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Move a GitHub Actions job onto our runners: create an account, install the GitHub App on an organisation or a personal account, add a card, and change one line.

Move a GitHub Actions job onto our runners: create an account, install the GitHub App, add a card, and change one line.

diff
 jobs:
   build:
-    runs-on: ubuntu-latest
+    runs-on: ghwarp-2vcpu-ubuntu-2404
     steps:
       - uses: actions/checkout@v4
       - run: make test

  1. Create an account. Go to runners.io/login?mode=signup and sign up with a work email and a password, or with Continue with GitHub. An organisation is created for you, and you are its owner. An email sign-up is confirmed by a link we email you: open it in the same browser and it signs you in. Signing up with GitHub needs no confirmation.

  2. Install the GitHub App. The dashboard opens on Connect GitHub to get started. Press Connect GitHub, then Install on GitHub. GitHub asks where to install the App: a GitHub organisation or your own personal account. Both work. Then choose the repositories it may see; you can change that later on GitHub. GitHub sends you back to the dashboard, and on Settings the GitHub card reads Connected.

  3. Add a card. On Settings, under Billing, press Add a payment method. Stripe's checkout page asks for the card and a billing address, and places a temporary authorisation to check the card is real, which is released, never charged. Until a card is on file nothing runs, and the dashboard says Add a card before anything will run. Once it is on file, your organisation can run jobs within a couple of minutes.

  4. Change one line. In a workflow under .github/workflows/, set the job's runs-on to ghwarp-2vcpu-ubuntu-2404, as in the change above, and push. Or let us do it: Repositories in the sidebar has Open a migration pull request beside each repository not yet using our runners. It opens a draft pull request changing only the runs-on lines that name ubuntu-latest, ubuntu-24.04, ubuntu-22.04 or ubuntu-20.04. Its own checks run with the new label, so you can see them pass before you mark it ready and merge it.

  5. Watch the job. Runners in the sidebar lists your jobs as they run. Open one to see how long it Waited for a runner, which is not billed, apart from how long it Ran for, which is, and its steps and log. GitHub's Actions tab shows the same job as it always did.

Once GitHub is connected, Overview in the dashboard carries a short checklist of the same work, Get your first job running, and marks each item done.

The App works on a personal GitHub account as well as on an organisation. We register a single-use runner on the repository a job belongs to, and GitHub allows that on a personal account's repositories as well as on an organisation's.

If you install it on a GitHub organisation you do not own, GitHub asks the organisation's owners to approve it. Nothing is connected until one of them does; once one has, connect again from the dashboard to finish. Connect your account has the rest of the install, and lists every permission the App asks for and why.

  • The job page says Paused — there's no payment method on your account. Add a card. Add it in the next few minutes and a waiting job starts by itself; if there is still no card about ten minutes on, we stop the job rather than leave it waiting, and you re-run it.

  • The job page says it was refused. The label is misspelled, or runs-on names something beside our label. Runner labels has the fix.

  • GitHub shows Waiting for a runner, and the job is not on the Runners page. Either the label does not start with ghwarp-, or the App cannot see that repository. On Settings, Manage on GitHub on the GitHub card opens the App's repository access.

Each month includes some run-minutes, and usage beyond them is metered by the minute. The pricing page has the figures.