CI/CD for a Rust CLI with GitHub Actions

Format, lint, test, and publish cross-platform binaries for your Rust CLI.

A Rust CLI ships as compiled binaries per platform. This recipe runs the standard Rust checks, then builds release binaries on an OS matrix and attaches them to a GitHub Release on a tag.

What the pipeline does

install Rust with rustfmt and clippy
check fmt and clippy
run tests
build release binaries on an OS matrix on a tag
attach binaries to a Release

The workflow

The release job runs across macOS, Linux, and Windows, builds an optimized binary, and uploads it to the release matching the tag using softprops/action-gh-release.

.github/workflows/ci.yml

name: CI
on:
  push:
    branches: [main]
    tags: ['v*']
  pull_request:
jobs:
  check:
    runs-on: ubuntu-latest
    steps:
      - uses: actions/checkout@v4
      - uses: dtolnay/rust-toolchain@stable
        with:
          components: rustfmt, clippy
      - uses: Swatinem/rust-cache@v2
      - run: cargo fmt --all --check
      - run: cargo clippy --all-targets -- -D warnings
      - run: cargo test --all
  release:
    needs: check
    if: startsWith(github.ref, 'refs/tags/v')
    strategy:
      matrix:
        os: [ubuntu-latest, macos-latest, windows-latest]
    runs-on: ${{ matrix.os }}
    permissions:
      contents: write
    steps:
      - uses: actions/checkout@v4
      - uses: dtolnay/rust-toolchain@stable
      - run: cargo build --release
      - uses: softprops/action-gh-release@v2
        with:
          files: target/release/mycli*

Caching and speed

Swatinem/rust-cache caches the registry and target directory on the check job. The matrix release job compiles in release mode on three OSes, which is CPU-heavy; cheaper managed runners such as Latchkey (around 69% cheaper than GitHub-hosted) cut total release time and auto-retry transient crates.io fetches.

Deploying

The binaries land on the GitHub Release. For wider distribution, publish to crates.io with cargo publish, add a Homebrew formula, or build a musl static binary for a portable Linux artifact and a tiny container.

Key takeaways

Run fmt, clippy -D warnings, and test before releasing.
Build release binaries across an OS matrix.
Also consider crates.io and a Homebrew formula.