Runc website screenshot

Runc

runc is a CLI tool for spawning and running containers on Linux according to the OCI (Open Container Initiative) specification. It is the reference implementation of the OCI runtime specification and is used as the default low-level container runtime by Docker, containerd, Podman, and other container platforms. runc manages container lifecycle operations including creating, starting, pausing, resuming, killing, and deleting containers. It implements the OCI Runtime Specification and exposes a command-line interface that higher-level runtimes use to manage individual container instances. runc also supports checkpoint/restore via CRIU, rootless containers (no root privileges needed via user namespaces), cgroup v2, seccomp syscall filtering, AppArmor, SELinux, and Intel Memory Protection Extensions. The current stable release line is 1.3.x (runc 1.5.0 expected late April 2026).

Runc publishes 1 API on the APIs.io network. Tagged areas include Container Runtime, Containers, Linux, OCI, and Open Source.

The Runc catalog on APIs.io includes 1 JSON-LD context and 1 Spectral governance ruleset.

Runc’s developer surface includes engineering blog, documentation, and 6 more developer resources.

🌐 Visit website 📡 Source on GitHub
34.8/100 thin ▬ flat Agent 3/100 human only Full breakdown ↓
scored 2026-07-28 · rubric v0.6
AccessFreemium
1 APIs
Container RuntimeContainersLinuxOCIOpen SourceCNCFOpen Container InitiativeCloud Native

Kin Score

Kin Score Kin Score How this is scored →
scored 2026-07-28 · rubric v0.6
Composite quality — 34.8/100 · thin
Contract Quality 5.7 / 25
Developer Ergonomics 2.2 / 20
Commercial Clarity 7.9 / 20
Operational Transparency 6.2 / 13
Governance 7.0 / 12
Discoverability 5.9 / 10
Agent readiness — 3/100 · human only
Machine-Readable Contract 0 / 18
Agentic Access Contract 0 / 10
MCP Server 0 / 12
Machine-Readable Auth 0 / 10
Idempotency 0 / 9
Stable Error Semantics 0 / 8
Request/Response Examples 0 / 7
Rate-Limit Signaling 7 / 7
Typed Event Surface 0 / 6
Agent Skills 0 / 5
Well-Known Catalog 0 / 4
Consent & Bot Identity 0 / 3
A2A Agent Card 0 / 8
Dry-Run / Simulate Mode 0 / 4
Improve this rating by publishing the missing artifacts — every area above can be raised, and the full rubric is at apis.io/rating/. This rating is computed from github.com/api-evangelist/runc: open an issue to ask a question, or submit a pull request to add artifacts. Want it done for you? Prioritized profiling — $2,500 →

APIs 1

Individual APIs this provider publishes, each with its own machine-readable definition.

Runc

runc is a CLI tool for spawning and running containers on Linux according to the OCI (Open Container Initiative) specification. It is the reference implementation of the OCI run...

Pricing Plans 1

Published pricing tiers and plan structures.

Runc Plans Pricing

3 plans

PLANS

Rate Limits 1

Documented rate limits and quota policies.

Runc Rate Limits

5 limits

RATE LIMITS

FinOps 1

Cost, billing, and metering signals for API financial operations.

Runc Finops

FINOPS

Semantic Vocabularies 1

JSON-LD contexts and semantic vocabularies used across these APIs.

Runc Context

43 classes · 5 properties

JSON-LD

Spectral Rules 1

Spectral governance rulesets for linting and validating these APIs.

Runc API Rules

5 rules · 3 warnings 2 info

SPECTRAL

JSON Schema 1

Standalone JSON Schema definitions for this provider's data models.

OCI Runtime Container Configuration

8 properties

JSON SCHEMA

JSON Structure 1

JSON Structure definitions describing this provider's data shapes.

Runc Container Config Structure

0 properties

JSON STRUCTURE

Examples 1

Example request and response payloads for these APIs.

Runc Container Config Example

7 fields

EXAMPLE

Security Posture 1

Authentication, domain security, vulnerability disclosure, and trust-center signals.

