-cryptography/traffic-filtering.md) — Routes actor outbound traffic through an egress proxy that checks identity, enforces destination allowlists, filters DNS, and injects credentials. ([source](https://github.com/agent-substrate/substrate/blob/main/docs/security/security.md))
- [Untrusted Workload Sandboxes](https://awesome-repositories.com/f/security-cryptography/untrusted-workload-sandboxes.md) — Runs each untrusted actor in its own strong compute sandbox with separate network namespace and storage, so actor code cannot reach the host or other actors. ([source](https://github.com/agent-substrate/substrate/blob/main/docs/security/security.md))
- [Workload Identity Authentication](https://awesome-repositories.com/f/security-cryptography/workload-identity-authentication.md) — Gives every actor a short-lived certificate and on-demand tokens while keeping sandboxes free of ambient credentials. ([source](https://github.com/agent-substrate/substrate/blob/main/docs/security/security.md))
- [MicroVM Sandboxes](https://awesome-repositories.com/f/security-cryptography/application-and-system-security/sandbox-and-isolation/isolated-execution-sandboxes/microvm-sandboxes.md) — Offers microVM and container-based sandbox classes behind one lifecycle, so isolation strength and restore behavior can be chosen per worker pool. ([source](https://github.com/agent-substrate/substrate/blob/main/docs/concepts/architecture.md))
- [Signing Key Rotation](https://awesome-repositories.com/f/security-cryptography/code-signing/signing-key-rotation.md) — Rotates actor signing keys by publishing a new key, waiting for relying parties to fetch it, activating it, then removing the old one. ([source](https://github.com/agent-substrate/substrate/blob/main/docs/guides/actor-jwt-key-rotation.md))
- [Egress-Triggered Placeholder Swaps](https://awesome-repositories.com/f/security-cryptography/credential-security/proxy-based-credential-injection/egress-triggered-placeholder-swaps.md) — Replaces a placeholder request header with a secret resolved by the gateway at send time, so the actor never holds the real secret. ([source](https://github.com/agent-substrate/substrate/blob/main/docs/guides/egress-credential-injection.md))
- [Agent Identities](https://awesome-repositories.com/f/security-cryptography/identity-and-access-management/agent-identities.md) — Gives each active agent a short-lived certificate and on-demand tokens so it is individually identifiable and can federate externally. ([source](https://github.com/agent-substrate/substrate#readme))
- [Namespace Partitions](https://awesome-repositories.com/f/security-cryptography/multi-tenant-isolation/logical-resource-partitioning/namespace-partitions.md) — Groups actors and snapshot storage paths into isolated partitions and authorizes API callers per partition using relationship-based access control. ([source](https://github.com/agent-substrate/substrate/blob/main/docs/security/security.md))
- [Default-Deny Agent Networking](https://awesome-repositories.com/f/security-cryptography/network-traffic-filtering/default-deny-agent-networking.md) — Applies default-deny networking with no lateral or control-plane access, routing inbound traffic through a router and filtering outbound requests through a replaceable policy-enforcing egress gateway. ([source](https://github.com/agent-substrate/substrate#readme))
- [Token Signature Verifiers](https://awesome-repositories.com/f/security-cryptography/public-key-authentication/token-signature-verifiers.md) — Validates actor tokens by checking issuer, signature against the published key set, audience, time claims, and subject so relying parties can trust callers. ([source](https://github.com/agent-substrate/substrate/blob/main/docs/guides/actor-jwts.md))
- [Workload Identity Federation](https://awesome-repositories.com/f/security-cryptography/workload-identity-federation.md) — Giving every actor a short-lived certificate and signed tokens so external services, cloud providers, and CI systems can verify which workload is calling and grant it access without stored secrets.

### System Administration & Monitoring

- [Agent Management Planes](https://awesome-repositories.com/f/system-administration-monitoring/agent-management-planes.md) — Registers many agents as actors under a control plane so each can be resumed, suspended, and tracked individually. ([source](https://github.com/agent-substrate/substrate/blob/main/demos/claude-code-multiplex/README.md))
- [End-to-End Message Tracing](https://awesome-repositories.com/f/system-administration-monitoring/end-to-end-message-tracing.md) — Samples and propagates distributed traces across gateway, router and workers so a request's full lifecycle appears in a tracing backend. ([source](https://github.com/agent-substrate/substrate/blob/main/docs/guides/observability.md))

### Part of an Awesome List

- [Agent Protocols and Standards](https://awesome-repositories.com/f/awesome-lists/devtools/agent-protocols-and-standards.md) — Kubernetes-native execution runtime for high-density, stateful AI-agent sandboxes.