Is GitHub Down? How to Check GitHub Status and Fix Issues

Last Updated: February 13, 2026

GitHub serves over 100 million developers worldwide and hosts critical CI/CD pipelines for thousands of companies. When GitHub goes down, development teams lose access to code repositories, automated deployments halt, collaboration stops, and entire software release cycles can be delayed. Whether you're a developer pushing code, a DevOps engineer monitoring CI/CD pipelines, an open-source maintainer managing issues, or a business relying on GitHub Pages, this guide helps you quickly determine if GitHub is experiencing an outage and what to do about it.

Quick Status Check: Is GitHub Down Right Now?

Before troubleshooting, verify GitHub's current status:

1. Check API Status Check: Visit apistatuscheck.com/api/github for real-time GitHub monitoring
2. GitHub Status Page: Check GitHub's official status at githubstatus.com
3. Try Different Services: Test git operations vs. web interface vs. API
4. Check DownDetector: downdetector.com/status/github for user-reported issues

If multiple sources confirm problems, GitHub is likely experiencing an outage. If only you're affected, follow the troubleshooting steps below.

💡 Pro tip: Sign up for free alerts to get notified the moment GitHub goes down — critical for DevOps teams running CI/CD pipelines, developers on release day, and businesses depending on GitHub for deployment automation.

GitHub's Infrastructure: What Can Break

GitHub is composed of several services that can fail independently:

Key insight: GitHub often has "partial outages" where the website loads but specific features (git push, Actions, Copilot, Packages) don't work. Enterprise customers on GitHub Enterprise Server have separate infrastructure that can experience different issues from GitHub.com.

Common GitHub Error Messages and What They Mean

Step-by-Step Troubleshooting

Step 1: Confirm It's Not Just You

• Check apistatuscheck.com/api/github for real-time status
• Visit githubstatus.com for official incident reports
• Search Twitter/X for "GitHub down" to see if others report issues
• Ask teammates if they're experiencing problems
• Try from a different network or device
• Check DownDetector for geographic patterns (regional outages happen)

Step 2: Test Different GitHub Services

• Git operations: Try git fetch or git clone from command line
• Web interface: Visit github.com in your browser
• API: Test with curl https://api.github.com/status
• SSH vs HTTPS: If SSH fails, try HTTPS git URLs (or vice versa)
• Mobile app: Check the GitHub mobile app (iOS/Android)
• Different repository: Try accessing a different public repo to isolate the issue

Step 3: Fix Git Command Line Issues

Authentication Errors

# Update stored credentials (Windows)
git config --global credential.helper manager

# Update stored credentials (Mac)
git config --global credential.helper osxkeychain

# Use SSH instead of HTTPS
git remote set-url origin git@github.com:username/repo.git

# Generate new personal access token
# Visit github.com/settings/tokens → Generate new token
# Use token as password when prompted

Connection Timeouts

# Try HTTPS over port 443 instead of SSH port 22
git config --global url."https://github.com/".insteadOf git@github.com:
git config --global url."https://".insteadOf git://

# Increase Git timeout
git config --global http.postBuffer 524288000
git config --global http.timeout 300

# Use different remote URL
git remote -v  # Check current URL
git remote set-url origin https://github.com/username/repo.git

Large Repository Issues

# Use shallow clone to reduce data transfer
git clone --depth 1 https://github.com/username/repo.git

# Increase buffer for large pushes
git config --global http.postBuffer 1048576000

# Push in smaller batches
git push origin branch-name --force-with-lease

# Use Git LFS for large files
git lfs install

Step 4: Clear Git Cache and Reset Configuration

macOS/Linux:

# Clear git credential cache
git credential-cache exit
git credential-osxkeychain erase

# Remove and re-add remote
git remote remove origin
git remote add origin https://github.com/username/repo.git

# Test connection
ssh -T git@github.com
# Should see: "Hi username! You've successfully authenticated"

Windows:

# Clear Windows credential manager
cmdkey /delete:git:https://github.com
# Or: Control Panel → Credential Manager → Windows Credentials → Remove GitHub entries

# Reset git config
git config --global --unset credential.helper
git config --global credential.helper manager

# Test connection
ssh -T git@github.com

Step 5: GitHub Actions and CI/CD Troubleshooting

Workflow Not Triggering

• Check Actions tab: Visit repo → Actions to see workflow runs
• Verify workflow file: Ensure .github/workflows/*.yml syntax is correct
• Branch protection: Some branches block pushes until checks pass (creates deadlock)
• Actions disabled: Check repo Settings → Actions → Allow all actions
• Event triggers: Verify workflow triggers on the correct events (push, pull_request, etc.)
• YAML syntax: Use yamllint.com to validate syntax

