console

CI providers: reviews, pricing and alternatives

Choosing CI means deciding where builds run, how pipelines are maintained and who owns the infrastructure when something fails. We look at 11 services in depth, then compare the architectures, company backgrounds and costs of all 48 providers in the wider directory.

By Last updated Read as Markdown ↗

Continuous integration (CI) builds and tests code changes as they enter a shared repository. A pipeline describes the work; runners or agents are the machines that execute it. This guide includes full CI platforms, replacement runners and tools that work alongside CI, so a shared category does not imply that every product does the same job.

Console reviews are independent. Buildkite, WarpBuild and Depot have previously advertised in our newsletter, but are not sponsors on this page. Our assessments discuss the situations each service fits and the tradeoffs involved; there is no overall winner. How we approached the comparison ↗

The editorial shortlist

Our Top 11

Our Top 11 is an alphabetical shortlist of the services reviewed in depth, not a ranking. If you want to keep GitHub Actions and change its runners, start with WarpBuild, Depot, Blacksmith and Namespace. For a different pipeline platform, compare Buildkite, GitLab CI, CircleCI and AWS CodeBuild. Dagger makes workflows reusable locally and in CI; Nx focuses on organising work across a monorepo. GitHub Actions remains the baseline for teams already working in GitHub. Workflow compatibility describes integration support; it does not by itself establish a drop-in replacement.

Cloud only

AWS CodeBuild

Best forTeams deploying onto AWS, especially those already using other AWS services — it connects through your VPC and inherits AWS IAM, security and logging

Last reviewed 1 November 2026

CodeBuild fits teams that already deploy onto AWS. It connects to AWS identity and access management, or IAM, as well as VPC networking and logging. That lets the build service work within the permissions and infrastructure the team already operates.

There are several execution choices: Lambda for smaller jobs, managed build machines, or continuously running reserved EC2 instances. The useful question is which of those models fits your workloads and existing AWS environment.

The tradeoff is AWS itself. The system is powerful but complicated, with a less approachable interface than a drop-in runner service. It is easier to justify as part of an existing AWS deployment than as a reason to move to AWS.

Company

  • Amazon
  • Founded 1994
  • Public (Nasdaq: AMZN)
  • HQ Seattle, USA

Architectures

Linux ARM
Yes
macOS
Apple Silicon
Windows x64
Yes
Windows ARM
No

Deployment

  • Cloud only
  • Self-hosted: No (hosted build fleets)
  • GitHub Actions compatibility: Yes
  • Open source: No
  • Free tier: Yes

Cloud only / Actions runners

Blacksmith

Best forTeams on GitHub Actions who want faster builds with the least possible migration effort

Last reviewed 7 November 2026

Blacksmith focuses on replacing GitHub Actions runners rather than supplying a broader CI platform. That keeps adoption simple for teams that want to retain their workflows. Its runners use bare-metal infrastructure, and the review highlights unlimited concurrency, caching and developer-experience improvements such as failed-test logs posted inline on GitHub.

The Linux and Windows execution model uses ephemeral Firecracker microVMs. These are lightweight virtual machines with hardware isolation between tenants; their state is destroyed after each job. The infrastructure also uses local NVMe storage, a storage interface suited to directly attached solid-state drives. These are architectural differences, not evidence of a measured performance advantage in this comparison.

The limitations follow from the product’s focus. It has fewer platform features than Buildkite or Depot and does not support personal GitHub accounts. Its separate [code]smith agent platform also shows the company expanding beyond runners.

Read the Console review ↗

Company

  • Founded 2024
  • Raised ~$125M
  • HQ San Francisco, USA

Architectures

Linux ARM
Yes
macOS
Apple Silicon
Windows x64
Yes
Windows ARM
No

macOS uses M4 machines. Hosted Windows x64 is in public beta.

Deployment

  • Cloud only
  • No self-hosted option.
  • GitHub Actions compatibility: Yes
  • Open source: No
  • Free tier: Yes

Hybrid

Buildkite

Best forTeams that want CI as a well-designed product in its own right, and are happy to run their own workers for scale; teams with specialised workloads or particular test targets, and larger teams where cloud costs become prohibitive

Last reviewed 7 November 2026

Buildkite stands out through the combination of its design, developer experience and control over execution. Its pipelines can change while a build is running: a step generates and uploads more steps, which can depend on earlier results. That is the useful distinction behind “dynamic pipelines”, rather than programmability alone.

You can mix your own agents with Buildkite-hosted agents in one pipeline. An agent is the worker that executes a job. Keeping selected jobs on your infrastructure lets you use custom hardware or connect to an existing environment, while other jobs run in Buildkite’s cloud. This is particularly relevant to specialised workloads and teams whose infrastructure requirements have outgrown a standard hosted setup.

Test Engine adds analysis and management of flaky tests: tests that fail inconsistently can be muted or disabled at failure thresholds so they stop blocking a pipeline. The overall product feels thoughtfully designed. The cost of that control is operational work if you manage your own workers; using the hosted cloud changes that tradeoff.

Company

  • Founded 2013
  • Raised US$39M (A$59.2M)
  • HQ Melbourne, Australia

Architectures

Linux ARM
Yes
macOS
Apple Silicon
Windows x64
Yes
Windows ARM
No

Hosted ARM64 availability is unclear: the docs say Enterprise only while the pricing page implies Pro includes it. Hosted macOS uses M4 machines.

Deployment

  • Hybrid
  • Self-hosted agents support your own ARM hardware through official aarch64 packages.
  • GitHub Actions compatibility: Partial
  • Open source: No
  • Free tier: Yes

Hybrid

CircleCI

Best forEnterprises — that is clearly where it is targeted; and teams whose builds have outgrown GitHub Actions and who will invest the configuration time to make it pay

Last reviewed 7 November 2026

CircleCI is an established independent CI service with a clear enterprise focus. It works with GitHub, GitLab and Bitbucket, so the build system can remain separate from your choice of source-code host. Its hosted environments cover Docker, Linux, Windows, ARM, Apple-silicon macOS and GPUs.

The interesting engineering is in how it distributes work. Test splitting divides a suite across execution environments using previous runs, while caching and dependency analysis avoid repeating unchanged work. Smarter Testing adds test-impact selection, dynamic splitting and automatic reruns. Making that useful requires time spent on configuration; this is not a product whose value comes simply from connecting a repository.

The interface feels dated, and the commercial model adds complexity. Seats and usage draw from a credit pool, with additional meters and billable-user rules to understand. SSO through SAML and configuration policies require the quote-only Scale plan. CircleCI Server can put the platform on your Kubernetes infrastructure, but source-code encryption at rest and the history of its secrets breach remain diligence concerns in the review.

Company

  • Founded 2011
  • Raised $315.5M
  • HQ San Francisco, USA

Architectures

Linux ARM
Yes
macOS
Apple Silicon
Windows x64
Yes
Windows ARM
No

Deployment

  • Hybrid
  • Self-hosted: Yes (hosted runners)
  • GitHub Actions compatibility: Partial
  • Open source: No
  • Free tier: Yes

Hybrid

Dagger

Best forEngineering teams who want the same checks locally and in CI, and who think of a pipeline as code and interfaces rather than YAML steps

Last reviewed 7 November 2026

Dagger treats a pipeline as a piece of software you can run and inspect locally. Its CLI and engine detect the project, dependencies and tests, then set up checks that can also run in the cloud on top of existing CI. Dagger Cloud supplies a hosted service, but adopting the engine does not require abandoning your current CI system.

The SDKs let you express work through functions, objects, checks, services and generators. A module packages that work behind a named interface, rather than leaving it as a sequence of commands someone has to remember. That can be useful both to engineers and to agents calling the same workflow.

