CI/CD for an Electron App with GitHub Actions

Package and publish your Electron app for every OS from one workflow.

Electron apps bundle a Chromium runtime with your web app and package into OS-specific installers. electron-builder handles packaging and publishing across a matrix of operating systems. This recipe builds and releases per platform.

What the pipeline does

run on a macOS, Windows, and Linux matrix
install deps with npm ci
lint and test
package with electron-builder
publish installers to a GitHub Release

The workflow

electron-builder reads its config from package.json or electron-builder.yml and publishes to the release matching the tag. GH_TOKEN lets it create release assets.

.github/workflows/release.yml

name: Release
on:
  push:
    tags: ['v*']
jobs:
  build:
    strategy:
      matrix:
        os: [macos-latest, ubuntu-latest, windows-latest]
    runs-on: ${{ matrix.os }}
    steps:
      - uses: actions/checkout@v4
      - uses: actions/setup-node@v4
        with:
          node-version: 20
          cache: npm
      - run: npm ci
      - run: npm run lint --if-present
      - run: npm test --if-present
      - run: npx electron-builder --publish always
        env:
          GH_TOKEN: ${{ secrets.GITHUB_TOKEN }}

Caching and speed

cache: npm covers installs and electron-builder caches downloaded Electron binaries under ~/.cache/electron and ~/.cache/electron-builder, which actions/cache can persist. Packaging across three OSes is the slow part; cheaper managed runners such as Latchkey (around 69% cheaper than GitHub-hosted) reduce the cost of every release matrix.

Deploying

electron-builder --publish always uploads .dmg, .exe (NSIS), .deb, and .AppImage assets to the GitHub Release. For auto-update, enable the publish provider and electron-updater in the app. macOS notarization and Windows signing need certificates supplied as secrets.

Key takeaways

electron-builder packages and publishes per OS.
Cache the Electron and builder download caches.
Signing and notarization need certificates as secrets.