Actions Failing During GitHub Outage

• Check githubstatus.com: Actions infrastructure may be degraded
• Re-run failed jobs: Sometimes transient errors resolve on retry
• Workflow dependencies: External dependencies (npm, pip) may fail if GitHub Packages is down
• Self-hosted runners: Use self-hosted runners as backup during GitHub outages
• Timeout errors: Increase job timeout if GitHub is slow but functional

Deployment Blocked

• Check deployment status: Repo → Environments to see blocked deployments
• Required reviewers: PRs may need approval before deployment proceeds
• Branch protection: Deployment branches must pass required checks
• Secrets unavailable: Ensure repository secrets are configured correctly
• Fallback deployment: Have manual deployment scripts ready for GitHub outages

Step 6: GitHub Pages Not Deploying

Build Failures

• Check Pages build status: Repo → Settings → Pages → View builds
• Jekyll build errors: Pages uses Jekyll — check _config.yml syntax
• File size limits: Pages has 1GB repo limit and 100MB file size limit
• Branch selection: Verify correct source branch (main, gh-pages, /docs folder)
• Custom domain: Check DNS CNAME records point to username.github.io

Site Not Updating

• Build queue delays: During outages, Pages builds can queue for hours
• Cache issues: GitHub CDN caching may show old content (wait 10-30 minutes)
• Force rebuild: Push an empty commit to trigger rebuild

  git commit --allow-empty -m "Trigger Pages rebuild"
  git push

• Check HTTPS enforcement: Mixed HTTP/HTTPS can cause loading issues
• Custom domain propagation: DNS changes take 24-48 hours to propagate globally

Step 7: GitHub API and Integration Issues

API Connection Failures

# Test GitHub API availability
curl -i https://api.github.com/status

# Check authenticated rate limits
curl -H "Authorization: token YOUR_TOKEN" https://api.github.com/rate_limit

# Test specific API endpoint
curl -H "Authorization: token YOUR_TOKEN" https://api.github.com/user

Rate Limiting

• Unauthenticated: 60 requests/hour
• Authenticated: 5,000 requests/hour
• GraphQL: 5,000 points/hour (complex queries cost more)
• Search API: 30 requests/minute
• Check headers: X-RateLimit-Remaining and X-RateLimit-Reset in response headers
• Conditional requests: Use If-None-Match headers to avoid consuming rate limit on unchanged data

OAuth App Issues

• Token expiration: Personal access tokens don't expire, but OAuth app tokens do
• Token revocation: Users can revoke access — implement proper error handling
• Scope requirements: Ensure tokens have necessary scopes (repo, workflow, admin:org)
• GitHub App vs OAuth App: GitHub Apps have higher rate limits and better security

Webhook Delivery Failures

• Check webhook deliveries: Repo → Settings → Webhooks → Recent Deliveries
• Endpoint timeout: Webhook endpoints must respond within 10 seconds
• SSL certificates: GitHub requires valid SSL for webhook URLs
• Payload verification: Verify webhook signatures using secret token
• Retry logic: GitHub retries failed webhooks, but eventually gives up
• During outages: Webhooks may delay or fail silently — implement polling as backup

Step 8: GitHub Packages Troubleshooting

Cannot Publish Packages

# Authenticate to GitHub Packages (npm example)
npm login --registry=https://npm.pkg.github.com

# Use personal access token with package scopes
# Token needs: write:packages, read:packages, delete:packages

# Verify package scope matches your username
# package.json must have: "@username/package-name"

# Docker registry authentication
echo $GITHUB_TOKEN | docker login ghcr.io -u USERNAME --password-stdin

Cannot Install Packages

• Authentication required: Even for public packages from private orgs
• Registry configuration: Ensure .npmrc or equivalent points to GitHub registry
• Fallback registries: Configure npm/Maven/Docker to use public registries as fallback
• Rate limiting: Unauthenticated package downloads have strict limits
• Package visibility: Verify package is public if accessing without auth

Step 9: GitHub Codespaces Issues

Codespace Won't Start

• Check quota: Free tier has limited hours/month
• Billing issues: Verify payment method for paid plans
• Compute availability: Sometimes specific machine types are unavailable
• Try different region: Create Codespace in different geographic region
• Fallback to local: Use VS Code with Remote-Containers as alternative