This is an engineering investment rather than a drop-in runner migration. Your existing CI still has to run, and you still pay for it. The module approach earns its complexity when a workflow needs a durable interface that can be reused; for a simple pipeline, it can be more machinery than you need.

Company

  • Founded 2018
  • Raised $30M
  • HQ San Francisco, USA

Architectures

Linux ARM
Yes
macOS
Agent only
Windows x64
No
Windows ARM
No

Deployment

  • Hybrid
  • Self-hosted: Yes (Linux container engine)
  • GitHub Actions compatibility: No
  • Open source: Open core
  • Free tier: Yes

Hybrid / Actions runners

Depot

Best forTeams who want the drop-in Actions replacement now, with the option of a fuller managed CI platform later

Last reviewed 7 November 2026

Depot offers two related products: drop-in GitHub Actions runners and a fuller CI platform with programmable pipelines. The runners are a straightforward starting point, while the platform is where the broader functionality lives. That gives teams a way to adopt it gradually.

Depot manages the execution environment and bills per second. Failed builds can be investigated through log search and SSH access to the instance. SSH gives you an interactive connection to the machine, which can help when logs do not explain its current state. How useful that is still depends on the debugging tools available once you connect.

Its BYOC option keeps the runners in your account while Depot manages the control plane, but it is limited to AWS. Teams using Azure or GCP should account for that restriction. It is also important to distinguish the scope of the runner replacement from the scope of the full platform: the quick migration does not give you every platform capability.

Company

  • Founded 2022
  • Raised $16.6M
  • HQ Beaverton, Oregon, USA

Architectures

Linux ARM
Yes
macOS
Apple Silicon
Windows x64
Yes
Windows ARM
No

Deployment

  • Hybrid
  • Self-hosted: Yes (hosted GitHub Actions runners)
  • GitHub Actions compatibility: Yes
  • Open source: No
  • Free tier: No

Hybrid

GitHub Actions

Best forDevelopers and teams already using GitHub — a generous free allowance, and a large ecosystem of actions for many scenarios

Last reviewed 7 November 2026

GitHub Actions makes sense when your code and team are already on GitHub. Builds sit alongside pull requests, notifications and the rest of the repository workflow. Its large marketplace of reusable actions gives you plenty of building blocks, and the included build minutes make it easy to get started.

The tradeoff is how much work happens inside GitHub. Reproducing a workflow locally is difficult, so debugging can turn into a cycle of pushing changes and inspecting remote failures. The minutes allowance also covers other activity, including Copilot code review on private repositories, which can make usage harder to anticipate.

Security needs deliberate attention. Pinning an action to a commit ID fixes the exact version of third-party code your workflow will execute. That matters in an ecosystem where compromised actions, token permissions and workflow triggers have all been attack routes. The broad ecosystem is useful, but it also becomes something your team must maintain. Once workflows are established, moving is painful unless the destination is compatible.

Company

  • GitHub
  • Founded 2008
  • Raised $350M before acquisition
  • HQ San Francisco, USA
  • Acquired by Microsoft in 2018 ($7.5B)

Architectures

Linux ARM
Yes
macOS
Both
Windows x64
Yes
Windows ARM
Yes

Deployment

  • Hybrid
  • Self-hosted: Yes (hosted runners)
  • GitHub Actions compatibility: Native
  • Open source: No
  • Free tier: Yes

Hybrid

GitLab CI

Best forTeams already using GitLab — it is valuable as part of the suite, not on its own

Last reviewed 7 November 2026

GitLab CI is most compelling as part of GitLab. Build results, notifications and merge requests stay in one place, and the suite’s self-hosting and open-source roots are part of its appeal. A team already using GitLab gets a coherent workflow without another service to integrate.

Pipelines use structured stages to describe how work progresses. That is a predictable model, although it also compensates for a smaller ecosystem of reusable actions than GitHub’s. An all-in-one suite can give coding agents a single toolchain to work with, too.

Its value is much less convincing in isolation. Choosing GitLab CI means choosing a component of the broader suite, rather than a standalone build service. Self-hosting is worth considering when you need particular hardware or want to operate your own infrastructure, but that also makes the infrastructure your responsibility.

Company

  • GitLab
  • Founded 2011
  • Raised ~$435M pre-IPO
  • HQ San Francisco, USA
  • Public (Nasdaq: GTLB)

Architectures

Linux ARM
Yes
macOS
Apple Silicon
Windows x64
Yes
Windows ARM
No

Deployment

  • Hybrid
  • Self-hosted: Yes (hosted SaaS runners)
  • GitHub Actions compatibility: No
  • Open source: Open core
  • Free tier: Yes

Cloud only / Actions runners

Namespace

Best forTeams who want faster Actions or Bazel runners now, and are interested in the wider Namespace platform of dev environments and sandboxes

Last reviewed 7 November 2026

Namespace supplies drop-in runners for GitHub Actions and Bazel, with a clearer interface for understanding what the runners are doing. Dependencies can be cached on attached NVMe storage or installed in a runner’s base image before a job starts. The review also describes a service largely operated on Namespace’s own bare-metal infrastructure.

The runners are one part of a wider platform that includes development environments and sandboxes. Connecting those pieces can make the development workflow more coherent, which is where much of the product’s appeal lies.

As a standalone runner replacement, its scope is relatively limited. Evaluate it in the context of whether you want that wider platform, rather than assuming the runners alone provide the same value. We have not treated its vendor performance claims as benchmark results.

Company

  • Namespace Labs
  • Founded 2022
  • Raised $65M
  • HQ Zurich, Switzerland

Architectures

Linux ARM
Yes
macOS
Apple Silicon
Windows x64
Yes
Windows ARM
No

Deployment

  • Cloud only
  • Self-hosted: No (hosted GitHub Actions runners)
  • GitHub Actions compatibility: Yes
  • Open source: No
  • Free tier: No

Hybrid

Nx

Best forTeams with a growing JavaScript or TypeScript monorepo whose builds and CI are slowing down

Last reviewed 7 November 2026

Nx is a task runner and build system centred on JavaScript and TypeScript monorepos. A monorepo keeps multiple projects in one repository. Nx models the relationships between those projects and the tasks they need, then uses caching and change detection to avoid repeating unaffected work.

The local task runner can execute targets in parallel, while Nx Cloud adds remote caching, task distribution and self-healing CI. Framework plugins provide generators, executors and migrations. The workspace can include different languages, but support is not equally deep: Java and .NET have official integrations, while Python, Go and Rust rely on community plugins. Other stacks can use generic task execution and caching.

Nx complements your CI rather than replacing it. Its fuller distributed workflow depends on Nx Cloud, and adopting its graph and tooling is a substantial commitment. It is most relevant when the monorepo is large enough that organising the work itself has become a problem.

Read the Console review ↗

Company

  • Nrwl
  • Founded 2016
  • Raised $24.6M
  • HQ Gilbert, Arizona, USA

Architectures

Linux ARM
Yes
macOS
None
Windows x64
Yes
Windows ARM
No

Deployment

  • Hybrid
  • Self-hosted: Yes (hosted Nx Agents)
  • GitHub Actions compatibility: No
  • Open source: Open core
  • Free tier: Yes

Hybrid / Actions runners

WarpBuild

Best forTeams on GitHub Actions who want cheaper runners without changing their workflows — and teams who want the runners inside their own cloud

Last reviewed 7 November 2026

WarpBuild replaces the runners behind GitHub Actions while keeping the workflow model. It offers usage-based pricing without seat fees or concurrency caps, and a macOS image selection that includes older versions for testing. That makes it relevant when the workflow itself is satisfactory but the execution environment is not.

