Configuration

The runner is configured with a single YAML file. It is optional: without one, the built-in defaults apply, which are the same as an empty YAML document and safe to run with.

gitea-runner generate-config > config.yaml
gitea-runner -c config.yaml register
gitea-runner -c config.yaml daemon

-c / --config is a global flag and is accepted by every command that loads configuration (register, daemon, cache-server). The generated file is fully commented and is reproduced in Example configuration.

No environment variable overrides

The runner process is configured only through the YAML file. Earlier releases let a few variables (GITEA_DEBUG, GITEA_TRACE, GITEA_RUNNER_CAPACITY, GITEA_RUNNER_FILE, GITEA_RUNNER_ENVIRON, GITEA_RUNNER_ENV_FILE) override parts of the config; those overrides have been removed.

The variables understood by the Docker images belong to their entrypoint, not to the runner, and GITEA_RUNNER_LABELS / GITEA_RUNNER_REGISTRATION_TOKEN are read by the corresponding CLI flags only.

Values with a duration type accept Go duration strings such as 30s, 10m, 3h.

log

Controls the runner’s own log, not how step output is streamed to the UI.

Option	Default	Description
log.level	info	trace, debug, info, warn, error, fatal or panic. trace and debug add the caller’s file:line.

runner

Option	Default	Description
file	.runner	path of the registration file. Each runner process needs its own.
capacity	1	jobs executed concurrently. With an empty container.network, every concurrent docker job takes a subnet from the daemon’s address pool, so a high capacity can exhaust it (see default-address-pools in the daemon config).
envs	–	extra environment variables given to every job.
env_file	.env	same, read from a file; ignored when empty or missing.
timeout	3h	maximum job duration. Gitea has its own timeout (3h by default) and may stop the job earlier.
shutdown_timeout	0s	how long a shutdown waits for running jobs before cancelling them.
insecure	false	skip TLS verification of the Gitea instance.
fetch_timeout	5s	timeout of a single job fetch.
fetch_interval	2s	base polling interval.
fetch_interval_max	5s	upper bound of the exponential backoff applied while idle. 0, or the same value as fetch_interval, disables the backoff.
labels	see Labels	labels used at registration, and by daemon when the flag is absent.
github_mirror	–	replaces https://github.com when actions are pulled and the instance’s DEFAULT_ACTIONS_URL points at GitHub.
action_shallow_clone	true	fetch only the requested ref of an action repository at depth 1 instead of its full history.
set_act_env	true	inject ACT=true into jobs. Set to false so workflows gated on if: ${{ !env.ACT }} behave as they do on GitHub.
allocate_pty	false	allocate a pseudo-TTY per step. Enable only when a job needs an interactive terminal; tools like docker build then write redrawing progress frames into the log.
workdir_cleanup_age	24h	age at which stale task workspaces and orphaned host-mode scratch directories are removed while idle.
idle_cleanup_interval	10m	cadence of the idle cleanup pass. Setting either this or workdir_cleanup_age to 0 disables all idle cleanup.
post_task_script	–	host script run after each task’s cleanup, see Post-task script.
post_task_script_timeout	5m	hard limit for that script.
hooks.job_started / hooks.job_completed	–	scripts run inside the job environment, see Job hooks.

Log and state reporting can be tuned when the UI updates too slowly or the instance sees too many requests:

Option	Default	Description
log_report_interval	5s	base interval of the periodic log flush.
log_report_max_latency	3s	maximum time a single log row waits. Only has an effect below log_report_interval.
log_report_batch_size	100	flush immediately once this many rows are buffered, so bursty output arrives promptly.
state_report_interval	5s	interval of task state reports. State is also sent on every step transition.
report_close_timeout	10s	per-attempt deadline for the final log and state flush of a finished job.

Idle cleanup

While no job is running, the runner cleans up after earlier ones:

• stale task workspaces older than workdir_cleanup_age are removed when container.bind_workdir is enabled. Only purely numeric subdirectories of container.workdir_parent are treated as workspaces, and the path is assumed not to be shared with another runner;
• orphaned host-mode scratch directories are removed on the same schedule;
• per-job docker networks left behind by jobs the runner did not live to tear down are removed. They are recognised by the com.gitea.runner.uuid label carrying this runner’s uuid, so leftovers of other runners on the same daemon are left alone. Without this, each leaked network keeps holding a subnet of the daemon’s address pool.

cache

See Caching for the full picture, including shared cache servers.

