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GitHub Actions vs GitLab comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive Summary
 

Categories and Ranking

GitHub Actions
Ranking in Build Automation
5th
Average Rating
8.4
Number of Reviews
19
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
GitLab
Ranking in Build Automation
1st
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
7.1
Number of Reviews
80
Ranking in other categories
Application Security Tools (11th), Release Automation (2nd), Static Application Security Testing (SAST) (10th), Rapid Application Development Software (13th), Software Composition Analysis (SCA) (5th), Enterprise Agile Planning Tools (2nd), Fuzz Testing Tools (2nd), DevSecOps (3rd)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of December 2024, in the Build Automation category, the mindshare of GitHub Actions is 10.4%, up from 1.8% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of GitLab is 17.5%, down from 19.2% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Build Automation
 

Featured Reviews

MohamedMostafa1 - PeerSpot reviewer
Handles scalability well, automatically managing execution infrastructure without requiring additional configurationsThe automation feature of GitHub Actions is
I find the automation feature of GitHub Actions most valuable for our building processes. It integrates seamlessly with GitHub, so there's no extra configuration needed, making the building process easy and efficient. GitHub Actions handles scalability well, automatically managing execution infrastructure without requiring additional configurations. We haven't yet explored GitHub Actions' support for AI projects, as we haven't used its AI capabilities.
Corné den Hollander - PeerSpot reviewer
Powerful, mature, and easy to set up and manage
It's more related to the supporting layer of features, such as issue management and issue tracking. We tend to always use, for example, Jira next to it. That doesn't mean that GitLab should build something similar to Jira because that will always have its place, but they could grow a bit in those kinds of supporting features. I see some, for example, covering ITSM on a DevOps team level, and that's one of the things that I and my current client would find really helpful. It's understandably not going to be their main focus and their core, and whenever you are with a company that needs a bit more advanced features on that specific topic, you're probably still going to integrate with another tool like Jira Service Management, for example. However, some basic features on things like that could be really helpful. In terms of additional features, nothing comes to mind. One of the potential pitfalls is to keep adding new features and functionalities. They can just improve some of the existing features to make it high-end, top-quality. I don't have any substantial experience with agile planning. I don't know the industries GitLab is in, and I don't know why they make decisions like this, but as a customer, I would rather see them invest in improving the basic agile planning functionalities rather than adding, for example, portfolio planning features. That's because if I'm going to do portfolio planning, I probably will also need a lot of business users. I'm not sure if I want them in GitLab, I'd rather have them in Jira collaborating with me on portfolio planning. That's way better fitted for that type of work.

Quotes from Members

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:
 

Pros

"The most valuable features of GitHub Actions include its seamless integration within GitHub, which simplifies the CI/CD pipeline setup. The scalability of using different types of runners—both public and private runners—enhances deployment flexibility."
"GitHub Actions can be easily configured, especially for environment variables and secrets. The UI is understandable and user-friendly for setting up CI/CD pipelines. I prefer tools like GitLab, where the pipeline starts quickly and is accessible near the commits for easy access. However, many CI/CD tools are interchangeable due to similar features of GitHub Actions and other similar tools."
"Creating workflows in YAML format is straightforward and easy to comprehend. This includes both understanding and writing workflows. Additionally, the downloading aspect for third-party instances can also be easily done. It's worth noting that vulnerability analysis and similar tasks should be part of our automation through data workflows. Furthermore, we can break down our processes step by step, starting from building, then moving on to analysis, testing, and finally deploying in production and the clear environment. All of these tasks can be efficiently managed within this platform."
"The most valuable feature of the solution is that it is a good product that offers stability and performance."
"I find the automation feature of GitHub Actions most valuable for our building processes. It integrates seamlessly with GitHub, so there's no extra configuration needed, making the building process easy and efficient. GitHub Actions handles scalability well, automatically managing execution infrastructure without requiring additional configurations. We haven't yet explored GitHub Actions' support for AI projects, as we haven't used its AI capabilities."
"GitHub Actions helps automate the deployment process, eliminating manual copying and testing, which saves time and minimizes errors."
"It is a very stable solution as we have not faced any issues."
"The main benefit is collaboration. It allows us to easily collaborate with other developers, regardless of location. For example, we can collaborate with both our African and German colleagues seamlessly. It's platform-agnostic, so it is flexible and not tied to any OS, so we can work on Linux, Windows, web, and even Oracle applications. It's flexible, reliable, and overall an excellent tool for our needs."
"It speeds up our development, it's faster, safer, and more convenient."
"I have found the most valuable feature is security control. I also like the branching and cloning software."
"GitLab integrates well with other platforms."
"The most valuable feature of GitLab is the ability to upload scripts and make changes when needed and then reupload them. Additionally, the solution is user-friendly."
"We like that we can have an all-encompassing product and don't have to implement different solutions."
"GitLab offers a good interface for doing code reviews between two colleagues."
"The scalability is good."
"We're only using the basic features of GitLab and haven't used any advanced features. The solution works fine, so that's what we like about GitLab. We're party using GitHub and GitLab. We have a GitHub server, while we use GitLab locally or only within our team, and it works okay. We don't have any significant problems with the solution. We also found the straightforward setup, stability, and scalability of GitLab valuable."
 