Its distinguishing option is bring your own cloud, or BYOC. WarpBuild manages the control plane—the service that coordinates and provisions runners—while the machines run in your AWS, Azure or GCP account. You can use existing virtual private clouds, or VPCs, and spot instances without building the runner deployment and autoscaling system yourself.

It is still a newer, smaller provider than the platform incumbents. Network configuration also deserves attention: enabling static IPs puts the runners behind a NAT gateway, which translates network addresses and introduces processing and egress charges. Those costs belong in the evaluation alongside the runner bill.

Company

  • Founded 2021
  • HQ San Francisco, USA

Architectures

Linux ARM
Yes
macOS
Apple Silicon
Windows x64
Yes
Windows ARM
No

Deployment

  • Hybrid
  • Self-hosted: Yes (hosted GitHub Actions runners)
  • GitHub Actions compatibility: Yes
  • Open source: No
  • Free tier: Yes

The reference

Compare all 48 providers

The wider category includes full platforms, runner services and tools for building or deploying software. Hybrid services combine hosted infrastructure with runners you operate; cloud-only services run the infrastructure for you. Self-hosted tools leave that responsibility with your team.

ARM and x64 describe CPU architectures, which determine which binaries and machine images can run. In the table, “Agent only” means the macOS component is an agent rather than a hosted macOS build machine. A dash means no comparable published value. Follow a provider’s source link for qualifications.

Listed alphabetically. Best for reflects the 11 reviews; other entries are not assessed.
ProviderLinux ARMmacOSWindows x64Windows ARMDeploymentCompanyBest for
AppVeyor[1]NoIntelYesNoHybrid — hosted cloud and self-hostedFounded 2011 · Bootstrapped · HQ Vancouver, Canada · SourceNot assessed
Argo CD[2]YesAgent onlyYesNoSelf-hosted onlyOpen-source project (2018, built at Intuit; Argo began at Applatix in 2017) · CNCF graduated project · SourceNot assessed
AWS CodeBuild[3]YesApple SiliconYesNoCloud only — no self-hosted optionAmazon — founded 1994 · Public (Nasdaq: AMZN) · HQ Seattle, USA · SourceTeams deploying onto AWS, especially those already using other AWS services — it connects through your VPC and inherits AWS IAM, security and logging
AWS CodePipeline[4]————Cloud only — no self-hosted optionAmazon — founded 1994 · Public (Nasdaq: AMZN) · HQ Seattle, USA · SourceNot assessed
Azure Pipelines[5]Self-hosted onlyBothYesSelf-hostedHybrid — hosted cloud and self-hostedMicrosoft — founded 1975 · Public (Nasdaq: MSFT) · HQ Redmond, USA · SourceNot assessed
Bitbucket Pipelines[6]Self-hosted onlyAgent onlyYesNoHybrid — hosted cloud and self-hostedAtlassian — founded 2002 · Raised $210M pre-IPO · HQ Sydney, Australia · Public (Nasdaq: TEAM) · SourceNot assessed
Bitrise[7]NoApple SiliconNoNoHybrid — hosted cloud and self-hostedFounded 2014 · Raised ~$100M · HQ Budapest, Hungary · SourceNot assessed
Blacksmith[8]YesApple SiliconYesNoCloud only — no self-hosted optionFounded 2024 · Raised ~$125M · HQ San Francisco, USA · SourceTeams on GitHub Actions who want faster builds with the least possible migration effort
Buddy[9]YesNoneNoNoHybrid — hosted cloud and self-hostedFounded 2015 · Bootstrapped · HQ Warsaw, Poland · SourceNot assessed
Buildkite[10]YesApple SiliconYesNoHybrid — hosted cloud and self-hostedFounded 2013 · Raised US$39M (A$59.2M) · HQ Melbourne, Australia · SourceTeams that want CI as a well-designed product in its own right, and are happy to run their own workers for scale; teams with specialised workloads or particular test targets, and larger teams where cloud costs become prohibitive
Celesto[11]NoNoneNoNoCloud only — no self-hosted optionCelesto AI, Inc. · Backed by Grayscale Ventures · No funding round, founding year or HQ published on its own site · SourceNot assessed
Cilicon[12]—Apple Silicon——Self-hosted onlyOpen-source project (2023), stewarded by Trade Republic · No company or funding · Berlin, Germany · SourceNot assessed
CircleCI[13]YesApple SiliconYesNoHybrid — hosted cloud and self-hostedFounded 2011 · Raised $315.5M · HQ San Francisco, USA · SourceEnterprises — that is clearly where it is targeted; and teams whose builds have outgrown GitHub Actions and who will invest the configuration time to make it pay
Codemagic[14]NoApple SiliconYesNoCloud only — no self-hosted optionNevercode — founded 2017 · Raised $1.5M · HQ Tartu, Estonia (UK holding company) · SourceNot assessed
Concourse[15]YesBothYesNoSelf-hosted onlyOpen-source project (begun at Pivotal, 2014) · No funding · Steward: Cloud Foundry Foundation · SourceNot assessed
Dagger[16]YesAgent onlyNoNoHybrid — hosted cloud and self-hostedFounded 2018 · Raised $30M · HQ San Francisco, USA · SourceEngineering teams who want the same checks locally and in CI, and who think of a pipeline as code and interfaces rather than YAML steps
Depot[17]YesApple SiliconYesNoHybrid — hosted cloud and self-hostedFounded 2022 · Raised $16.6M · HQ Beaverton, Oregon, USA · SourceTeams who want the drop-in Actions replacement now, with the option of a fuller managed CI platform later
Devbox (Jetify)[18]YesBothNoNoHybrid — hosted cloud and self-hostedJetify (formerly Jetpack) — founded 2020 · Raised $10M · HQ Oakland, USA · SourceNot assessed
Docker Build Cloud[19]Yes—NoNoCloud only — no self-hosted optionDocker — founded 2008 (as dotCloud; Docker launched 2013) · Raised ~$434M · HQ Palo Alto, USA · SourceNot assessed
Flox Build & Publish[20]YesBothNoNoHybrid — hosted cloud and self-hostedFlox — founded 2021 · Raised $66.4M · HQ New York, USA · SourceNot assessed
GetMac[21]NoApple SiliconNoNoCloud only — no self-hosted optionOperator, founding and HQ not disclosed anywhere on its own site · All hardware fully owned by GetMac, in a TIER III, ISO-certified data centre · SourceNot assessed
GitHub Actions[22]YesBothYesYesHybrid — hosted cloud and self-hostedGitHub — founded 2008 · Raised $350M before acquisition · HQ San Francisco, USA · Acquired by Microsoft in 2018 ($7.5B) · SourceDevelopers and teams already using GitHub — a generous free allowance, and a large ecosystem of actions for many scenarios
GitLab CI[23]YesApple SiliconYesNoHybrid — hosted cloud and self-hostedGitLab — founded 2011 · Raised ~$435M pre-IPO · HQ San Francisco, USA · Public (Nasdaq: GTLB) · SourceTeams already using GitLab — it is valuable as part of the suite, not on its own
Gitness (now Harness Open Source)[24]YesAgent onlyYesNoSelf-hosted onlyHarness — founded 2017 · Raised $570M equity · HQ San Francisco, USA · SourceNot assessed
GoCD[25]YesBothYesNoSelf-hosted onlyThoughtworks — founded 1993 · HQ Chicago, USA · GoCD is its open-source product · SourceNot assessed
Google Cloud Build[26]NoNoneNoNoCloud only — no self-hosted optionGoogle — founded 1998 · Public (Alphabet) · HQ Mountain View, USA · SourceNot assessed
HardenRunner[27]YesBothYesNoHybrid — hosted cloud and self-hostedStepSecurity — founded 2021 · Raised $3M · HQ Seattle, USA · SourceNot assessed
Harness CI[28]YesApple SiliconYesNoHybrid — hosted cloud and self-hostedHarness — founded 2017 · Raised $570M equity · HQ San Francisco, USA · SourceNot assessed
Jenkins[29]Self-hosted onlyAgent onlyYesNoSelf-hosted onlyOpen-source project (2011, forked from Hudson) · No funding · Steward: CD Foundation; main commercial vendor is CloudBees · SourceNot assessed
Moonrepo[30]YesBothYesNoHybrid — hosted cloud and self-hostedFounded 2022 · Raised $500K (Y Combinator) · HQ Portland, USA · SourceNot assessed
Namespace[31]YesApple SiliconYesNoCloud only — no self-hosted optionNamespace Labs — founded 2022 · Raised $65M · HQ Zurich, Switzerland · SourceTeams who want faster Actions or Bazel runners now, and are interested in the wider Namespace platform of dev environments and sandboxes
Northflank[32]NoNoneNoNoHybrid — hosted cloud and self-hostedFounded 2019 · Raised $22M (Series A + seed) · HQ London, UK · SourceNot assessed
Nx[33]YesNoneYesNoHybrid — hosted cloud and self-hostedNrwl — founded 2016 · Raised $24.6M · HQ Gilbert, Arizona, USA · SourceTeams with a growing JavaScript or TypeScript monorepo whose builds and CI are slowing down
Octopus Deploy[34]YesNoneYesNoHybrid — hosted cloud and self-hostedFounded 2011 · Raised $202.5M · HQ Brisbane, Australia · SourceNot assessed
RunsOn[35]YesNoneYesNoSelf-hosted onlyFounded 2023 · Bootstrapped (solo founder) · HQ Rennes, France · SourceNot assessed
Semaphore[36]YesApple SiliconYesNoHybrid — hosted cloud and self-hostedRendered Text — founded 2009 · Bootstrapped · HQ Novi Sad, Serbia · SourceNot assessed
Shipyard[37]————Cloud only — no self-hosted optionFounded 2020 · Raised $2.3M · HQ Brooklyn, New York, USA · Acquired by StackGen (Sep 2026) · SourceNot assessed
Spacelift[38]YesNoneNoNoHybrid — hosted cloud and self-hostedFounded 2020 (Warsaw, Poland) · Raised $73.6M · HQ Redwood City, USA · SourceNot assessed
Spinnaker[39]————Self-hosted onlyOpen-source project (created at Netflix, open-sourced 2015) · No company or funding · Steward: CD Foundation (Linux Foundation); donated by Netflix and Google in 2019 · SourceNot assessed
Sprinters[40]YesNoneNoNoSelf-hosted onlyInfrastructureX GmbH · HQ Munich, Germany · Founding year not disclosed (its Terms are dated 18 Sep 2024) · SourceNot assessed
TeamCity[41]Self-hosted onlyBothYesNoHybrid — hosted cloud and self-hostedJetBrains — founded 2000 · Bootstrapped, no VC · HQ Prague, Czech Republic · SourceNot assessed
Tekton[42]YesNoneYesNoSelf-hosted onlyOpen-source project (2019, originated at Google) · No funding · Steward: CD Foundation · SourceNot assessed
Tenki[43]NoApple SiliconNoNoCloud only — no self-hosted optionTenki Cloud, LLC — a wholly owned subsidiary of Luxor Technology Corporation (operating since 2017, from Bitcoin mining infrastructure) · Tenki launched summer 2025 · No standalone funding disclosed · SourceNot assessed
Travis CI[44]YesNoneYesNoHybrid — hosted cloud and self-hostedFounded 2011 · Raised ~$135K disclosed · HQ Berlin, Germany · Acquired by Idera in 2019 · SourceNot assessed
Ubicloud[45]YesNoneNoNoHybrid — hosted cloud and self-hostedFounded 2023 · Raised $16M · HQ San Francisco, USA · SourceNot assessed
Vercel CI[46]NoNoneNoNoCloud only — no self-hosted optionFounded 2015 (as ZEIT) · Latest round $300M Series F at a $9.3B valuation (Sep 2025) · HQ San Francisco, USA · SourceNot assessed
WarpBuild[47]YesApple SiliconYesNoHybrid — hosted cloud and self-hostedFounded 2021 · HQ San Francisco, USA · SourceTeams on GitHub Actions who want cheaper runners without changing their workflows — and teams who want the runners inside their own cloud
Woodpecker[48]YesAgent onlyYesNoSelf-hosted onlyCommunity open-source project (2019, forked from Drone CI) · No company or funding · SourceNot assessed

