Short answer
Standard GitHub-hosted runners are free in public repositories, so many open-source projects need nothing else; larger runners are always charged. Providers with open-source offers on their own pages (read 2026-10-27): Blacksmith has an OSS program (currently supporting Celery, Ladybird, Zen and Limbo, with requirements of an actively maintained public repository and a permissive licence); RunsOn's license is free for open-source, non-profit and personal non-commercial projects in exchange for a public link back. Vitko Runners supports private repositories only. Maintained by Vitko, Inc., which sells one of the products measured.
What each page says
| Provider | What its page says | Source |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub-hosted | GitHub Actions usage is free for standard GitHub-hosted runners in public repositories; larger runners are always charged, even in public repositories. | GitHub Docs, billing for GitHub Actions, read 2026-10-27 |
| Blacksmith | OSS program: "We see GitHub’s free plan falling short for many OSS projects. We want to help." Requirements listed: actively maintained public repo, permissive OSS license, clear community usage. | Blacksmith pricing, read 2026-10-27 |
| RunsOn | The full product is free for non-profit, open-source and personal non-commercial projects in exchange for a public link back to runs-on.com; runs in your AWS account. | RunsOn pricing, read 2026-10-27 |
| Vitko Runners | Not offered for public repositories: private repositories only. | Vitko Runners limits, read 2026-10-27 |
Security: GitHub's documentation says self-hosted runners should almost never be used for public repositories, because anyone can open a pull request (GitHub Docs, secure use, read 2026-10-27). See questions to ask a runner service.
More: all questions answered · 12 options compared · macOS alternatives · price per minute, Linux x64.
Descriptions restate each provider's public page as read on 2026-10-27 and may have changed; their pages are the authority. None of these runners were measured: CI Bench v1 covers Linux x64. Maintained by Vitko, Inc., which sells one of the products measured. Page dated October 28, 2026.