Figment vs VunCloud: Mac Hosting Compared

Direct verdict

VunCloud's entry Mac mini M4 (16 GB / 256 GB) lists at $101.70/month on vuncloud.com, with daily, weekly, monthly, and quarterly cadences across six regions. Figment's M-series entry is from $95/month, with the exact chip, RAM, and storage confirmed in the written quote — so this is an entry-price comparison, not an equal-hardware comparison. For a verified like-for-like M4/16/256 fit, ask Figment to quote that configuration.

If you need CI pipeline setup, backups, monitoring, and a named support allowance bundled into one monthly price, Figment's Managed Build Mac at $249/month on one M-series Mac is the plan to evaluate; VunCloud publishes bare rental only.

For projects that stay on Intel toolchains, Figment's virtual Intel macOS VM at $29/month (2 vCPU, 8 GiB RAM, 80 GiB disk) runs supported Intel Xcode — Xcode 26 or earlier per Apple's porting guide — and can cross-compile and sign universal or arm64 targets. Access is through the browser console; it is not an Apple silicon machine, and Xcode 27, visionOS, and ARM-only execution need an M-series host.

See all Figment Mac plans · Request a configuration quote

Published plan, term and effective cost

Prices read from vuncloud.com/en/index.html on 2026-11-10 and Figment's published retail offers.

Tax and fees apply as stated in each provider's own offer at checkout; we do not estimate them here. Neither provider publishes a public uptime SLA in the pages we checked — report what your own contract states, and do not infer reliability from the absence of a number.

Worked cost check: when managed earns the premium

The bare entry delta is small: $101.70 − $95 = $6.70/month in Figment's favour at the entry tier, equal hardware not yet confirmed. The more useful question for most teams is whether Managed Build ($249) − VunCloud M4 Base ($101.70) = $147.30/month is worth it. Price it against what you spend today:

If an in-house engineer spends even two hours a month on these tasks, the managed premium typically clears. If you already run this stack at no marginal cost, benchmark Figment M-series (from $95) against VunCloud's $101.70 and decide on hardware fit instead.

Hardware, access and toolchain fit

VunCloud ships physical Apple M4 hardware with SSH/VNC console access, a dedicated public IPv4, 1 Gbps bandwidth, and six regions (Singapore, Japan, South Korea, Hong Kong, US East, US West). Power operations are ticket-driven — note that if your CI needs scripted host restarts.

Figment's M-series plans are physical Macs provisioned on request; the chip, RAM, storage, region, access method, and macOS version are set in the quote rather than pre-published. The $29 virtual Intel macOS VM runs on Linux/KVM, is reached through its browser desktop (inbound SSH is not available), and has no GPU acceleration or audio. It can still run compatible Intel Xcode toolchains, cross-compile arm64 device apps, produce universal macOS binaries, and sign supported targets.

Xcode and macOS compatibility (verified against Apple's Xcode system requirements on 2026-11-10 and Apple's Apple-silicon porting guide):

• Xcode 27 targeting macOS 27 / DriverKit 27 must run on Apple silicon. Use VunCloud M4 or a Figment M-series Mac.
• Xcode 26 and earlier can run on Intel, so the $29 VM is a viable host for those versions. Check the exact Xcode/macOS pair at Apple's page before provisioning — version rows differ.
• visionOS development requires Apple silicon regardless of Xcode version.
• macOS Tahoe runs on both Apple silicon and a published set of Intel Macs; it is not Apple-silicon-only.

If your CI publishes heavily to Asia-region App Store Connect endpoints, VunCloud's Tokyo, Seoul, Hong Kong, or Singapore nodes may shave latency; test with the probe below before committing.

A buyer's worksheet, not a benchmark

Published build-speed or latency numbers from either vendor are not something we've verified, so the useful artifact is a short test you run yourself. The examples below are unexecuted — use them as a starting template, not a benchmark result.

Latency probe from your CI agent or laptop:

#!/usr/bin/env bash
set -euo pipefail
# Replace with the hostnames each vendor assigns after signup.
for HOST in "your-vuncloud-host.example" "your-figment-host.example"; do
  echo "--- $HOST ---"
  ping -c 10 "$HOST" | tail -3
done

Build-time sanity check, run on the candidate Mac using your own project (not a fabricated scheme):

#!/usr/bin/env bash
set -euo pipefail
: "${SCHEME:?set to your real Xcode scheme name}"
: "${WORKSPACE:?set to the full path of YourApp.xcworkspace}"

echo "=== Host ==="
sw_vers
system_profiler SPHardwareDataType | grep -E "Chip|Processor|Memory"

echo "=== Clean build ==="
rm -rf "$HOME/Library/Developer/Xcode/DerivedData"
time xcodebuild clean build \
  -workspace "$WORKSPACE" \
  -scheme "$SCHEME" \
  -destination 'generic/platform=iOS' \
  CODE_SIGNING_ALLOWED=NO

Run three clean builds, take the median of successful runs only, and compare in the same region. A non-zero exit is not a data point.

VunCloud-to-Figment migration steps

This is written for a VunCloud account that is already in production. Adapt it to your CI.

Before you cancel VunCloud

• Request a Figment quote at /mac-hosting/start. Confirm chip, RAM, disk, region, access method, macOS version, and monthly price in writing.
• Agree an evaluation window on the Figment side so you can run parallel builds before you cut over.
• Inventory tooling on the VunCloud host:

  brew list --formula > ~/brew-formulae.txt
  brew list --cask    > ~/brew-casks.txt
  ls /Applications | grep -i Xcode > ~/xcode-versions.txt
  

• Export each signing identity as an encrypted .p12 from Keychain Access (right-click the identity → Export → Personal Information Exchange, strong password). Do not export the whole keychain. Do not write environment variables to a plaintext file; some may contain keys.
• Copy provisioning profile files from ~/Library/MobileDevice/Provisioning Profiles/ to your artifact store or a secure share. Provisioning profiles are files, not Keychain items.
• Record the names of required secrets (API keys, tokens, CI variables). Restore the values on the new host through your CI service's secret manager.
• Note the VunCloud host's outbound IPv4. If anything in your stack allowlists it — your artifact store, internal firewall, or CI service — plan the swap for the Figment IP. There is no generic App Store Connect or TestFlight IP allowlist to update.
• Archive the working tree: tar czf project-$(date +%Y%m%d).tar.gz ~/projects/YourApp.

On the Figment host

• Replay Homebrew packages:

  /bin/bash -c "$(curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/Homebrew/install/HEAD/install.sh)"
  xargs brew install          < ~/brew-formulae.txt
  xargs brew install --cask   < ~/brew-casks.txt
  

• Install the Xcode version your project needs from developer.apple.com/download. Match it to the macOS build on the host.
• Import the .p12 into the login keychain on the new Mac and unlock it for the CI user before signing jobs run.
• Drop the provisioning profile files back into ~/Library/MobileDevice/Provisioning Profiles/.
• Load secrets from your secret manager into the CI job environment; do not paste literals into shell history.
• Update any customer-controlled allowlists with the new Figment IP.
• Run the build-time check above; confirm a full green build before you cancel VunCloud.

Only then cancel VunCloud, after a clean CI run on Figment and after every team member has the new access credentials.

Pick the Figment plan

The i3 Mac at $49/month and any physical plan outside the retail list are request-based while supply is confirmed — treat an availability window as part of the quote, not as instant stock.

Explore Figment Mac hosting · Start with a configuration quote

Related reading

• Figment vs YourMini
• Figment vs Zavcloud
• Cloud Mac vs keeping an office Mac