actions/download-artifact: Retrieve Build Outputs

download-artifact retrieves files a previous job uploaded, so jobs can hand work off.

Download a single named artifact, or use pattern/merge to pull several into one directory. Commonly used to ship a build from a build job to a deploy job.

Key inputs (with:)

name: artifact to download; omit to fetch all.
path: destination directory.
pattern: glob to match multiple artifact names.
merge-multiple: flatten matched artifacts into one path.
run-id / github-token: download from another workflow run.

Example workflow

.github/workflows/ci.yml

jobs:
  deploy:
    needs: build
    runs-on: ubuntu-latest
    steps:
      - uses: actions/download-artifact@v4
        with:
          name: dist
          path: dist/
      - run: ./deploy.sh dist/

On any runner

Artifact download works on any runner. Latchkey managed runners run it unchanged.

Key takeaways

Omit name to download every artifact from the run.
Use needs: to order the producing and consuming jobs.
run-id plus a token pulls artifacts across workflow runs.

Related guides

actions/upload-artifact: Persist Build OutputsReference for actions/upload-artifact: save files and directories from a job for download or later jobs, with… actions/checkout: Inputs & Workflow UsageReference for actions/checkout: clone your repository into the runner, control fetch-depth, submodules, refs,… softprops/action-gh-release: Publish GitHub ReleasesReference for softprops/action-gh-release: create or update a GitHub Release on tag pushes and upload assets,…