GitHub Actions vs Jenkins comparison

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GitHub Actions

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Executive SummaryUpdated on Mar 5, 2025

Jenkins and GitHub Actions compete in the continuous integration and delivery (CI/CD) space. GitHub Actions appears to have the upper hand in terms of integration and ease of use, while Jenkins shines with its extensive plugin support and customization capabilities.

Features: Jenkins is renowned for its open-source community, extensive plugin ecosystem, and high flexibility as an automation platform. It offers configurable pipelines and integration capabilities with third-party systems, supporting CI/CD processes effectively. In contrast, GitHub Actions is praised for its seamless integration within GitHub, simplifying CI/CD pipelines while facilitating automation without manual intervention. It offers built-in scalability and a user-friendly interface, making it versatile for various deployment needs.

Room for Improvement: Jenkins could refine its user interface, enhance plugin stability, and streamline cloud integration processes, particularly with AWS and Azure. GitHub Actions could expand its programming language support, simplify debugging processes, and improve dashboard and pipeline management. Both platforms could enhance specific integrations to boost user experience further.

Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: Jenkins is prevalently used in on-premises and hybrid environments, heavily supported by its open-source community via extensive documentation and forums. GitHub Actions is often deployed in public cloud settings, appreciated for its streamlined cloud integration and comprehensive community support that includes detailed documentation and forums for user assistance.

Pricing and ROI: Jenkins is an open-source, cost-effective solution with no licensing fees but some addon costs. It offers significant ROI through operational savings. GitHub Actions provides a mostly free service with additional costs for enterprise features beyond certain usage limits. Advanced features and enterprise plans carry pricing, though users find them generally affordable. Both solutions deliver notable ROI through automation efficiencies.

To learn more, read our detailed GitHub Actions vs. Jenkins Report (Updated: June 2026).

GitHub Actions vs. Jenkins

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Helped 900,747 peers since 2012

Review summaries and opinions

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

Categories and Ranking

GitHub Actions

Ranking in Build Automation

3rd

Average Rating

8.4

Reviews Sentiment

5.4

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

No ranking in other categories

Jenkins

Ranking in Build Automation

1st

Average Rating

8.0

Reviews Sentiment

7.0

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

No ranking in other categories

Mindshare comparison

As of June 2026, in the Build Automation category, the mindshare of GitHub Actions is 6.3%, down from 11.5% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Jenkins is 9.1%, down from 10.5% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

Build Automation Mindshare Distribution
Product	Mindshare (%)
Jenkins	9.1%
GitHub Actions	6.3%
Other	84.6%

Build Automation

Featured Reviews

Bharadwaj Deepak Mohapatra

DevOps Engineer at ENTERPRISE SYSTEM SOLUTIONS LIMITED

Has supported repository management and demonstrates potential in workflow flexibility

While GitHub Actions offers a range of functionalities, it is newer compared to more established tools such as Jenkins and Azure DevOps. There is still room for improvement, especially in areas concerning deeper capabilities akin to those provided by Jenkins and Azure DevOps. Given the evolving nature of technology, there are potential improvements GitHub Actions can focus on, including enhancing support and reliability to match its competitors.

Read full review

Jamshaid I

Principal Software Engineer at a financial services firm with 5,001-10,000 employees

Efficient resource allocation and robust workflow with autoscaling capabilities

In Kubernetes, we use node-based architecture with nodes and pods and follow practices like RBAC and rollback. Multiple pods can run concurrently. We benefit from Kubernetes' ability to autoscale pods and use horizontal pod autoscalers to adjust the number of pods based on metrics like CPU or memory usage, ensuring efficient resource allocation and stability under load.

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Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"GitHub Actions helps automate the deployment process, eliminating manual copying and testing, which saves time and minimizes errors."

"The most valuable feature of GitHub Actions is that it is completely free, can be integrated with different environments and cloud providers supporting all major cloud providers, and improves efficiency as it involves no downtime and is managed by GitHub."

"GitHub Actions provides workflows that allow for process automation, enabling operations such as build, deploy, and scale applications."

