Developer Sandboxes in Yokohama: True Isolation for ServiceNow Devs

[Travis Toulson]

For too long, ServiceNow developers have had to battle with shared instances, conflicting changes, and limited source control support. But that changes with the Developer Sandboxes introduced in the Yokohama release.

In the latest Creator Toolbox episode, I sit down with product experts Anthony Tang and Jivanjot Kaur to walk through what developer sandboxes are, how they work, and why they’re a big deal.

What Are Developer Sandboxes?

Developer Sandboxes allow up to 30 isolated environments per instance. These are lightweight replicas of your base instance where individual developers can work independently without stepping on each other's toes.

No more:

• Accidental overwrites

• Constant coordination to avoid conflict

• Juggling feature branches manually

Each sandbox can connect to source control with its own branch, so developers can use real Git workflows without the limitations of one branch per app.

Live Demo Highlights

• Provisioning new sandboxes from the management dashboard

• Working in Studio in an isolated environment

• Committing changes to Git using individual feature branches

• Resolving merge conflicts using standard Git tools

• Switching between sandboxes and maintaining full isolation

How It Helps Your Team

• ✅ Enables true parallel development

• ✅ Reduces merge conflicts and errors

• ✅ Supports modern Git-based workflows

• ✅ Easy cleanup and resource management

• ✅ Works with Pro-Code SDK and IDE tools

Caveats & Next Steps

There’s a 30 sandbox limit per instance (due to infrastructure), and you’ll need to work with ServiceNow to get set up. But the potential here is huge, especially when combined with newer pro-code tooling that eliminates the pain of XML-based app development.

If you're ready to level up your team’s workflow and embrace a more Git-native process, Developer Sandboxes are the tool you've been waiting for.