4,105 stars · MIT · 4.76.0 (2026-09-30) · Track this in Scout
Runs a GitLab build-and-test pipeline on the machine in front of you.
▶Repo detailsthe review · specs · pros & cons · install
What it is
The program reads a project's .gitlab-ci.yml file and carries out the jobs in it, either directly in a shell or inside containers, the way GitLab's own runners would.
What it is good for. Anyone who has pushed the same commit eleven times to fix a typo in a build file. It removes the wait entirely, and it keeps the failed attempts out of the project's shared history.
- MIT licence, read from the file at
master/LICENSE, plain and unmodified, with the holder named: "Copyright (c) 2025 Mads Jon Nielsen". - Packaged for many systems — a package repository for Debian and Ubuntu, Homebrew for macOS, Arch, npm and Bun — so there is a route that fits most machines.
- Busy and current: 4,105 stars, release 4.76.0 of 30 September 2026, code pushed on 5 October 2026.
- It is only useful where a
.gitlab-ci.ymlfile already exists, and the output is raw build logs in a terminal. There is nothing to click. - Running jobs in containers pulls real build images, which are commonly several gigabytes. No memory, disk or processor requirement is published anywhere, so there is no figure to plan against. The readme file does state that the
bashshell "must be above or equal 4.x.x", and the version macOS ships is older than that, so macOS users need a newerbashfirst. - It reads real build secrets from a plain, unencrypted file in your home folder, and the shell mode runs the job scripts directly on the machine with your own permissions. Running a pipeline from a repository you do not trust runs its commands with your access.
nektos/actThe same idea of running a build pipeline locally in containers, covered in Edition 41, but for GitHub Actions rather than GitLab.
Track this in Scout- cirruslabs/cirrus-cli
Also runs build tasks locally in containers, but uses the Cirrus task format rather than an existing GitLab file.
Track this in Scout - earthly/earthly
Also runs reproducible build steps locally, but in its own build language, and its own page says it is no longer actively maintained.
Track this in Scout
# Debian or Ubuntu, the route the project prefers: sudo wget -O /etc/apt/sources.list.d/gitlab-ci-local.sources \ https://gitlab-ci-local-ppa.firecow.dk/gitlab-ci-local.sources sudo apt-get update sudo apt-get install gitlab-ci-local # Or, if Node.js and npm are already installed: npm install -g gitlab-ci-local # macOS, which also needs a newer bash: brew install bash gitlab-ci-local
