CircleCI
Dedicated CI/CD platform billed on a credits system, with unmetered self-hosted runner build time.
- CI/CD
- Yes
- Performance plan: starting at $15/month, including 30,000 free credits plus additional paid credits.
- Not documented
Who it suits.
Teams running mostly on self-hosted runners, where build-minute cost disappears entirely and the credits system only meters users and premium features.
Consider something else if…
The workload is small and simple — a credits system adds a layer of currency conversion a flat per-minute or per-user price doesn't.
Editorial · Palash Bagchi · approved
What the documentation says.
Each value below links to the page it was read from, with the sentence it came from. Criteria CircleCI does not publish are not listed.
Pricing
Free tier
Yes
Sources (1) →Sources ↓
- CircleCI Pricing ↗
“Up to 6,000 build minutes [small Docker resource class]. Up to 5 active users/month. 30,000 credits included free.”
Read 2026-09-11 · official pricing
Entry paid plan
Performance plan: starting at $15/month, including 30,000 free credits plus additional paid credits.
Sources (1) →Sources ↓
- CircleCI Pricing ↗
“Starting at $15 /month. 30,000 credits included free.”
Read 2026-09-11 · official pricing
Pricing model
Credits-based: purchased up-front and consumed in real time for compute usage, active users and premium features. Network egress beyond the plan allowance is billed at 420 credits per GB.
Sources (1) →Sources ↓
- CircleCI Pricing ↗
“Credits are purchased up-front and are used to pay for CircleCI platform usage in real time. Network egress...charged at a rate of 420 credits per GB.”
Read 2026-09-11 · official pricing
CI/CD
Self-hosted runners
Supported on every tier: 5 concurrent self-hosted tasks on Free, 20 on Performance, unlimited on Scale. No per-minute charge for self-hosted runner builds.
Sources (1) →Sources ↓
- CircleCI Pricing ↗
“Free: 5 [concurrent self-hosted tasks]. Performance: 20. Scale: Unlimited. CircleCI does not charge per build minute on self-hosted runners.”
Read 2026-09-11 · official pricing
When these numbers change, hear about it. Sources are re-checked monthly; a repricing goes out as a short note.