Option	Default	Description
enabled	true	run the built-in cache server used by actions/cache and friends.
dir	$HOME/.cache/actcache	where cache blobs are stored. Ignored with external_server.
host	–	address job containers use to reach this runner’s cache server. Empty means auto-detect; 0.0.0.0 is not valid.
port	0	port of the built-in server, 0 picks a free one.
external_server	–	URL of a shared cache-server to use instead of a local one.
external_secret	–	shared secret, required with external_server; must be identical everywhere. Generate with openssl rand -hex 32.
external_secret_file	–	read that secret from a file instead. Setting both is an error.
offline_mode	false	reuse a cached action instead of fetching it on every job. A moved tag or updated branch then stays at the cached commit until the entry expires or is removed.
v2	true	serve the cache service v2 API used by actions/cache@v4.2 and later.

container

Applies to jobs that run in containers.

Option	Default	Description
network	–	network the job container joins: host, bridge, or a custom network name. Empty means the runner creates one per job. network_mode is still accepted for old configs.
network_create_options.enable_ipv4 / enable_ipv6	Docker defaults	only apply to auto-created networks. IPv6 additionally requires dockerd --ipv6.
privileged	false	run job containers privileged; required for Docker-in-Docker inside jobs.
options	–	extra docker run options, e.g. --add-host=my.gitea.url:host-gateway. A volume declared here replaces the one the runner mounts on the same container path, which is how the tool cache can be kept on the host (--volume /host/toolcache:/opt/hostedtoolcache); its source must also be allowed by valid_volumes.
workdir_parent	/workspace	parent directory of a job’s working directory inside the container. A leading / is trimmed and re-added.
valid_volumes	[]	volumes and bind mounts a job may mount, as glob patterns. [] forbids all, ['**'] allows all.
docker_host	–	override the docker host. Empty auto-detects it, - auto-detects it but does not mount the socket into job containers.
force_pull	false	pull images even when present. Images pinned by digest are never re-pulled, and a failed pull with a local copy available only warns.
force_rebuild	false	rebuild local action images even when present.
require_docker	false	always require a reachable daemon, even for host-only labels.
docker_timeout	0s	how long to wait for the daemon to become reachable.
bind_workdir	false	bind-mount the workspace from the host instead of using a docker volume. Needed for jobs that use docker compose with bind mounts under Docker-in-Docker. The parent directory must then be mounted into the runner container and listed in valid_volumes.

Privileged mode and workflow container options

A workflow’s own jobs.<job_id>.container.options are untrusted input. While container.privileged is disabled, the options that would break out of the container are stripped with a warning in the job log: --pid, --ipc, --uts, --cgroupns, --userns, --cap-add, --security-opt, --device, --device-cgroup-rule, --gpus, --volumes-from, --runtime, --cgroup-parent and --sysctl. They are honoured once privileged mode is enabled, because the operator has then opted into host access.

host

Option	Default	Description
host.workdir_parent	$HOME/.cache/act/	parent directory of a job’s working directory for host-mode jobs.

health_check and metrics

Both are covered in Monitoring.

Option	Default	Description
health_check.enabled	false	pause fetching new tasks while the machine looks unhealthy.
health_check.min_free_disk_space_mb	1024	minimum free space on the filesystem holding the workspaces.
health_check.script	–	extra executable; a non-zero exit, a timeout or a start failure marks the runner unavailable.
health_check.interval	30s	how long a result is cached.
health_check.timeout	10s	maximum script runtime.
metrics.enabled	false	serve /metrics, /healthz and /readyz.
metrics.addr	127.0.0.1:9101	listen address. There is no authentication, so only expose it behind a firewall.
metrics.readiness_grace	30s	how long consecutive polling failures may last before /readyz returns 503.

Reloading

The runner reads its configuration at startup only. Restart the process after a change — with shutdown_timeout set, running jobs are given that much time to finish first.