"GitHub Actions is valuable for its ease of use and integration."

"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."

"It is user-friendly, with clear and organized processes, making it easy to navigate and work with."

"It is easy to use, especially if you are accustomed to using GitHub."

"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."

More GitHub Actions pros

"Jenkins is a great tool for continuous integration."

"The deployment of traditional Jenkins is easy."

"Using Jenkins we have configured and automated the complete build procedure."

"It has been helpful in monitoring the progress and understanding how the daily build is happening."

"In my opinion, this is the best open source solution for CI and CD."

"Jenkins appeared to be a good alternative to become parallel infrastructure purely dedicated for testing."

"Being able to test builds for each branch before it is merged to mainstream branch helped to improve stability of the app and have faster develop-test iterations."

"Jenkins is the most widely used development tool, so there are many plugins and it's easy to integrate."

More Jenkins pros

Cons

"My company would want to see some AI features in the tool as it can add value to the product."

"We still use Jenkins for some tasks, which suggests there may be areas for improvement in GitHub Actions."

"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."

"Sometimes incremental steps should be taken during deployment instead of trying to execute all tasks simultaneously, particularly when dealing with AWS EKS clusters and Helm charts."

"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."

"In our company, procedures or rules need to be completed, which is not a problem with GitHub Actions but with our process."

"The primary area for improvement I see is in artifact management, especially for saving screenshots or videos from failed tests or data-driven actions. Currently, the configuration for saving these artifacts is complex."

"There is a part that detects outdated libraries. If that feature could be more intuitive and informative, that would be nice."

More GitHub Actions cons

"The user interface could definitely be improved, and I rate it close to zero."

"This solution could be improved by removing the storage of unnecessary data such as the history of test deployments that were unsuccessful."

"Integrating Jenkins with other tools or solutions has presented some challenges. For instance, when attempting to integrate Jenkins with Kubernetes, I encountered numerous errors, which took several days to resolve. In Jenkins, adding a feature typically involves incorporating the repository feature separately. Jenkins lacks built-in Git repository functionality, necessitating an external Git repository to store Jenkins manifests."

"Jenkins is an open-source solution, and people tend to stay on the same version for a long time. When you look for an answer on Google, you often find something that doesn't relate to your implementation. The plugins are both the aspect of Jenkins and also one of the worst because the plugins can have different versions, so it's hard to figure out how to solve the problems."

"The user interface could be updated a little."

"Provisioning of VMs during deployment."

"I think the logs could be improved so that anyone using the build for the first time gets a better view as to how it's performing, what the data is, and what processing is occurring."

"Jenkins has no pipelines support by default."

More Jenkins cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The tool's price is okay and reasonable."

"Regarding cost, as an enterprise, we negotiate our license and expenses, so I can't provide a specific rating for that."

"The cost for GitHub Actions may be around $45 dollars per user."

"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."

"It is free and open platform, so I would rate it 1 out of 10."

"For our basic usage, we didn't have to pay."

"It's low-priced. Not high, but definitely low."

"The product is slightly more expensive than some alternatives."

"Jenkins is open-source, so it is free."

"This is an open-source solution for the basic features. However, if an organization wishes to include specific functionality, outside of the basic package, there are extra costs involved."

"The solution is open source."

"It is free."

"It is a free product."

"The pricing for Jenkins is free."

"We use the tool's open-source version which is free. There is an enterprise version which is expensive but comes with better support."

"Jenkins is a free solution, it is open source."

More Jenkins pricing and cost advice

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Financial Services Firm

20%

Manufacturing Company

Comms Service Provider

University

Financial Services Firm

19%

Manufacturing Company

13%

Construction Company

Comms Service Provider

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	9
Midsize Enterprise	4
Large Enterprise	11

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	27
Midsize Enterprise	15
Large Enterprise	58

Questions from the Community

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for GitHub Actions?

I would rate pricing a seven, which leans toward the expensive side. However, there is still value for money, and that's why we continue using it.

What needs improvement with GitHub Actions?

What is your primary use case for GitHub Actions?

