For most automation scenarios, you'll use the official actions/download-artifact action. This allows you to retrieve artifacts uploaded earlier in the same run or from previous runs. In the Same Workflow Run
Downloading artifacts in is a fundamental skill for maintaining efficient CI/CD pipelines, allowing you to persist data—like build binaries, test results, or screenshots—after a job completes. Whether you need to pass data between jobs, audit results manually, or automate cross-repository transfers, GitHub provides several distinct methods to access these files. 1. Manual Downloads via the GitHub UI download github actions artifacts
If a later job depends on an artifact from an earlier job, use the needs keyword to ensure the download only happens after the upload is complete. For most automation scenarios, you'll use the official
Starting with , the standard action supports downloading from different workflow runs or even different repositories. Store and share data with workflow artifacts - GitHub Docs Whether you need to pass data between jobs,
Go to the "Actions" tab of your repository and select a specific workflow run.
jobs: deploy: runs-on: ubuntu-latest needs: build # Ensures the build job completes first steps: - name: Download build artifact uses: actions/download-artifact@v4 with: name: my-build-output path: ./dist # Optional: specify a target directory Use code with caution. Cross-Run and Cross-Repository Downloads