Cons

"My company would want to see some AI features in the tool as it can add value to the product."
"The reporting capabilities are somewhat limited."
"The main challenge I've experienced is with integration, particularly uploading to OneDrive, which was more complex compared to Google Drive or AWS S3 bucket."
"GitHub Actions lacks a feature for automating the build process for mobile applications."
"We can leverage this database tool to manage everything within our environment and data burners, allowing for customization and execution. An additional advantage is the capability to modify aspects like file size, making processes more efficient and faster across the pipelines. Regarding improvements or implementations, I believe there should be enhancements made to the deployment tool. It should be integrated as part of the solution. Infrastructure-wise, we already have tools like GitHub and RobSpot, and data enables us to automate various processes, which is quite beneficial. As for further enhancements, I'm uncertain. I've shared everything I know. However, if there's something specific you'd like to see in future releases, a feature that may not exist yet but would be desirable, I can't provide any input on that matter."
"There could be more integration options with different platforms."
"The minor drawback of GitHub Actions is the management of the dashboard and pipeline runs, which needs improvement. The dashboard for running pipelines could be better."
"Switching between hosted and self-hosted agents can be a bit complex, as self-hosted agents need to be provisioned in platforms like Azure or AWS."
"There is room for improvement in GitLab Agents."
"Some of the scripts that we encountered in GitLab were not fully functional and threw up errors."
"Perhaps the integration could be better."
"Technologies are always changing. Nowadays, new things like serverless computing and workload management have emerged. We have noticed a few gap items for faster service delivery. For example, we do user interface testing in the latest team and automate it using some tools. Recently, we integrated a tool with user interface testing, which can simulate a multi-user environment. So, we would like to see more integration with different platforms."
"I rate the support from GitLab a four out of five."
"GitLab would be improved with the addition of templates for deployment on local PCs."
"There is a need to improve or adopt AI into the ecosystem like a co-pilot, which Microsoft has done with GitHub."
"I've noticed an area for improvement in GitLab, particularly needing to go through many steps to push the code to the repository. Resolving that issue would make the product better. My team quickly fixed it by writing a small script, then double-clicking or enabling the script to take care of the issue. However, that quick fix was from my team and not the GitLab team, so in the next release, if an automatic deployment feature would be available in GitLab, then that would be good because, in Visual Studio, you can do that with just one click of a button."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Price-wise, GitHub Actions is okay. If I want to use the product's advanced features, then I need to pay the licensing charges for the solution."
"The tool's price is okay and reasonable."
"For our basic usage, we didn't have to pay."
"It is free and open platform, so I would rate it 1 out of 10."
"The product is slightly more expensive than some alternatives."
"The cost for GitHub Actions may be around $45 dollars per user."
"Regarding cost, as an enterprise, we negotiate our license and expenses, so I can't provide a specific rating for that."
"It's low-priced. Not high, but definitely low."
"My company uses the free version of GitLab, which is GitLab Community Edition. There is a licensed version also available for GitLab."
"On a scale of one to ten, where one is cheap, and ten is expensive, I rate the pricing a five out of ten."
"This is an open-source solution."
"Its price is fine. It is on the cheaper side and not expensive. You have to pay additionally for GitLab CI/CD minutes. Initially, we used the free version. When we ran out of GitLab minutes, we migrated to the paid version."
"I don't mind the price because I use the free version."
"We are currently using the open-source version."
"There are different licensing options available, including a free limited-user license."
"In terms of the pricing for GitLab, on a scale of one to five, with one being expensive and five being cheap, I'm rating pricing for the solution a four. It could still be cheaper because right now, my company has a small team, and sometimes it's difficult to use a paid product for a small team. You'd hope the team will grow and scale, but currently, you're paying a high license fee for a small team. I'm referring to the GitLab license that has premium features and will give you all features. This can be a problem for management to approve the high price of the license for a team this small."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
16%
Computer Software Company
13%
Manufacturing Company
11%
Healthcare Company
6%
Educational Organization
29%
Computer Software Company
11%
Financial Services Firm
11%
Manufacturing Company
8%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about GitHub Actions?
I have optimized job execution time by running test scripts in parallel and creating multiple pipelines; we've significantly reduced execution times. What could take 50 minutes can be cut down to j...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for GitHub Actions?
There are pricing considerations where exceeding the free hours given in a month incurs additional costs. GitHub provides a free version with certain hours, which seems reasonable for my usage.
What needs improvement with GitHub Actions?
The main challenge I've experienced is with integration, particularly uploading to OneDrive, which was more complex compared to Google Drive or AWS S3 bucket. I had to conduct extensive research to...
What do you like most about GitLab?
I find the features and version control history to be most valuable for our development workflow. These aspects provide us with a clear view of changes and help us manage requests efficiently.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for GitLab?
GitLab is mostly free, with potential costs arising from upgrade versions. There is a trial period of about six months during which it is free. Afterward, fees apply.
What needs improvement with GitLab?
There are some challenges with repository file management as GitLab may struggle to manage larger files. Improvements could be made regarding size management and file partitioning. Also, the UI has...
 

Comparisons

 

Also Known As

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Fuzzit
 

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Overview

 

Sample Customers

Information Not Available
1. NASA  2. IBM  3. Sony  4. Alibaba  5. CERN  6. Siemens  7. Volkswagen  8. ING  9. Ticketmaster  10. SpaceX  11. Adobe  12. Intuit  13. Autodesk  14. Rakuten  15. Unity Technologies  16. Pandora  17. Electronic Arts  18. Nordstrom  19. Verizon  20. Comcast  21. Philips  22. Deutsche Telekom  23. Orange  24. Fujitsu  25. Ericsson  26. Nokia  27. General Electric  28. Cisco  29. Accenture  30. Deloitte  31. PwC  32. KPMG
Find out what your peers are saying about GitHub Actions vs. GitLab and other solutions. Updated: December 2024.
824,067 professionals have used our research since 2012.