Is GitHub worth the price?
GitHub Team at $4/user/month is the cheapest mainstream Git hosting for small teams, but the sticker price hides a sprawling add-on ecosystem.
A 5-developer team paying $240/year for Team seats can easily spend $11,400/year on Copilot Business alone, dwarfing the platform cost. The January 2026 Actions pricing overhaul cut hosted-runner rates by ~40% but introduced a $0.002/minute platform charge on self-hosted runners — a new cost for teams that previously paid nothing for CI/CD compute.
Enterprise at $21/user/month remains the gate for SAML SSO, audit logs, and Advanced Security (now unbundled into Secret Protection at $19/committer/month and Code Security at $30/committer/month). For most 5-person teams, Team + Copilot Business is the realistic baseline.
Pricing Plans
14-day Free TrialFree
Free
For individuals and small teams
- Unlimited public and private repos
- 2,000 CI/CD minutes/month
- 500MB Packages storage
- Dependabot security updates
- Issues and Projects
- Community support
Team
$4//user/month
For growing teams and organizations
- Everything in Free
- 3,000 CI/CD minutes/month
- 2GB Packages storage
- Repository rules and code owners
- Required reviewers and draft PRs
- GitHub Codespaces
- Web-based support
Enterprise
$21//user/month
For enterprises with advanced security needs
- Everything in Team
- 50,000 CI/CD minutes/month
- 50GB Packages storage
- SAML SSO and SCIM provisioning
- Enterprise Managed Users
- Data residency (EU, Australia)
- Advanced audit log and API
- Premium 24/7 support with SLA
Hidden Costs & Gotchas
Copilot Business at $19/user/month costs more than GitHub Team itself ($4/user/month) — for 5 devs, Copilot adds $1,140/year vs $240/year for the platform
Actions minutes burn fast on macOS ($0.062/min, ~10x Linux cost) — a 20-minute macOS build costs $1.24 vs $0.12 on Linux. The 3,000 Team minutes deplete in ~48 macOS builds/month
LFS is $5/month per 50 GB data pack (bandwidth + storage). Teams with large assets (game dev, ML models) can accumulate multiple packs — 200 GB of LFS costs $20/month
Packages storage overage is $0.25/GB/month beyond the 2 GB Team allowance. Docker image registries grow fast — 20 GB of container images costs $4.50/month extra
Self-hosted runners now incur $0.002/min platform charge (since March 2026) — a team running 10,000 self-hosted minutes/month pays $20/month that was previously free
Advanced Security is unbundled
Secret Protection ($19/committer/month) + Code Security ($30/committer/month) = $49/committer/month for the full suite. For 5 active committers: $2,940/year
Codespaces compute at $0.18/hour adds up — 4 hours/day per dev for 22 workdays = $79/dev/month ($4,752/year for a 5-person team)
Enterprise plan ($21/user/month) is required for SAML SSO — a hard gate that forces a 5.25x price jump from Team
Which Plan Do You Need?
Teams already embedded in the GitHub ecosystem (Issues, Actions, Packages, Copilot)
Open-source maintainers (unlimited free public repos, free Actions on public repos)
Small teams that need affordable Git hosting with CI/CD included
Organizations that want Copilot AI tightly integrated with their code host
Our Recommendation
startup
Team at $4/user/month + Copilot Business at $19/user/month is the sweet spot. For 5 devs: $1,440/year. Skip Advanced Security until you handle sensitive data or face compliance requirements.
enterprise
Enterprise at $21/user is starting price. At 100+ seats, negotiate 15-30% off. Budget for Copilot Enterprise ($39/user) and Advanced Security ($49/committer) separately — these can exceed the platform cost.
freelancer
Free plan covers solo work. Add Copilot Pro ($10/month) for AI assistance. Total: $120/year.
small Business
The Team-to-Enterprise jump ($4 → $21/user) is steep but unavoidable if you need SSO. For 5 devs, Enterprise + Copilot Business = $3,600/year. Negotiate — GitHub discounts Enterprise for annual commits.
Team Cost Scenario
Team of 5, 12 months: Baseline with Copilot. Without Copilot: $300/year. Add $2,940/year for full Advanced Security.
| lfs | $5 x 12 = $60 (1 data pack) |
| team Plan | $4 x 5 x 12 = $240 |
| actions Overage | ~$0 (3,000 min/month covers most teams on Linux) |
| copilot Business | $19 x 5 x 12 = $1,140 |
| packages Overage | ~$0 (2 GB sufficient for small teams) |
| Annual Total | $1,440 |
Recent Pricing Changes
January 2026
Actions hosted-runner prices cut ~40% across all sizes. New $0.002/min platform charge on self-hosted runners (effective March 2026).
Advanced Security unbundled into Secret Protection ($19) and Code Security ($30) per committer/month, now available on Team plan (previously Enterprise-only).
How GitHub Compares to Competitors
GitLab Premium ($29/user/month billed annually) costs 7.25x more than GitHub Team ($4/user) but bundles CI/CD compute minutes (10,000/month), built-in security scanning, and project management — no add-ons needed. A 5-dev team on GitLab Premium pays $1,740/year for platform alone vs GitHub Team at $240/year, but adding Copilot Business ($1,140) and one LFS pack ($60) to GitHub narrows the gap to $1,440 vs $1,740. Bitbucket Standard ($3.30/user/month or $16.50 flat for up to 5 users) is cheapest at $198/year, but its CI/CD (2,000 build minutes on Standard) and ecosystem are thinner. Bitbucket Premium ($6.60/user/month) adds deployment permissions and 3,500 minutes/user. For teams wanting an all-in-one DevOps platform, GitLab wins on integration. For teams that want best-of-breed tools (GitHub for code, separate CI, separate security), GitHub Team is cheaper as a foundation.