Understanding the bill

Platform fees and build fees

Pricing verified 1 November 2026; targeted corrections verified 8 November 2026.

A CI bill usually has two parts. The platform fee buys access to the service, often per user or per plan. The build fee pays for execution, usually by the minute. A low subscription price can still produce a substantial bill once usage grows, while a more expensive plan can include enough minutes to change the comparison.

Platform fees

These are the charges before additional build usage. Free allowances, trials and paid subscriptions have different limits, so read the included capacity alongside the headline price.

CI platform fees across 48 providers
Provider Free tier Cheapest paid plan Source
AppVeyor Free for open-source / public projects $29/mo Basic Pricing
Argo CD Free, open source (Apache 2.0), self-hosted Free / open source Pricing
AWS CodeBuild 100 free build minutes/month (build.general1.small) No platform fee; pay-as-you-go only Pricing
AWS CodePipeline Free tier: 1 free active pipeline/mo (V1); 100 free action execution minutes/mo (V2) $1/active pipeline/month (V1); V2 $0.002 per action execution minute Pricing
Azure Pipelines 1 free Microsoft-hosted parallel job (1,800 min/mo) plus 1 free self-hosted job $40/mo per extra hosted parallel job; Basic $6/user/mo after 5 free users Pricing
Bitbucket Pipelines Free plan for up to 5 users, 50 build minutes/mo Standard $3.65/user/mo Pricing
Bitrise Hobby free forever, 300 credits/month, 1 private app $89/month Starter billed annually ($99 monthly) Pricing
Blacksmith 3,000 free minutes/month Pay-as-you-go, no platform fee Pricing
Buddy Free plan, 1 seat, $1/month usage credit $29/month Pro Pricing
Buildkite Free plan, up to 5 users, 10 concurrent jobs, 2,000 Linux vCPU-min/mo Pro $30/active user/mo Pricing
Celesto $5 trial credit (up to 20,000 Micro runner minutes, 30 days, no card) No platform fee — prepaid credit, billed per runtime minute Pricing
Cilicon Free, open source Free / open source Pricing
CircleCI Free plan, 30,000 credits/mo, up to 5 active users Performance from $15/mo Pricing
Codemagic 500 free macOS M2 minutes/month (individual accounts) Pay-as-you-go, no base fee; annual plans from $3,990/year Pricing
Concourse Free open-source, full product Free / open source Pricing
Dagger Free open-source engine, self-hosted $20/mo Starter (Dagger Cloud) Pricing
Depot None (7-day free trial, no card required) $20/month Developer plan Pricing
Devbox (Jetify) Devbox CLI free and open source; Solo plan first month free Solo $5/month flat (includes $5 usage credits) Pricing
Docker Build Cloud Personal plan free; Build Cloud 7-day trial only $9/user/month Pro billed annually ($11 monthly) Pricing
Flox Build & Publish Personal plan free (CLI, 3 private FloxHub envs) Not public Pricing
GetMac Free plan: 100 compute min/mo and 1 concurrent VM, no card required; free runners for qualifying open-source projects $11.99/mo (Developer) including 1,000 compute min and 1 concurrent VM; the Free plan is $0 Pricing
GitHub Actions Free plan with 2,000 min/mo for private repos; public repos free Team $4/user/mo Pricing
GitLab CI Free tier, 400 compute minutes/mo on shared runners Premium $29/user/mo, billed annually Pricing
Gitness (now Harness Open Source) Free, open source, self-hosted; included in Harness Free plan Free / open source Pricing
GoCD Free open-source, full product Free / open source Pricing
Google Cloud Build 2,500 free build-minutes/month per billing account No platform fee; pay-as-you-go only Pricing
HardenRunner Community tier free for public repositories Enterprise $16/contributing developer/month Pricing
Harness CI Free plan for individuals and small teams Not public — Essentials and Enterprise via sales Pricing
Jenkins Entire product free Free / open source Pricing
Moonrepo moon CLI free, open source (MIT) Free / open source Pricing
Namespace None (Developer plan is pay-as-you-go, no fixed fee) Team $100/month with included plan minutes Pricing
Northflank Free Developer Sandbox: up to $20/mo of resources (2 services, 2 jobs, 1 database); builds included, metered as compute Pay-as-you-go, no platform fee Pricing
Nx Hobby free: 50k credits/month, 5 contributors Team $29/mo including $29 usage credit; five contributors included, then $19/contributor/mo Pricing
Octopus Deploy Free tier: 10 projects, 10 tenants, 10 machines, 10 users $104/project/year (Professional) Pricing
RunsOn Free for OSS, non-profits and non-commercial use €300/year flat licence (Starter, under 50k jobs/month) Pricing
Semaphore $15 monthly credits (~2,000 Linux minutes); free open-source Community Edition No platform fee, pay-as-you-go; support add-ons from $50/mo Pricing
Shipyard 30-day free trial Not public; extra Drydocks $100/month Pricing
Spacelift Free: 2 users, 1 public worker Starter from $399/mo Pricing
Spinnaker Free, open source (Apache 2.0) Free / open source Pricing
Sprinters Free for public repositories; 1,000 jobs free in the first 30 days for private repositories No subscription — $0.01 per job for private repositories Pricing
TeamCity Free on-prem Professional edition (3 build agents, 100 build configurations) TeamCity Cloud from $15/committer/mo (minimum 3 committers) Pricing
Tekton Free open-source framework, full product Free / open source Pricing
Tenki $100 in free credits for new accounts ($50 on sign-up, $50 when a payment method is added; ≈25,000 min on the standard 2 vCPU runner) $0 — Starter plan is pay-as-you-go with no seat fees; cheapest subscription Team $200/mo billed yearly, including $100/mo of usage credits Pricing
Travis CI None listed, free trial only $15/mo Usage Based Pricing
Ubicloud $2.50/month account credit (~1,250 runner minutes) Usage-based, no seat fee Pricing
Vercel CI No published free CI allowance (Beta available on all plans, incl. free Hobby) Pro: $0.0035 per CPU minute, usage-based; no separate CI plan fee Pricing
