Use latest release of action of repository

[lx-wnk]

Why are you starting this discussion?

Product Feedback

What GitHub Actions topic or product is this about?

Workflow Configuration

Discussion Details

In #88510, someone asked how to use the latest version of an action. The OP accepted ‘use @main’ as the answer, but that doesn't really solve my problem – who really wants to base automated tasks on the main/trunk branch?
I also searched for other similar discussions, but couldn't find any – if there are any, please excuse the duplication!

In my case, I would like to always use the latest version/tag of an action container, such as ‘uses: $myCompany/$myRepository/actions/setup-php-project@latest’, instead of always manually incrementing my version, such as ‘uses: $myCompany/$myRepository/actions/setup-php-project@v0.3’.
In an internal company pipeline with many different repositories, it could simply be a pushed bug fix for the actions that should be used directly by all other repositories.

I may be on the wrong track to solve this problem (if so, please help me here) 🙂

Thanks in advance!

[github-actions[bot]]

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[GR0UD]

You’re right — @main is almost never what people want in production pipelines.

GitHub deliberately does not support @latest on actions (to avoid accidental breaking changes when a maintainer pushes a new tag).
The recommended pattern is:

YAMLuses: owner/repo/action@v1 # or @v1.2

Best solutions for “always get the latest stable”:

1. Use Dependabot (free) → it auto-creates PRs when a new tag is released.
2. For internal company actions only: tag with semantic versions and use a tiny GitHub Action that resolves @latest at runtime (there are community ones like docker://ghcr.io/.../update-action-tag).
3. Or pin to the major version and let Dependabot handle the rest.

This way you get automatic updates without the risk of @main.