CI/CD

Dagger15.6k★

Dagger lets you write CI/CD pipelines in Go, Python, or TypeScript instead of YAML. The same pipeline runs identically on your laptop and in GitHub Actions — no more "works locally" debugging. It organizes steps into a DAG for automatic parallelization, and everything runs in containers for reproducibility. GitHub Actions is what most teams use, with tight GitHub integration and a massive marketplace. CircleCI and GitLab CI are solid hosted alternatives. Earthly takes a similar containers-as-CI approach. Use Dagger if you're frustrated with YAML-based CI and want testable, debuggable pipelines you can run locally before pushing. It doesn't replace your CI provider — it runs inside GitHub Actions, GitLab CI, or whatever you use. Apache 2.0 licensed. The catch: Dagger adds a layer on top of your existing CI, which means more complexity, not less. For simple build-test-deploy pipelines, YAML works fine. Dagger shines when your CI logic is genuinely complex — multiple services, conditional builds, shared steps across projects. Don't adopt it for a simple Node.js app.

OneDev14.8k★

OneDev is the self-hosted GitLab alternative that actually runs on a single server. Git hosting, CI/CD pipelines, issue tracking, Kanban boards, and package registry — all in one Java app. Think "what if GitLab didn't need 16GB of RAM." If you want a complete DevOps platform you can self-host on a $10 VPS, OneDev is remarkably capable. GitLab is the feature benchmark but demands serious hardware. Gitea is lighter for pure Git hosting but lacks built-in CI. Forgejo is the Gitea fork with more community governance. GitHub is SaaS and free for public repos. Best for solo developers and small teams who want everything in one self-hosted package without the resource overhead of GitLab. The catch: the community is small compared to GitLab or Gitea. The CI pipeline syntax is custom — not GitHub Actions or GitLab CI compatible. Java means higher baseline memory than Go-based alternatives. And if you're already on GitHub, the switching cost probably isn't worth it unless self-hosting is a hard requirement.

Semaphore13.4k★

Semaphore is the web UI that Ansible, Terraform, and Pulumi should have shipped with. Schedule and run playbooks, manage inventories, track execution history, control access — all from a clean dashboard. No more SSH-ing into a jump box to run ansible-playbook. If you use Ansible for server management and want a self-hosted alternative to Ansible Tower/AWX without the Red Hat complexity, Semaphore is the answer. AWX is the direct open source competitor — feature-complete but heavyweight (needs Kubernetes). Rundeck does similar task automation with more enterprise features. Ansible Tower is the commercial version. Best for small teams and solo DevOps engineers who manage servers with Ansible and want a simple, self-hosted UI. Single Go binary, minimal dependencies. The catch: it's narrower than AWX — fewer integrations, no workflow chaining, limited RBAC. The Terraform and Pulumi support is newer and less mature than the Ansible integration. And if you're managing more than a handful of environments, you'll probably outgrow it and need AWX or a commercial solution.

Woodpecker6.7k★

Woodpecker is what Drone CI was before Harness acquired it and gated features behind an enterprise license. A fully open-source CI/CD engine (Apache 2.0) that runs on 100MB RAM, supports GitHub, GitLab, Gitea, and Forgejo, and uses the same YAML pipeline syntax Drone users already know. Every feature is free for everyone — no enterprise tiers. If you're self-hosting Git on Gitea or Forgejo and want CI/CD that isn't GitHub Actions, Woodpecker is the natural choice. GitHub Actions is the zero-config default but brings vendor lock-in and opaque billing. Drone is the predecessor with a now-restrictive license. GitLab CI is excellent but requires GitLab itself. The catch: Woodpecker's plugin ecosystem is smaller than Drone's at its peak, and much smaller than GitHub Actions' marketplace. The community is passionate but small — when you hit an edge case, you might be reading source code, not Stack Overflow. And if you're already on GitHub, the convenience of Actions is hard to beat for most indie projects.