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From model to agent: Equipping the Responses API with a computer environment

OpenAI Blog / 3/11/2026

💬 OpinionDeveloper Stack & InfrastructureTools & Practical Usage

Key Points

  • OpenAI documents building an agent runtime that combines the Responses API, the shell tool, and hosted containers to let agents run with files, tools, and persistent state.
  • The approach emphasizes secure sandboxing and scalable deployment to support many concurrent agents without data or state leakage.
  • The design enables agents to access external tools and resources, enabling more complex tasks beyond prompt-only interactions.
  • The articleframes this as a practical step from language models to a full agent platform, outlining architectural tradeoffs in security, tooling, and performance.
How OpenAI built an agent runtime using the Responses API, shell tool, and hosted containers to run secure, scalable agents with files, tools, and state.