Self Hosted Copilot Agent

[JohnYoungers]

Why are you starting this discussion?

Question

What GitHub Actions topic or product is this about?

ARC (Actions Runner Controller)

Discussion Details

Per the documentation, having the agent run on a self-hosted runner is not supported: https://docs.github.com/en/copilot/how-tos/use-copilot-agents/coding-agent/customize-the-agent-environment

Is this a technical limitation? or is it more along the lines of it's not something GitHub is ready to publish instructions for (or support)? If it's the latter has anyone gotten the functionality to work?

In my copilot-setup-steps.yml I've gotten everything it appears to need regarding pre-reqs, but it'll log [error]Process completed with exit code 104. and stop without further detail, right after outputting a large yaml file

[yashasam]

It's strongly recommended to adhere to the GitHub documentation and use GitHub-hosted runners for any workflows involving GitHub Copilot agents. Trying to force it onto self-hosted runners, especially when the documentation explicitly states it's unsupported, will likely continue to result in errors and frustration, and you won't receive support from GitHub for such a configuration.

[JuanjoJmnz]

Hello @JohnYoungers ,

Regarding the use of Copilot agents on self-hosted runners, the current official GitHub documentation indeed states that this setup is not supported. This is primarily because:

• The Copilot agent relies on a managed environment with specific security and network configurations that GitHub controls to ensure reliability and compliance.
• Running the agent on self-hosted runners introduces variables (like networking, OS differences, permissions) that could affect its functionality and security posture.

So, it’s more of a technical and security limitation, not simply that GitHub hasn’t published instructions yet. At this time, GitHub does not officially support or recommend running Copilot agents outside their managed infrastructure.

As for your specific error [error]Process completed with exit code 104, this likely relates to a failure in starting or maintaining the connection required by the agent. Unfortunately, without further logs, it’s hard to pinpoint, but it aligns with the unsupported scenario where the agent cannot operate correctly.

Some community members have tried workarounds or partial setups, but these are experimental and can be unstable.

If you want to pursue this further, I recommend:

• Monitoring the GitHub Copilot and Actions repositories for updates or feature requests related to self-hosted agents.
• Engaging on GitHub Community or GitHub Support for potential early access programs or insider information.
• Reviewing your runner’s environment closely for network/firewall restrictions that might cause connection drops.

Hope this clarifies the situation! Feel free to share more logs if you want deeper troubleshooting.