The main use case for GitHub Actions is maintaining enterprise repositories in private for security reasons, because we have multiple enterprise clients. We're using the premium GitHub service for ...

How does Tekton compare with Jenkins?

When you are evaluating tools for automating your own GitOps-based CI/CD workflow, it is important to keep your requirements and use cases in mind. Tekton deployment is complex and it is not very e...

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Jenkins?

Jenkins is used in many companies to save money, especially within R&D divisions, by avoiding the expenses of proprietary tools.

What needs improvement with Jenkins?

I do not have any notes for improvement.

Harness vs GitHub Actions

Comparisons

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Compared 9% of the time

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Compared 7% of the time

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Compared 5% of the time

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Compared 7% of the time

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Compared 5% of the time

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Compared 5% of the time

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Compared 5% of the time

Bazel vs Jenkins

Compared 3% of the time

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Product Reports

GitHub Actions

Download GitHub Actions product report

Download Jenkins product report

Overview

GitHub Actions streamlines CI/CD processes with an intuitive YAML workflow and robust automation, enhancing efficiency and integration with third-party tools and cloud providers.

GitHub Actions automates development pipelines, supports scalable public and private runners, and manages secure secrets. This tool integrates seamlessly with platforms like AWS, Kubernetes, Google Cloud, and Databricks. It enhances DevOps workflows with reliable task automation. Users note areas for UI and deployment tool improvements, artifact management simplification, and additional programming language support. Debugging complexity and hosting agent transitions pose challenges, along with integration enhancements for tools like OneDrive.

What are GitHub Actions' key features?

YAML Workflow Creation: Simplifies configuration with intuitive YAML.
CI/CD Integration: Provides seamless integration within DevOps pipelines.
Automation Capabilities: Automates tasks with minimal manual intervention.
Third-Party Tool Compatibility: Works well with diverse tools and platforms.
Secure Secrets Management: Protects sensitive information effectively.

What benefits do users find in GitHub Actions?

Enhanced Performance: Boosts task execution speed and reliability.
Scalability: Supports growth with flexible runner options.
Improved Release Cycles: Ensures consistent updates and deployments.
Workflow Efficiency: Reduces manual tasks, increasing operational efficiency.

Companies in tech and software development frequently utilize GitHub Actions for integrating, deploying, and versioning projects. It is often employed for deploying applications to cloud environments like AWS and Kubernetes, managing extensive CI/CD workflows, and automating test and security operations, thereby streamlining production cycles across industries.

GitHub

Jenkins is an open-source automation server known for its extensive plugin ecosystem and seamless integration with a broad range of tools, enhancing CI/CD processes.

As an automation server, Jenkins streamlines development workflows by managing continuous integration and deployment with powerful pipeline support and distributed build capabilities. Its strong community backbone and ease of use contribute to its ongoing appeal. While highly versatile, Jenkins can encounter scalability and plugin management issues, with areas like cloud integration and security needing attention. It supports automation for build, test, and deployment, ensuring smoother software delivery and infrastructure management across environments.

What are Jenkins's key features?

Extensive Plugin Ecosystem: Allows seamless tool integration.
Open-Source Nature: Backed by a strong community.
CI/CD Optimization: Streamlines development workflows.
Pipeline Support: Facilitates complex scripting.
Distributed Build Management: Efficiently handles multiple environments.

What benefits and ROI should users look for in reviews?

Automation Capabilities: Reduces manual effort.
Scalability: Adapts to growing project needs.
Integration Versatility: Works well with tools like Git.
Community Support: Offers practical solutions and resources.
Ease of Use: Simplifies complex automation processes.

Jenkins is implemented in industries focused on continuous software delivery and infrastructure management, including technology firms, finance sectors needing robust deployment pipelines, and enterprise environments requiring complex workflow automation. Companies leverage its automation to enhance productivity and minimize errors in development processes.

Sample Customers

Information Not Available

Airial, Clarus Financial Technology, cubetutor, Metawidget, mysocio, namma, silverpeas, Sokkva, So Rave, tagzbox

GitHub Actions vs. Jenkins