WarpBuild Free usage credits on signup (amount not stated) Usage-based, no seat fee Pricing
Woodpecker Free, open source (Apache 2.0) Free / open source Pricing

Build fees

The unit matters as much as the rate. A vCPU-minute measures one virtual CPU used for one minute; it is not necessarily the same amount of work as a minute on another provider’s machine. Self-hosted software can have no build fee while still requiring hardware and someone to operate it.

CI build fees across 48 providers
Provider Build fees Source
AppVeyor Included in plan, flat by concurrent jobs; extra concurrent job $50/mo, no per-minute hosted fees Pricing
Argo CD Self-hosted on own Kubernetes cluster, no build fees Pricing
AWS CodeBuild Per-minute: Linux general1.small $0.005/min, medium $0.01/min, large $0.02/min Pricing
AWS CodePipeline No build fees of its own — builds are billed by the action provider (e.g. CodeBuild); plus S3 artifact storage Pricing
Azure Pipelines Flat per parallel job with unlimited minutes on paid jobs; no per-minute build fees Pricing
Bitbucket Pipelines Build minutes included per plan (Standard 2,500/mo, Premium 3,500/mo); extra minutes $10 per 1,000 Pricing
Bitrise Included in Starter (unlimited usage); Pro per-minute infra: Linux $0.0022+, macOS $0.0072+ Pricing
Blacksmith Per-minute: Linux $0.004/min, ARM $0.0025/min, Windows $0.008/min, macOS $0.08/min Pricing
Buddy Pay-as-you-go usage from $0.00024 per CPU-minute / GB-minute Pricing
Buildkite Self-hosted compute unmetered (extra agents $3.50/agent/mo); hosted agents per vCPU-minute: Linux $0.004, Mac $0.02 Pricing
Celesto Per-minute by size: Micro (1 vCPU/2 GB) $0.00025, Standard (2/4 GB) $0.0005, Memory (2/8 GB) $0.00067, XL (8/32 GB) $0.00267; billed minutes include runner prep and cleanup Pricing
Cilicon Self-hosted on your own Macs, no build fees Pricing
CircleCI Credits per minute by resource class (1 credit = $0.0006; Linux medium ≈ $0.006/min); self-hosted runners unmetered Pricing
Codemagic Per-minute: Linux/Windows $0.045/min, macOS M2 $0.095/min, M4 $0.114/min Pricing
Concourse Self-hosted, no build fees Pricing
Dagger Cloud usage-based: CPU $0.005/CPU-min new work, $0.001 repeat; plan minimum or usage, whichever higher; plus metered memory, input and output charges Pricing
Depot Billed per second: 2,000 minutes included, then $0.006/min (2-vCPU Linux) Pricing
Devbox (Jetify) Usage past credits: Devspace $0.39 per 4-vCPU hour; deploys $0.10/vCPU/hr Pricing
Docker Build Cloud Included minutes: Pro 200/month, Team 500/month, Business 1,500/month; extra minutes purchasable Pricing
Flox Build & Publish No build fees; builds run locally or in your own CI Pricing
GetMac No per-minute tariff — minutes are bundled in plans: Developer $11.99/1,000 min (≈$0.012/min), Team $33.99/3,000 min (≈$0.011/min), Business $110.99/10,000 min. Only the Mac M4 Base (4 cores/8 GB) is live, at a 1× usage multiplier; M4 Pro (2×) and M4 Max (4×) are listed as coming soon Pricing
GitHub Actions Per-minute: Linux $0.006/min, Windows $0.010/min, macOS $0.062/min; self-hosted free Pricing
GitLab CI Compute minutes included in plan (Premium 10,000/mo, Ultimate 50,000/mo); extra minutes $10 per 1,000; own runners free Pricing
Gitness (now Harness Open Source) Self-hosted, no build fees Pricing
GoCD Self-hosted, no build fees Pricing
Google Cloud Build Per-minute: e2-medium $0.003/min, e2-standard-2 $0.006/min, highcpu up to $0.064/min Pricing
HardenRunner No build fees; licensed per contributing developer, not per build minute Pricing
Harness CI Per-minute Harness Cloud: Linux from $0.005/min, Windows $0.020/min, macOS $0.180/min Pricing
Jenkins Self-hosted only, no build fees Pricing
Moonrepo No build fees; runs in your CI, remote cache self-hosted (hosted Moonbase sunset) Pricing
Namespace Per-minute credits: Linux from $0.001/min prepaid, $0.0015/min overage (1 vCPU) Pricing
Northflank Per-second compute billing ($0.01667/vCPU-hour + $0.00833/GB-hour); default build plan 4 vCPU/16 GB ≈ $0.20/build-hour Pricing
Nx Credits: 500 per CI execution; Nx Agents 5–52 credits/min; extra credits $5.50/10k Pricing
Octopus Deploy No per-minute build fees; per project plus Cloud task-cap platform fee Pricing
RunsOn Runs in your own AWS account; EC2 spot at cost, no markup (~$0.0013/min) Pricing
Semaphore Per-minute: Linux ARM $0.003/min, Linux x64 $0.0075/min, macOS $0.09/min, self-hosted $0.0025/min Pricing
Shipyard No build fees; flat subscription per Drydock (concurrent ephemeral environment) Pricing
Spacelift Flat plans priced by worker count; no per-minute or per-run fees Pricing
Spinnaker No build fees — Spinnaker has no build step; it runs on your infrastructure and deploys what your CI system built Pricing
Sprinters No per-minute rate: $0.01/job flat (private repos) plus your own EC2 on-demand/spot charges, billed by AWS to your account. Sprinters' own worked example totals ≈$0.0016/min all-in on a 4 vCPU spot instance Pricing
TeamCity Cloud builds consume build credits (24,000/mo included); self-hosted agents have no build fees Pricing
Tekton Self-hosted on Kubernetes, no build fees Pricing
Tenki Per second, from per-vCPU rates — x64 $0.002/vCPU/min: small 2c-4g $0.004/min, medium 4c-8g $0.008, large 8c-16g $0.016, large-plus 16c-32g $0.032; macOS $0.020/vCPU/min: mini 2c-4g $0.040, small 4c-8g $0.080, medium 6c-16g $0.120, large 8c-32g $0.160 Pricing
Travis CI Credit-based: 35,000 Linux build credits/mo included; Unlimited plan has unlimited credits Pricing
Ubicloud Per-minute: Linux standard from $0.00125/min, premium from $0.002/min (2 vCPU) Pricing
Vercel CI Per CPU minute (CPUs × wall-clock per task, rounded up to the next second; cached or unaffected tasks not billed); Enterprise custom Pricing
WarpBuild Per-minute: cloud Linux $0.004/min (2 vCPU); BYOC $0.002/min plus your cloud bill Pricing
Woodpecker Self-hosted, no build fees Pricing

