GitHub Actions vs Jenkins

Overview

What is being compared

GitHub Actions is a cloud-native CI/CD platform built into GitHub. Jenkins is a self-hosted, open-source automation server with thousands of plugins and a long enterprise history.

• Hosting — Cloud-native, built into GitHub — Self-hosted
• Pipeline definition — YAML workflow files committed with the code — Jenkinsfile in Groovy, or jobs defined in the UI
• Extensibility — Marketplace of Actions — Thousands of plugins
• Infrastructure — None to manage — Yours to provision, patch and scale
• Trade-off — Less to run — Unlimited customization, more operational burden

Who runs what

Green is handled for you; yellow is your team's work. The GitHub Actions column assumes GitHub-hosted runners; a self-hosted runner moves its machines to your side.

> [!TIP] A push running through both systems, keyless OIDC deploys to AWS next to a Jenkins credential store, and the three questions that pick one, step by step in Visual Explanation below.

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