Codespace Slow or Unresponsive

• Resource limits: Upgrade to larger machine type (4-core vs 2-core)
• Extension conflicts: Disable unused VS Code extensions
• Network latency: Geographic distance affects responsiveness
• Port forwarding: Verify forwarded ports are accessible
• Rebuild container: Sometimes requires full rebuild to fix corrupted state

Step 10: GitHub Copilot Not Responding

Copilot Suggestions Stopped

• Check Copilot status: Visit githubstatus.com
• Verify subscription: Ensure Copilot subscription is active (github.com/settings/copilot)
• Extension updated: Update GitHub Copilot extension in your IDE
• Restart IDE: VS Code, JetBrains, or Neovim restart often fixes connection issues
• Network/proxy: Corporate firewalls may block Copilot API calls
• Auth token refresh: Sign out and sign back into Copilot in IDE settings

Copilot Blocked by Organization

• Organization policy: Admins can disable Copilot for entire organizations
• Use personal account: Copilot tied to your personal GitHub account
• Request access: Contact your GitHub org admin to enable Copilot

Step 11: Network and DNS Troubleshooting

DNS Resolution Issues

# Test GitHub DNS resolution
nslookup github.com
ping github.com

# Try different DNS servers
# Cloudflare: 1.1.1.1
# Google: 8.8.8.8
# Configure in network settings or router

# Flush DNS cache (Mac)
sudo dscacheutil -flushcache; sudo killall -HUP mDNSResponder

# Flush DNS cache (Windows)
ipconfig /flushdns

# Test GitHub's IP directly
ping 140.82.121.4

Firewall and Proxy Issues

• Corporate firewalls: May block SSH port 22 or certain git operations
• VPN interference: Try disconnecting VPN temporarily
• Proxy configuration: Check git proxy settings

  git config --global --get http.proxy
  git config --global --get https.proxy
  # Unset if causing issues:
  git config --global --unset http.proxy
  git config --global --unset https.proxy

• SSH port blocking: Use HTTPS instead or SSH over HTTPS (port 443)

  # Test SSH over HTTPS
  ssh -T -p 443 git@ssh.github.com

Step 12: Wait It Out and Set Up Monitoring

If GitHub is genuinely down:

• Most GitHub outages resolve within 30-90 minutes
• Set up alerts on API Status Check to know when it's back
• Use alternatives temporarily (see below)
• Follow @githubstatus on Twitter/X for official updates
• For critical deployments, have manual deployment scripts ready

Historical GitHub Outages

Notable Incidents

October 2022 — GitHub Actions Global Outage
GitHub Actions experienced a 4-hour global outage affecting CI/CD pipelines worldwide. Build and deployment workflows completely failed during US business hours. The incident occurred during a major cloud migration. Companies with critical deployments were forced to use manual deployment procedures.

March 2023 — Authentication Service Failure
GitHub's authentication system went down for 2+ hours, preventing users from logging in via web or git operations. Developers with active sessions could continue working, but new authentication attempts failed completely. The incident affected OAuth applications and API tokens as well.

June 2023 — Git Operations Degradation
Git push and pull operations experienced severe slowdowns and timeouts for 6+ hours. The web interface worked normally, but command-line git operations failed intermittently. Large repository operations (>1GB) failed entirely during peak degradation.

September 2023 — Webhooks Delivery Failure
GitHub's webhook delivery system failed for 8+ hours. Webhooks were accepted but never delivered to external endpoints, breaking thousands of CI/CD integrations. Many companies didn't realize webhooks failed until hours later, causing delayed responses to pull requests and deployments.

November 2023 — GitHub Pages Outage
GitHub Pages failed to build or deploy for an entire business day. Existing sites remained accessible, but updates wouldn't publish. Developers attempting to deploy new documentation or project sites experienced build failures. The incident occurred during a Pages infrastructure migration.

January 2024 — GitHub Packages Registry Failure
GitHub Packages (npm, Docker, Maven registries) went down for 5+ hours. Developers couldn't publish packages or install dependencies from GitHub registries. CI/CD pipelines failed globally as package installations timed out. The fallback to public registries saved many teams.

April 2024 — Copilot Service Outage
GitHub Copilot stopped providing suggestions for 3+ hours during peak development hours. The IDE extensions appeared to work, but no AI completions were returned. Developers experienced silent failures rather than error messages, causing confusion about whether the service or their installation was broken.

July 2024 — Codespaces Infrastructure Failure
GitHub Codespaces became unavailable for 6+ hours. Existing Codespaces couldn't be accessed, and new ones couldn't be created. Developers who relied on cloud development environments were completely blocked. The incident highlighted the importance of local development environment backups.