What 1,000 and 10,000 minutes cost

The worked example uses each provider’s cheapest eligible Linux machine, includes free allowances and assumes one paid seat at 10,000 minutes where charges are per seat. The 1,000-minute column retains free plans where eligible. The machines differ, so this is a comparison of billing models rather than equivalent performance. A dash means there is no comparable published build-minute price; the basis column explains why.

Monthly CI costs for 1,000 and 10,000 build minutes
Provider 1,000 min/mo 10,000 min/mo Basis Source
AppVeyor $29 $29 Basic plan is flat with minutes included at both volumes; no per-minute fees Pricing
Argo CD — — CD tool — deploys what your CI built; the software itself is free and self-hosted Pricing
AWS CodeBuild $4.50 $49.50 100 free min/mo, then Linux general1.small at $0.005/min Pricing
AWS CodePipeline — — Orchestration only — no build minutes of its own; builds are billed by CodeBuild etc. Pipelines cost $1/active pipeline/mo Pricing
Azure Pipelines $0 $40 Free hosted job includes 1,800 min/mo; beyond that, a paid parallel job ($40/mo) carries unlimited minutes Pricing
Bitbucket Pipelines $3.65 $78.65 One Standard seat ($3.65/user/mo) includes 2,500 min/mo; extra minutes are $10 per 1,000 (7,500 extra at 10k) Pricing
Bitrise $89 $89 Starter ($89/mo billed annually) includes unlimited usage at both volumes; per-minute Pro rates exist, but the plan price is the derivable figure Pricing
Blacksmith $0 $28 3,000 free minutes/month, then Linux at $0.004/min (7,000 paid minutes at 10k) Pricing
Buddy — — Metered per CPU-minute and GB-minute from $0.00024 — the bill depends on machine size, so no single figure; Pro plan is $29/mo Pricing
Buildkite $0 ≈$54 At 1k, Free; at 10k, Pro ($30/user/mo, includes 4,000 Linux vCPU-min) plus hosted agents at $0.004/vCPU-min for the remaining 6,000 Pricing
Celesto $0.25 $2.50 Cheapest size (Micro, 1 vCPU/2 GB) at $0.00025/min; like-for-like 2 vCPU/8 GB (Memory) is $0.67 / $6.67. Billed minutes include runner prep and cleanup Pricing
Cilicon $0 $0 Free and open source — runs on your own Macs Pricing
CircleCI $0 ≈$45 At 1k, Free; at 10k, Performance includes 30,000 free credits and five users. Linux medium uses 10 credits/min; the remaining 70,000 credits require three 25,000-credit blocks at $15 each = $45. The $15/month starting price is the minimum credit purchase, not an additional plan fee Pricing
Codemagic $45 $450 Pay-as-you-go Linux at $0.045/min, no base fee (the 500 free minutes are macOS only); committed annual plans may undercut at volume Pricing
Concourse $0 $0 Free and open source — self-hosted on your infrastructure Pricing
Dagger $20 $50 Dagger Cloud: $0.005/CPU-min of new work with a $20/mo Starter minimum — the minimum binds at 1k, usage ($50) at 10k; excludes metered memory, input and output charges Pricing
Depot $20 $68 Developer plan $20/mo includes 2,000 minutes, then $0.006/min (8,000 extra at 10k) Pricing
Devbox (Jetify) — — No hosted CI minutes — builds run locally or in your own CI Pricing
Docker Build Cloud — — Pro ($9/user/mo) includes only 200 build minutes and even Business only 1,500; no comparable extra-minute rate is included in this example Pricing
Flox Build & Publish — — No hosted build service — builds run locally or in your own CI, so there are no build minutes to buy Pricing
GetMac — — macOS-only — it sells no Linux minutes to price (its Developer plan bundles 1,000 macOS minutes for $11.99/mo) Pricing
GitHub Actions $0 $46 At 1k, Free; at 10k, Team: $4/user/mo for one seat, 3,000 included minutes; $4 + 7,000 × $0.006 = $46 Pricing
GitLab CI $29 $29 Free tier's 400 compute min/mo is not enough; one Premium seat ($29/user/mo, billed annually) includes 10,000 — so 10k costs the same as 1k Pricing
Gitness (now Harness Open Source) $0 $0 Free and open source — self-hosted Pricing
GoCD $0 $0 Free and open source — self-hosted Pricing
Google Cloud Build $0 $22.50 2,500 free build-minutes/mo per billing account, then e2-medium at $0.003/min (7,500 paid minutes at 10k) Pricing
HardenRunner — — Not a runner — it secures GitHub Actions; licensed per contributing developer ($16/dev/mo Enterprise), with no build fees Pricing
Harness CI $5 $50 Harness Cloud Linux at $0.005/min; the plan itself is sales-priced, so these are usage costs only Pricing
Jenkins $0 $0 Free and open source — self-hosted on your infrastructure Pricing
Moonrepo — — Runs inside your own CI — there are no build minutes to buy; the tool itself is free and open source Pricing
Namespace $1 $10 Prepaid Linux credits from $0.001/min (1 vCPU); no fixed fee on the Developer plan Pricing
Northflank $0 ≈$33 Builds metered as compute: the default build plan (4 vCPU/16 GB, ≈$0.20/build-hour) costs ≈$3.33 per 1,000 min — inside the free Sandbox's $20/mo allowance at 1k, ≈$33 at 10k Pricing
Nx $0 From $29; usage-dependent Small Linux agents use 5 credits/min: 10,000 minutes consume 50,000 credits, plus 500 per CI execution and other metered usage. Team starts at $29/mo including $29 usage credit and five contributors; the total depends on execution count and usage. At 1k, Hobby is free only while total usage remains within 50,000 credits. Credit pricing Pricing
Octopus Deploy — — CD tool — no build minutes sold; Professional is $104/project/year Pricing
RunsOn ≈$26 ≈$38 Licence €300/yr (≈€25/mo) plus EC2 spot compute at cost in your own AWS account (≈$1.30 per 1,000 min) Pricing
Semaphore $0 $60 $15 of free monthly credits ≈ 2,000 Linux minutes, then x64 at $0.0075/min (8,000 paid minutes at 10k) Pricing
Shipyard — — No build minutes — flat subscription per Drydock environment; pricing not public Pricing
Spacelift $0 $0 Free plan (1 public worker) is unmetered in the published pricing at both volumes; paid plans are flat by worker count (Starter from $399/mo), never per minute Pricing
Spinnaker — — No build step at all — it deploys what your CI system built; the software is free and self-hosted Pricing
Sprinters — — Priced per job, not per minute — $0.01/job (private repos; public repos free) plus EC2 at cost in your own AWS account; a minutes figure needs a job-count assumption Pricing
TeamCity From $45 From $45 TeamCity Cloud from $15/committer/mo (3-committer minimum) with 24,000 build credits/mo included. The amounts shown are subscription minimums; build-credit consumption determines the total cost. The free on-prem Professional edition would make both $0 on your own hardware Pricing
Tekton $0 $0 Free and open source — self-hosted on Kubernetes Pricing
Tenki $0 $0 $100 of new-account credits covers ≈25,000 minutes on the standard 2 vCPU runner ($0.004/min) — both volumes run free; at list rates beyond the credits it would be $4 / $40 Pricing
Travis CI $15 $15 Cheapest plan ($15/mo Usage Based) includes 35,000 Linux build credits/mo at both volumes; the minute yield varies by machine size Pricing
Ubicloud $0 $10 Standard Linux from $0.00125/min (2 vCPU); the $2.50/mo account credit covers the first ~1,250 minutes Pricing
Vercel CI $3.50 $35 Pro usage at $0.0035 per CPU minute; tasks restored from cache or skipped as unaffected are not billed, so a real bill can be lower Pricing
WarpBuild $4 $40 Cloud Linux runners at $0.004/min (2 vCPU); no seat fee Pricing
Woodpecker $0 $0 Free and open source — self-hosted Pricing