Runc Domain Security

TLSv1.3 · HSTS

SECURITY

Resources

Documentation 2

Reference material describing how the API behaves

Documentation
Documentation
 Specification
Specification

Build 2

SDKs, sample code, and the tooling you integrate with

GitHubOrganization
GitHubOrganization
 GitHubRepository
GitHubRepository

Access & Security 2

Authentication, authorization, and security posture

DomainSecurity
DomainSecurity
 Security
Security

Company 2

The organization behind the API

Website
Website
 Blog
Blog

Source (apis.yml)

apis.yml Raw ↑ 
aid: runc
name: Runc
description: runc is a CLI tool for spawning and running containers on Linux according to the OCI (Open Container Initiative)
  specification. It is the reference implementation of the OCI runtime specification and is used as the default low-level
  container runtime by Docker, containerd, Podman, and other container platforms. runc manages container lifecycle operations
  including creating, starting, pausing, resuming, killing, and deleting containers. It implements the OCI Runtime Specification
  and exposes a command-line interface that higher-level runtimes use to manage individual container instances. runc also
  supports checkpoint/restore via CRIU, rootless containers (no root privileges needed via user namespaces), cgroup v2, seccomp
  syscall filtering, AppArmor, SELinux, and Intel Memory Protection Extensions. The current stable release line is 1.3.x (runc
  1.5.0 expected late April 2026).
type: Index
accessModel:
  pricing: freemium
  onboarding: unknown
  trial: false
  try_now: false
  public: false
  label: Freemium
  confidence: medium
  source:
  - plans
  generated: '2026-07-22'
  method: derived
position: Consumer
access: 3rd-Party
image: https://kinlane-images.s3.amazonaws.com/shared/apis-json/icons/runc.png
tags:
- Container Runtime
- Containers
- Linux
- OCI
- Open Source
- CNCF
- Open Container Initiative
- Cloud Native
url: https://raw.githubusercontent.com/api-evangelist/runc/refs/heads/main/apis.yml
created: '2026-03-26'
modified: '2026-05-02'
specificationVersion: '0.19'
apis:
- aid: runc:runc
  name: Runc
  description: 'runc is a CLI tool for spawning and running containers on Linux according to the OCI (Open Container Initiative)
    specification. It is the reference implementation of the OCI runtime specification, providing a lightweight and portable
    container runtime that can be used independently or embedded into higher-level container systems like Docker and containerd.
    runc implements the full OCI Runtime Spec lifecycle: create, start, state, kill, delete. It also supports checkpoint/restore
    via CRIU, rootless containers, and cgroup v2. The container configuration is defined in a config.json file following the
    OCI Runtime Specification schema.'
  humanURL: https://github.com/opencontainers/runc
  tags:
  - Container Runtime
  - Containers
  - Linux
  - OCI
  - Open Source
  - CNCF
  - Open Container Initiative
  - Cloud Native
  properties:
  - type: Documentation
    url: https://github.com/opencontainers/runc/blob/main/README.md
  - type: GettingStarted
    url: https://github.com/opencontainers/runc#creating-an-oci-bundle
  - type: GitHubRepository
    url: https://github.com/opencontainers/runc
  - type: Specification
    url: https://github.com/opencontainers/runtime-spec
  - type: ReleaseNotes
    url: https://github.com/opencontainers/runc/releases
  - type: License
    url: https://github.com/opencontainers/runc/blob/main/LICENSE
  - type: Security
    url: https://github.com/opencontainers/runc/blob/main/SECURITY.md
  - type: ChangeLog
    url: https://github.com/opencontainers/runc/blob/main/CHANGELOG.md
  - type: JSONSchema
    url: json-schema/runc-container-config-schema.json
  - type: JSONStructure
    url: json-structure/runc-container-config-structure.json
  - type: JSONLD
    url: json-ld/runc-context.jsonld
  - type: Examples
    url: examples/runc-container-config-example.json
  - type: Vocabulary
    url: vocabulary/runc-vocabulary.yml
common:
- type: DomainSecurity
  url: security/runc-domain-security.yml
- type: Website
  url: https://opencontainers.org/
- type: GitHubOrganization
  url: https://github.com/opencontainers
- type: GitHubRepository
  url: https://github.com/opencontainers/runc
- type: Blog
  url: https://opencontainers.org/posts/blog/
- type: Documentation
  url: https://github.com/opencontainers/runc/blob/main/README.md
- type: Specification
  url: https://github.com/opencontainers/runtime-spec
- type: Security
  url: https://github.com/opencontainers/runc/blob/main/SECURITY.md
maintainers:
- FN: Kin Lane
  email: kin@apievangelist.com