All alternatives, against GitHub-hosted (ubuntu-latest)
| Rank | Configuration | Type | Speed | Cost per job at 10,000 jobs a month | List price per minute | Failed runs |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Vitko Runners (warm starts + test splitting)Vitko | Managed | 2.3x faster | 84% lower | $0.002 a minute | 3 of 360 |
| 2 | Vitko RunnersVitko | Managed | 1.7x faster | 84% lower | $0.002 a minute | 0 of 360 |
| 3 | GitHub-hosted larger runner (4 vCPU) | Managed | 1.6x faster | 39% higher | $0.012 a minute | 3 of 360 |
| 4 | Blacksmith | Managed | 1.6x faster | 52% lower | $0.004 a minute | 3 of 360 |
| 5 | Self-hosted runners on Google Cloud | Self-hosted | 1.5x faster | 59% lower | your cloud bill | 1 of 360 |
| 6 | RunsOn | Self-hosted | 1.2x faster | 75% lower | your cloud bill | 1 of 360 |
| 7 | Self-hosted runners on AWS (one VM per job) | Self-hosted | 1.2x faster | 60% lower | your cloud bill | 0 of 360 |
| 8 | Ubicloud | Managed | 1.1x faster | 83% lower | $0.00125 a minute | 1 of 360 |
Managed services bill per minute or per second; self-hosted options run in your own cloud account and are priced all-in, with fixed monthly costs spread over the volume. The head-to-head pages show each pair in detail, workload by workload.
Head to head: Vitko Runners vs Blacksmith · Vitko Runners vs Ubicloud · Vitko Runners vs RunsOn · Vitko Runners vs Self-hosted runners on AWS · Vitko Runners vs Self-hosted runners on Google Cloud · Vitko Runners vs GitHub-hosted larger runner (4 vCPU) · Vitko Runners vs GitHub-hosted (ubuntu-latest) · Blacksmith vs GitHub-hosted (ubuntu-latest).
More: speed ranking · cost ranking · alternatives to GitHub-hosted · monorepo workload · self-hosted vs managed · list prices · free minutes · alternatives to Blacksmith, RunsOn, Ubicloud.
Maintained by Vitko, Inc., which sells one of the products measured. Measured October 7 to 11, 2026 (result set v1); page generated October 27, 2026. Every number comes from results.json; the workflows and every raw job record are in the repository, and the method says how the runs were made.