Cost, in context

Cheapest CI

The hosted shortlists below compare only the 11 services reviewed in depth. The wider directory includes runner utilities with lower headline rates, but mixing those into this shortlist would change what is being compared. Platform cost and execution cost answer different questions, so we keep them separate.

Lowest platform fees

AWS CodeBuild and WarpBuild charge no platform or seat fee. Blacksmith lists usage prices with no separate seat fee shown. Namespace has a $0 platform fee on the pay-as-you-go Developer tier (Team plan is $100/mo). GitHub Actions Team follows at $4 per user per month, with CircleCI Performance starting at $15 per month. Seats become significant as a team grows: 20 GitHub Actions Team seats cost $80 per month before additional build usage.

Lowest platform fees among the 11 reviewed services
# Provider Platform fee The catch
1 Blacksmith, AWS CodeBuild, WarpBuild, Namespace $0 — no separate platform or seat fee listed Blacksmith lists usage prices with no separate seat fee shown. Namespace: $0 platform fee on the pay-as-you-go Developer tier (Team plan is $100/mo). You pay per build minute instead — see the build-fees list
2 GitHub Actions (Team) $4/user/mo Includes plan minutes; per-user fee scales with team size
3 CircleCI (Performance) From $15/mo Per-seat plus usage, both paid from one credit pool; the enterprise Scale tier is quote-only

Lowest Linux build rates

Namespace has the lowest listed rate in this group, but it applies to prepaid credits for a 1-vCPU machine. Blacksmith’s $0.004 per minute comes after its free allowance; WarpBuild matches that rate, while Buildkite meters by vCPU-minute. CodeBuild’s entry rate is $0.005 per minute. Those distinctions are why the unit and included capacity belong next to the price.

Lowest hosted Linux build rates among the 11 reviewed services
# Provider Build fee The catch
1 Namespace From $0.001/min (prepaid credits, 1 vCPU) The cheapest rate in the 11, but the smallest machine class — not like-for-like with the 2 vCPU rows below; needs prepaid credits
2 Blacksmith $0.004/min (Linux, after 3,000 free minutes/mo) Bare-metal runners; WarpBuild matches the rate at $0.004/min, and Buildkite's hosted agents are $0.004/vCPU-min
3 AWS CodeBuild $0.005/min (Linux general1.small, after 100 free min/mo) Dagger Cloud is also $0.005/CPU-min, with a $20/mo minimum, plus metered memory, input and output charges

At 10,000 minutes, the worked example puts Namespace at $10, Nx from $29 (usage-dependent), Blacksmith at $28 and GitLab CI at $29. The remaining figures are WarpBuild $40, CircleCI approximately $45, GitHub Actions $46, AWS CodeBuild $49.50, Dagger Cloud $50, Buildkite approximately $54 and Depot $68. Allowances, minimum charges and included minutes change the order you would infer from rates alone.

Free software still needs infrastructure

Jenkins, Concourse, Tekton, GoCD, Woodpecker, Gitness, Argo CD, Cilicon, Moonrepo and Spinnaker have no platform or build licence fee in the wider comparison. Their roles differ, and the cost of hardware and operation remains. GitLab CI and Dagger are open core, combining an open-source foundation with commercial functionality. Choosing between them requires looking at the workflow you want to operate, not just a zero in the pricing table.

Beyond the shortlist

The wider directory

These 37 entries extend the comparison with company and architecture facts. We have not added review opinions or Best for recommendations. The links let you inspect the underlying documentation where a capability needs closer examination.

Hybrid — hosted cloud and self-hosted

Cloud only — no self-hosted option

Celesto

GitHub Actions runner service

Company
  • Celesto AI, Inc.
  • Backed by Grayscale Ventures
  • No funding round, founding year or HQ published on its own site
Architectures
Linux ARM
No
macOS
None
Windows x64
No
Windows ARM
No
Deployment
  • Cloud only
  • Self-hosted: No (hosted runners: Ubuntu 24.04 Linux x64 only, six sizes Micro–XL)
  • GitHub Actions compatibility: Yes
  • Open source: Open core
  • Free tier: No

GetMac

GitHub Actions runner service

Company
  • Operator, founding and HQ not disclosed anywhere on its own site
  • All hardware fully owned by GetMac, in a TIER III, ISO-certified data centre
Architectures
Linux ARM
No
macOS
Apple Silicon
Windows x64
No
Windows ARM
No
Deployment
  • Cloud only
  • Self-hosted: No (hosted runners: macOS on M4 Mac minis only (Sonoma/Sequoia/Tahoe images))
  • GitHub Actions compatibility: Yes
  • Open source: No
  • Free tier: Yes

Tenki

GitHub Actions runner service

Company
  • Tenki Cloud, LLC — a wholly owned subsidiary of Luxor Technology Corporation (operating since 2017, from Bitcoin mining infrastructure)
  • Tenki launched summer 2025
  • No standalone funding disclosed
Architectures
Linux ARM
No
macOS
Apple Silicon
Windows x64
No
Windows ARM
No
Deployment
  • Cloud only
  • Self-hosted: No (hosted runners on Tenki/Luxor bare metal: Linux x64 (5th Gen AMD Ryzen) and macOS on M4 Pro)
  • GitHub Actions compatibility: Yes
  • Open source: No
  • Free tier: Yes

Vercel CI

Company
  • Founded 2015 (as ZEIT)
  • Latest round $300M Series F at a $9.3B valuation (Sep 2025)
  • HQ San Francisco, USA
Architectures
Linux ARM
No
macOS
None
Windows x64
No
Windows ARM
No
Deployment
  • Cloud only
  • Self-hosted: No (hosted Hive compute: Linux containers (Amazon Linux 2023 / Ubuntu 24.04), x86_64 only)
  • GitHub Actions compatibility: No
  • Open source: No
  • Free tier: No

