CI/CD · decision tool

GitHub Actions vs GitLab CI — for your app, not in general

GitHub Actions or GitLab CI? Scored on documented capabilities for your requirements — the honest fit comparison, with "No clear winner" when they're genuinely close.

Capabilities verified 2026-07-17 against official documentation · fit weights are our estimates (see methodology) · share the URL to share your configuration

As of Jul 2026, for this page's default requirements, GitHub Actions is the clear pick at 84% capability fit (GitLab CI: 36%). This is a capability-fit decision, not a price ranking — StackSays does not invent a unified dollar comparison across these tools' incompatible billing units. Change any requirement below and the verdict recomputes.

Your requirements

The verdict updates as you change these. Share the URL to share your answers.

Where your code livesnative CI is the least setupWant generous free minuteslive on the free tierWant self-hosted runnerscheap compute on your own infraComplex pipelinesmatrices, orbs, heavy caching

Clear pick

GitHub Actions (84% fit)

Ranked by capability fit

GitHub Actions vs GitLab CI — the tradeoffs that decide it

Native to your git host: GitHub Actions — Native to GitHub — zero integration, runs where your code is (documented). GitLab CI — An extra integration outside GitHub.
Free-tier generosity: GitHub Actions — Generous free minutes (verified). GitLab CI — Free minutes are more limited.

When to pick GitLab CI instead: when the lines above where it leads matter more to you than the ones where GitHub Actions leads. Change the inputs to see the ranking flip.

This is a capability-fit decision, not a price ranking — these tools bill in incompatible units (per-search vs per-RAM cluster vs per-PB scanned) and several publish rates only in their own calculators, so StackSays does not invent a unified dollar comparison. Every score above traces to a documented capability; see Data sources below.

At a glance

Tool	Deployment	Open source	Verified
GitHub Actions	Self-hosted	No	2026-07-17
GitLab CI	Self-hosted	Yes	2026-07-17

Where did you land?anonymous, one click

Data sources

Tool	Source	Verified
GitHub Actions	GitHub Actions pricing (free minutes verified)	2026-07-17
GitLab CI	GitLab pricing (capabilities)	2026-07-17

A monitor re-checks these pages for changes; when a vendor moves a price, the date updates and every verdict recomputes.

Keep deciding

Compare head-to-head

CircleCI vs GitHub Actions — for your app, not in general →CircleCI vs Buildkite — for your app, not in general →Buildkite vs GitHub Actions — for your app, not in general →CircleCI vs GitLab CI — for your app, not in general →Buildkite vs GitLab CI — for your app, not in general →

Alternatives

GitHub Actions alternatives — ranked for your stack →GitLab CI alternatives — ranked for your stack →CircleCI alternatives — ranked for your stack →Buildkite alternatives — ranked for your stack →

← All GitHub Actions vs GitLab CI vs CircleCI Developer Tools & CI/CD channel →