GitHub Actions stuck in queue – ubuntu-latest runners busy despite available minutes

[nirjondipo]

🏷️ Discussion Type

Bug

💬 Feature/Topic Area

ARC (Actions Runner Controller)

Discussion Details

Hello GitHub Community,

I'm experiencing an issue with GitHub Actions where my workflow remains queued and never starts executing.

Repository details

• GitHub account: nirjondipo
• Repository: nirjondipo/ticket-platform (Private)
• Workflow: Sync to client repo
• Job: sync
• Runner: ubuntu-latest
• GitHub plan: Free

Error message

Requested labels: ubuntu-latest
Waiting for a runner to pick up this job...
All GitHub-hosted runners with label [ubuntu-latest] are busy.

GitHub Actions usage

• Included minutes: 2,000
• Used minutes: 1,549
• Remaining minutes: 451
• Current billable usage: $0.00

Workflow configuration

name: Sync to client repo

on:
  push:
    branches: [main]
  workflow_dispatch:

concurrency:
  group: sync-to-client
  cancel-in-progress: false

jobs:
  sync:
    runs-on: ubuntu-latest

The workflow was still waiting for a runner after more than five minutes.

What I need help with

1. Why is GitHub not assigning an ubuntu-latest runner?
2. Could there be an account-level runner allocation or concurrency restriction?
3. Is this a temporary GitHub-hosted runner capacity issue?
4. How can I troubleshoot and resolve this?

My GitHub Actions usage shows remaining included minutes, and my workflow configuration appears valid.

Any guidance would be appreciated.

Thank you!

[github-actions[bot]]

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[Dextheking1]

Nothing in your numbers blocks this. You have 451 included minutes left, and that message only means no runner has picked the job up yet. It is not a quota error.

One repo side cause to check first: your concurrency group. With cancel-in-progress: false, if an earlier run of this workflow is still running or queued, every new run in the group waits behind it. Check for an older sync run that never finished.

If there is no older run, it is GitHub side capacity. This week has a stack of identical reports in this category, jobs sitting queued on ubuntu-latest while minutes are available. Those clear on their own, there is no setting to change.