Self-hosted only

Argo CD

Company
  • Open-source project (2018, built at Intuit; Argo began at Applatix in 2017)
  • CNCF graduated project
Architectures
Linux ARM
Yes
macOS
Agent only
Windows x64
Yes
Windows ARM
No
Deployment
  • Self-hosted only
  • Self-hosted: Only (Kubernetes CD tool, CLI binaries)
  • GitHub Actions compatibility: No
  • Open source: Yes
  • Free tier: Yes

Jenkins

Company
  • Open-source project (2011, forked from Hudson)
  • No funding
  • Steward: CD Foundation; main commercial vendor is CloudBees
Architectures
Linux ARM
Self-hosted only
macOS
Agent only
Windows x64
Yes
Windows ARM
No
Deployment
  • Self-hosted only
  • Self-hosted: Only (self-hosted agents)
  • GitHub Actions compatibility: No
  • Open source: Yes
  • Free tier: Yes

RunsOn

GitHub Actions runner service

Company
  • Founded 2023
  • Bootstrapped (solo founder)
  • HQ Rennes, France
Architectures
Linux ARM
Yes
macOS
None
Windows x64
Yes
Windows ARM
No
Deployment
  • Self-hosted only
  • Self-hosted: Only (runs in your AWS account)
  • GitHub Actions compatibility: Yes
  • Open source: Open core
  • Free tier: Yes

Spinnaker

Company
  • Open-source project (created at Netflix, open-sourced 2015)
  • No company or funding
  • Steward: CD Foundation (Linux Foundation); donated by Netflix and Google in 2019
Architectures
Linux ARM
—
macOS
—
Windows x64
—
Windows ARM
—
Deployment
  • Self-hosted only
  • Self-hosted: Only (self-hosted CD platform — no hosted build machines)
  • GitHub Actions compatibility: No
  • Open source: Yes
  • Free tier: Yes

Sprinters

GitHub Actions runner service

Company
  • InfrastructureX GmbH
  • HQ Munich, Germany
  • Founding year not disclosed (its Terms are dated 18 Sep 2024)
Architectures
Linux ARM
Yes
macOS
None
Windows x64
No
Windows ARM
No
Deployment
  • Self-hosted only
  • Self-hosted: Only (EC2 instances in your own AWS account: Ubuntu x64 and arm64 (Graviton), 612 instance types)
  • BYOC
  • GitHub Actions compatibility: Yes
  • Open source: No
  • Free tier: Yes

Common decisions

Frequently asked questions

What is the cheapest CI?

Among the 11 deep-dive services, AWS CodeBuild and WarpBuild have no platform or seat fee. Blacksmith lists usage prices with no separate seat fee shown. Namespace has a $0 platform fee on the pay-as-you-go Developer tier (Team plan is $100/mo). Namespace has the lowest listed Linux build rate, from $0.001/min with prepaid credits for 1 vCPU. In the 10,000-minute worked example, Namespace is $10, Nx from $29 (usage-dependent) and Blacksmith $28. Machine sizes, allowances and plan fees differ; these are not like-for-like performance comparisons. See the pricing basis.

What is the best CI for monorepos?

Nx is worth considering for a growing JavaScript or TypeScript monorepo—a repository containing multiple projects—when organising builds has become difficult. Its review highlights the task graph, caching and local task runner, with uneven language support beyond JavaScript and TypeScript. It is CI-adjacent, rather than a replacement for CI. Read the Nx assessment.

What is the best open-source CI?

This comparison does not name a best open-source CI. Jenkins, Concourse, Tekton, GoCD, Woodpecker, Gitness (Harness Open Source), Argo CD, Cilicon, Moonrepo and Spinnaker are free options in the wider table. They have different roles, and running them still costs hardware and operating time. GitLab CI and Dagger are open core: an open-source foundation sits alongside commercial functionality. Compare deployment models and architectures.

What is the best GitHub Actions alternative?

The right alternative depends on what you want to change. WarpBuild suits teams looking for different runner economics or execution inside their own cloud without changing Actions workflows. Depot provides a similar entry point with a fuller managed CI platform to adopt later. Dagger is a different model: it lets engineers express checks as code and run them locally as well as in CI. Compare the migration paths.

Switching from GitHub Actions

Start by deciding whether you want to change the machines that execute your workflows or the way the workflows are expressed. WarpBuild, Depot, Blacksmith and Namespace offer drop-in runners for GitHub Actions. WarpBuild can manage runners inside your AWS, Azure or GCP account; Depot’s equivalent option is AWS-only. Dagger and Nx ask for a different kind of investment: Dagger makes checks callable locally and from existing CI, while Nx organises work across a monorepo. These paths solve different problems, so compatibility with Actions is only the beginning of the decision.

From our assessments of WarpBuild, Depot, Blacksmith, Namespace, Dagger and Nx.

Leaving Cirrus CI or BuildJet

Cirrus CI and BuildJet no longer run jobs. BuildJet was an Actions runner service, which makes the runner shortlist above a useful starting point.

Planning a migration

First decide what you need to preserve: your existing workflow definitions, the environment that runs them, or both. Use the architecture and deployment facts above to shortlist providers, and read the qualifications before treating a compatibility label as a migration promise.

Before a cutover, inventory your workflow triggers, build images, secrets, permissions, caches and published artifacts. Identify which settings must move and which depend on your current provider. Trial a representative workflow on the candidate service, compare its outputs with the current pipeline, and record the configuration needed to reproduce it. For a service that has already shut down, use your retained configuration and build artifacts as the baseline.

Agree how you will validate the replacement and recover from a failed cutover before routing production work through it. This is a planning checklist, not a tested provider-specific runbook — configuration conversion, secrets and cache transfer will vary by provider.

Shut down, and off the list

A comparison is only useful if the services still exist. These providers are excluded from the tables and directory.

Earthly — Earthly CI shut down on 1 Oct 2023, and Earthly Cloud (including Satellites) shut down on 16 Jul 2025. The open-source project is no longer actively maintained and the company has pivoted to Earthly Lunar.

Cirrus CI — stopped running jobs on 1 Jun 2026, after Cirrus Labs joined OpenAI (announced 7 Apr 2026). Its open-source tools (Tart, Vetu, Orchard) live on under permissive licences.

BuildJet — GitHub Actions runner service. Announced its shutdown on 6 Feb 2026 and stopped running jobs on 31 Mar 2026.

About this guide

Methodology and independence

The Top 11 are the services covered by our in-depth assessments. They are a shortlist to read, not a ranking from best to worst. The other 37 entries contain researched facts and links without a new editorial verdict. We link to first-party evidence where available and identify third-party funding sources. We have not published a reproducible benchmark for this comparison, so architecture and workflow differences should not be read as measured speed advantages. We have not run a hands-on test of every provider. Open-source and open-core labels describe different scopes: consult the linked component documentation before assuming the entire hosted service is open source.

Console reviews are independent. Buildkite, WarpBuild and Depot have previously advertised in our newsletter, but are not sponsors on this page. Our assessments discuss the situations each service fits and the tradeoffs involved; there is no overall winner.

Pricing uses each provider’s cheapest eligible Linux machine, counts free allowances and assumes one paid seat at 10,000 minutes where pricing is per seat. The 1,000-minute column retains free plans where eligible. Different machine sizes and credit systems limit direct comparisons. Unpublished prices and unknown company details remain unknown rather than being estimated.

Sources are linked beside the company facts, technical details and pricing rows. Pricing verification and review dates appear beside the relevant sections; the date at the top describes this page’s update.

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