Cirrus Runners Alternatives for GitHub Actions (2026)
Last updated
Cirrus Runners charges a flat $150 per runner per month, so people leave when their runners sit idle or when they need more concurrency than they want to buy. Per-minute services such as compiler.dev, WarpBuild, Blacksmith, Namespace and Ubicloud make idle time free. RunsOn is the choice for high volume on your own AWS. Prices were checked in October 2026.
Why teams look for alternatives to Cirrus Runners
- Idle time costs the same as busy time. Per its pricing page, each runner is $150 a month with unlimited minutes, and one runner is one concurrent job. A team whose CI runs a few hours a day pays for 24.
- Concurrency is what you buy. A matrix of 10 jobs needs 10 runners to run at once, which is $1,500 a month.
- Fixed machine shapes. macOS is 4 M4 Pro cores / 16 GB, Linux x86 is 16 vCPU / 48 GB, Linux arm64 is 8 vCPU / 24 GB. You cannot pick a small 2 vCPU machine for light jobs.
- A short trial. 10 days.
- No Windows listed on the pricing page.
- No described fallback if the service is down.
What Cirrus gets right: a bill you can predict to the dollar, big machines, macOS and GPU runners (8 vCPU / 24 GB), a 15% annual discount and a 50% non-profit discount.
Quick picks
| Alternative | Best for | Pricing model | Link |
|---|---|---|---|
| compiler.dev | Bursty load, one line, fallback | Prepaid credit, no expiry | compiler.dev/pricing |
| WarpBuild | Per-minute plus Arm and macOS | Per minute, monthly | warpbuild.com |
| Blacksmith | Light usage, free minutes | Per minute plus add-ons | blacksmith.sh |
| Ubicloud | Lowest per-minute price | Per minute, $2.50 credit | ubicloud.com |
| Namespace | Many shapes, prepaid plans | Pay as you go or plans | namespace.so |
| RunsOn | Heavy volume in your AWS | Annual license plus AWS bill | runs-on.com |
The alternatives
compiler.dev
Per-minute from prepaid credit that never expires. A fresh 8 vCPU / 16 GB VM costs $0.012/min, so $150 buys about 12,500 minutes, roughly 208 hours of one job, with no concurrency limit to buy. Sizes run from 2 vCPU ($0.003) to 32 vCPU ($0.048). One line changes: runs-on: [self-hosted, Linux, compiler-ci], and jobs fall back to your old runners if credit runs out. Tradeoffs: no Arm, no GPU, macOS is early access (M4 Pro 14-core $0.055/min). See the benchmarks.
WarpBuild
x64 $0.004/min (2 vCPU) to $0.064/min (32 vCPU), Arm from $0.003/min, macOS M4 Pro 6 vCPU $0.08/min. Priced per minute at every size. Cache storage extra at $0.20 per GB per month.
Blacksmith
3,000 free minutes a month make light usage free. Then $0.004/min at 2 vCPU x64. Tradeoff: sizes beyond 2 vCPU are not priced on the page.
Ubicloud
Standard x64 $0.00125/min (2 vCPU), $0.005 (8 vCPU), $0.01 (16 vCPU). At 16 vCPU, $150 buys 15,000 minutes. New accounts default to premium, which is more. No macOS.
Namespace
Pay as you go $0.003 to $0.048/min, plus Team ($100) and Business ($250) plans with prepaid minutes. macOS 6 vCPU $0.09/min.
RunsOn
For the highest steady volumes, EC2 at AWS rates with no markup plus an annual license from EUR 300 can beat $150 per runner. You manage AWS.
How to choose
The break-even is simple. At $0.012/min, one flat $150 runner equals about 208 hours of use per month. A month has about 730 hours. If your runners are busy less than roughly 29% of the time, per-minute billing costs less; busier than that, the flat price wins (before comparing machine sizes). Do that arithmetic with your own numbers in the cost calculator and the runner price table. A GPU or large macOS need may keep you on Cirrus whatever the math says.
Migration notes
Swap the label per job:
jobs:
test:
# was: runs-on: ghcr.io/cirruslabs/ubuntu-runner-amd64:latest
runs-on: [self-hosted, Linux, compiler-ci]Check your own workflow for the exact Cirrus label you use. Because a Cirrus runner is 16 vCPU and 48 GB, a job moved to a smaller machine may run slower or run out of memory, so choose a size to match; the runner size picker helps, and the slow CI guide covers slow runs. Caches do not carry over, so expect one cold run. For the full comparison with compiler.dev, see Cirrus Runners vs compiler.dev. The provider ranking has more options.
FAQ
Is Cirrus Runners cheaper than per-minute providers?
If runners are busy more than about a third to a half of the month, yes. Idle runners cost the same as busy ones.
What if I need more than my number of runners?
Jobs queue until a runner frees up. Per-minute services scale concurrency without a purchase.
Does Cirrus Runners have GPU or macOS?
Yes: GPU at 8 vCPU / 24 GB and macOS on 4 M4 Pro cores / 16 GB.
Is there a discount?
15% for annual billing and 50% for non-profits, per its pricing page.
Related
- Actuated Alternatives for GitHub Actions in 2026Actuated alternatives for GitHub Actions in 2026 when you do not want to supply servers: compiler.dev, WarpBuild, Blacksmith, Namespace, RunsOn, Cirrus.
- Best Bitbucket Pipelines Alternatives in 2026Best Bitbucket Pipelines alternatives in 2026: GitHub Actions, GitLab CI, CircleCI, Buildkite, Semaphore, Jenkins and compiler.dev.
- Best Buildkite Alternatives in 2026Best Buildkite alternatives: GitHub Actions, GitLab CI, CircleCI, Semaphore, Jenkins and compiler.dev, compared on pricing, agents and migration effort.
- Best CircleCI Alternatives in 2026Best CircleCI alternatives: GitHub Actions, GitLab CI, Buildkite, Semaphore, Jenkins and compiler.dev compared on pricing model, migration effort and fit.