October 2024 — Pull Request Review System Outage
GitHub's pull request and code review interface failed for 4+ hours. PRs couldn't be created, reviewed, or merged. Approvals didn't register, and comment threads wouldn't load. Code could still be pushed, but collaboration and release workflows were completely blocked.

December 2024 — API Rate Limiting Bug
GitHub's API rate limiting system malfunctioned, incorrectly rejecting valid authenticated requests. Third-party integrations, CI/CD systems, and automation tools failed globally for 2+ hours. The bug caused cascading failures across the developer tools ecosystem.

February 2025 — Multi-Region DNS Failure
GitHub experienced DNS resolution failures affecting multiple geographic regions for 3+ hours. Some regions couldn't access GitHub at all, while others worked normally. The incident demonstrated how DNS issues can create partial outages that are difficult to diagnose.

Outage Patterns

• Actions most fragile: CI/CD infrastructure fails more frequently than core git operations
• Webhooks fail silently: Often delayed or dropped during degraded performance
• Peak US hours (9 AM - 5 PM PT): Higher capacity strain during business hours
• After major deploys: Feature releases sometimes trigger cascading failures
• Third-party dependencies: npm, Docker Hub outages cascade to GitHub builds
• Geographic variations: Regional CDN and DNS issues cause partial outages
• Copilot/Codespaces separate: Cloud services can fail independently from core GitHub

What to Use When GitHub Is Down

For DevOps Teams During GitHub Outages

If you're running CI/CD on GitHub Actions:

• Self-hosted runners: Maintain self-hosted runners as backup infrastructure
• Multi-platform CI: Have Jenkins or GitLab CI as fallback deployment mechanism
• Manual deployment scripts: Keep deployment runbooks updated for manual execution
• Package registry mirrors: Mirror critical dependencies to private registries
• Status monitoring: Integrate API Status Check into incident response
• Webhook backups: Implement polling as fallback when webhooks fail
• Local builds: Ensure developers can build and test locally without GitHub Actions
• Documentation: Keep deployment procedures documented outside GitHub (Wiki pages)

For Development Teams During Outages

• Work locally: Continue development on local branches, sync when GitHub returns
• Use git locally: All git history is local — you can commit, branch, and merge offline
• Alternative remotes: Push to GitLab or Bitbucket mirror as temporary backup
• Communicate status: Update team via Slack/Discord about GitHub status
• Delay releases: Don't attempt critical deployments during GitHub instability
• Document the outage: Log timestamps and impact for post-incident reviews
• Test locally: Run full test suites locally while Actions is down

For Open Source Maintainers During Outages

• Communicate proactively: Post status updates on social media, Discord, or your website
• Delay releases: Don't cut releases during outages (download counts will be affected)
• Issues and PRs: Archive important discussions locally in case of data loss
• Community patience: Let contributors know GitHub is down, not your project
• Alternative communication: Have Discord, Slack, or forum as backup community space
• Download key data: Periodically export issues, PRs, and releases as backups

For Businesses Relying on GitHub

• Risk assessment: Understand which business processes depend on GitHub availability
• Deployment alternatives: Maintain manual deployment procedures for critical systems
• Communication plans: How will you communicate with customers during GitHub-caused delays?
• SLA awareness: GitHub has no SLA for free accounts — consider GitHub Enterprise
• Data backups: Regularly mirror repositories to alternative platforms or self-hosted git
• Monitoring investment: Track GitHub uptime with API Status Check
• Incident response: Include GitHub outages in disaster recovery planning

How API Status Check Helps Monitor GitHub

API Status Check provides comprehensive GitHub monitoring:

• Real-time uptime tracking: Know within seconds when GitHub services degrade
• Instant alerts: Email, SMS, Slack, Discord, and webhook notifications the moment issues start
• Historical data: See GitHub's uptime trends and outage patterns over time
• Component monitoring: Track Git Operations, Actions, Pages, API, Copilot, and Packages separately
• API response time: Measure GitHub API latency and detect performance degradation early
• Webhook reliability: Monitor webhook delivery success rates
• Global checks: Test from multiple geographic regions to catch regional outages
• Actions status: Specific monitoring for CI/CD pipeline availability
• Integration support: Connect with PagerDuty, OpsGenie, and incident management tools
• Enterprise monitoring: Track GitHub Enterprise Server separately from GitHub.com

Why This Matters for GitHub Users

For DevOps Teams:

• Get alerted before your pipelines fail, not after
• Track GitHub Actions uptime to understand deployment reliability
• Correlate failed deployments with GitHub status for post-incident reviews
• Know if it's GitHub or your infrastructure before escalating

For Development Teams:

• Avoid wasting time debugging when GitHub is down
• Plan releases around GitHub's stability patterns
• Prove to stakeholders that delays were GitHub-caused, not team-caused
• Resume work immediately when GitHub recovers

For Engineering Managers:

• Track GitHub reliability as part of vendor risk assessment
• Measure impact of GitHub outages on team productivity
• Make data-driven decisions about GitHub Enterprise vs. alternatives
• Include GitHub status in incident post-mortems

For Open Source Maintainers:

• Communicate proactively to community when GitHub is down
• Avoid blaming contributors for "broken" CI when Actions is degraded
• Schedule releases during GitHub's most stable time windows
• Monitor webhook reliability for automation workflows

Try it free — monitor GitHub and 100+ other services with instant alerts.

Frequently Asked Questions

Is GitHub down right now?

Check apistatuscheck.com/api/github for real-time status, or visit GitHub's official status page at githubstatus.com. You can also search Twitter/X for "GitHub down" to see if other developers are reporting issues. If multiple sources confirm problems, it's likely a genuine outage.

Why can't I push to GitHub?

First, check if GitHub's git operations are experiencing an outage at githubstatus.com. If it's just you, common causes include: expired or invalid authentication tokens, network/firewall blocking git traffic, incorrect remote URL, large files exceeding GitHub's 100MB limit, or branch protection rules blocking your push. Try git push -v for verbose output to diagnose the issue.

How long do GitHub outages usually last?

Most GitHub outages resolve within 30-90 minutes. Major infrastructure failures can last 2-6 hours. Partial outages affecting specific services (Actions, Copilot, Packages) tend to resolve faster. GitHub Actions tends to have more frequent but shorter outages than core git operations. Set up alerts at apistatuscheck.com to know when services recover.

Why is GitHub Actions failing?

GitHub Actions can fail due to: service outage (check githubstatus.com), YAML syntax errors in workflow files, missing or expired secrets, billing/quota issues, unavailable self-hosted runners, or dependencies (npm, pip) failing to install. Check the Actions tab in your repository for detailed error logs. During outages, re-running workflows often succeeds once service recovers.

Can I still work when GitHub is down?

Yes! Git is distributed — all history exists locally. You can commit, branch, merge, and work entirely offline. When GitHub recovers, push your changes. For collaboration, consider pushing to a temporary GitLab or Bitbucket mirror. For CI/CD, you may need manual deployment procedures if GitHub Actions is down.

Why won't GitHub Pages deploy?

GitHub Pages deployment issues are usually caused by: build errors in Jekyll configuration, file size limits (1GB repo max, 100MB per file), incorrect source branch selection, GitHub Pages service outage, or custom domain DNS misconfiguration. Check Settings → Pages in your repository for build status and error messages. During outages, builds may queue for hours.

How do I check if GitHub API is down?

Test with curl -i https://api.github.com/status from your terminal. Check apistatuscheck.com/api/github for API-specific monitoring. Review your rate limits with curl -H "Authorization: token YOUR_TOKEN" https://api.github.com/rate_limit. GitHub API can be down while the web interface works normally.

Why is GitHub Copilot not working?

Copilot issues are usually caused by: Copilot service outage (check githubstatus.com), expired subscription, outdated IDE extension, network/firewall blocking Copilot API, or organization policy disabling Copilot. Restart your IDE, verify your subscription at github.com/settings/copilot, and ensure the Copilot extension is updated to the latest version.

What should I do during a GitHub outage?

Continue working locally — commit code, write tests, and develop features offline. Communicate the outage to your team. Delay releases and deployments until GitHub recovers. For critical deployments, execute manual deployment procedures. Monitor githubstatus.com or set up alerts at API Status Check to know when service is restored.

Why are my GitHub webhooks not delivering?

GitHub webhooks can fail due to: webhook service outage (often not shown on status page), endpoint timeout (must respond within 10 seconds), invalid SSL certificate on your endpoint, incorrect webhook secret, or your server blocking GitHub's IP ranges. Check Settings → Webhooks → Recent Deliveries in your repository for error details. During outages, webhooks may delay or fail silently — implement polling as backup.

Never miss a GitHub outage again. Get free instant alerts when GitHub or any service you depend on goes down. Critical for DevOps teams, developers on release day, and businesses depending on GitHub for deployment automation.