# GitHub Actions "The job was not started because your account has insufficient minutes"

> Fix "The job was not started because your account has insufficient minutes" when your GitHub-hosted Actions minute allowance is exhausted.

Source: https://latchkey.dev/learn/github-actions/github-actions-insufficient-minutes-account  
Updated: 2026-06-26

GitHub-hosted runners draw from a monthly included-minutes allowance scaled by your plan. When the allowance and any paid overage cap are exhausted, GitHub refuses to start the job instead of queuing it.

## Diagnose it: is the job queued, or is the runner gone?

A job that never starts and a job whose runner disappeared mid-run look similar in the UI and have opposite causes. The first is a labelling or capacity problem, the second is the runner being killed, usually by memory pressure or a spot reclaim.

```.github/workflows/ci.yml
- name: Runner facts
  run: |
    echo "runner name: $RUNNER_NAME"
    echo "os/arch:     $RUNNER_OS/$RUNNER_ARCH"
    nproc; free -h; df -h /
    echo "labels this job asked for: ${{ toJSON(job) }}"
```

> If the job sits in `queued` and never picks up, no runner matches every label you listed. Labels are ANDed: `runs-on: [self-hosted, linux, gpu]` needs one runner carrying all three, not three runners carrying one each.

## The failures that are not your workflow

- Exit 137 is the kernel out-of-memory killer, not an application error. Check `free -h` above against your peak usage.
- Disk exhaustion presents as unrelated write errors deep in a build. GitHub-hosted runners ship roughly 14 GB of free space, which a Docker-heavy job can exhaust.
- A lost connection to the server on a self-hosted runner is usually the host being reclaimed or rebooted, not a network fault in your job.
- A job that starts and immediately fails with no step output normally failed during runner setup, before your workflow ran at all.

## FAQ

### What causes GitHub Actions "The job was not started because your account has insufficient minutes"?

There are 3 common causes: monthly included minutes consumed, no payment method or spending limit of $0, and expensive runner os multiplier. Free and paid plans include a fixed number of minutes per cycle; private-repo jobs on macOS/Windows multiply consumption (10x/2x).

### How do I fix GitHub Actions "The job was not started because your account has insufficient minutes"?

There are 3 fixes depending on which cause you have: raise the actions spending limit or add a payment method, reduce minute consumption, and use managed runners without github minute caps. Work through them in order, since the first is the most common.

### What does GitHub Actions "The job was not started because your account has insufficient minutes" actually mean?

Jobs on GitHub-hosted runners never start; the run shows the job failed immediately with a minutes message.

### How do I stop GitHub Actions "The job was not started because your account has insufficient minutes" happening again?

Monitor minute usage in the billing dashboard before the cycle ends. The prevention section lists 2 changes that keep it from recurring.

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Latchkey runs CI/CD that repairs its own failures. Agent entry points: https://latchkey.dev/agent.txt, https://latchkey.dev/openapi.json, https://latchkey.dev/llms.txt