GitHub vs GitLab: Revenue, Profit and Business Model
GitHub reported $2B of revenue in FY2024 and — of net income. GitLab reported $955.2M of revenue in FY2026 and a net loss of $56M.
Latest financial snapshot
Financial summary
GitHub
Microsoft does not report GitHub as a separate segment, so its financials are known only from occasional disclosures. GitHub's revenue was reported at roughly $200-300 million when Microsoft agreed to buy it in 2018. Microsoft said GitHub passed $1 billion in annual recurring revenue in October 2022 and reached a $2 billion annual revenue run rate by July 2024, with Copilot driving more than 40% of that year's growth. Microsoft has not published a newer GitHub revenue figure; later disclosures have focused on Copilot adoption, including 4.7 million paid Copilot subscribers in January 2026, up 75% year over year.
GitLab
GitLab revenue grew from $81.2 million in FY2020 to $955.2 million in FY2026, with growth slowing from 87% to 26% as the company scaled. GAAP net loss narrowed from $425.7 million in FY2024 to $6.3 million in FY2025 before widening to $56.0 million in FY2026, while operating cash flow reached $232.9 million and non-GAAP adjusted free cash flow $219.6 million. In FY2027 the company guided to $1.129-$1.133 billion in revenue after Q2 (18-19% growth), which would be its first year above $1 billion. Q2 FY2027 non-GAAP operating margin was 15% and non-GAAP gross margin 86%, down from 90% a year earlier as AI and hosting costs rose. The board authorized a $400 million share repurchase program alongside FY2026 results.
Revenue and profit by year
GitHub
| Year | Revenue | Net income | Margin | Growth | Source |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| FY2024 | $2B | — | 0.0% | — | Source |
| FY2022 | $1B | — | 0.0% | — | Source |
| FY2018 | $300M | — | 0.0% | — | Source |
GitLab
| Year | Revenue | Net income | Margin | Growth | Source |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| FY2026 | $955.2M | -$56M | -5.9% | +25.8% | Source |
| FY2025 | $759.2M | -$6.3M | -0.8% | +30.9% | Source |
| FY2024 | $579.9M | -$425.7M | -73.4% | +36.7% | Source |
| FY2023 | $424.3M | -$173.4M | -40.9% | +68.0% | Source |
| FY2022 | $252.7M | -$155.1M | -61.4% | +66.0% | Source |
| FY2021 | $152.2M | -$192.2M | -126.3% | +87.3% | Source |
| FY2020 | $81.2M | -$130.7M | -161.0% | — | Source |
Where the revenue comes from
GitHub
- GitHub Enterprise Subscriptions
Not disclosed
Recurring per-seat licensing for GitHub Enterprise Cloud and Server, delivering SAML SSO, advanced governance, custom roles, and 99.99% uptime SLAs.
- GitHub Copilot AI Subscriptions
Not disclosed
Per-seat Copilot subscriptions for individuals and organizations, including Copilot Business ($19 per user per month) and Copilot Enterprise ($39 per user per month).
- GitHub Actions & Cloud Compute Consumption
Not disclosed
Metered billing for automated CI/CD runner build minutes (Linux, Windows, macOS, GPU runners) and GitHub Codespaces cloud dev compute.
- GitHub Advanced Security (GHAS) & npm
Not disclosed
Add-on security seat licensing for CodeQL static code analysis, secret scanning, software supply chain defense, and private npm package hosting.
GitLab
- Subscriptions (self-managed and SaaS)
Majority of revenue
Ratably recognized subscription fees for Premium, Ultimate, GitLab Dedicated and related add-ons, priced mainly per user.
- License and other
Smaller share
Upfront license component of self-managed term subscriptions, plus professional services and training.
- AI and usage-based add-ons
Not disclosed separately
GitLab Duo add-ons, GitLab Credits, compute minutes and usage-based products such as Secrets Manager, increasingly sold through GitLab Flex.
Business model and strategy
GitHub
How it makes money
GitHub runs a freemium subscription model. Public and private repositories are free for individuals, which keeps developers and open-source projects on the platform. Revenue comes from paid seats: GitHub Team and GitHub Enterprise (cloud or self-hosted Server) for companies that need SSO, audit logs and compliance controls;
Growth strategy
GitHub's growth plan centers on Copilot. It has expanded Copilot from code completion into chat, code review and a coding agent that can take a GitHub issue and return a pull request, and it lets users choose models from OpenAI, Anthropic, Google and others. Alongside AI, GitHub keeps selling Enterprise seats and Advanced Security into large companies, often bundled through Microsoft's enterprise sales channel.
Competitive advantage
GitHub's main advantage is network effects. Most major open-source projects, from Linux mirrors to React and Kubernetes, are hosted there, so new developers sign up by default and their commit history becomes a public portfolio. Companies then buy GitHub Enterprise because their engineers already know it.
GitLab
How it makes money
GitLab makes money mainly by selling per-seat subscriptions to its Premium and Ultimate tiers, delivered either as SaaS on GitLab.com, as single-tenant GitLab Dedicated, or as self-managed software installed on a customer's own servers. The core Community Edition is open source and the Free tier drives bottom-up adoption;
Growth strategy
GitLab's growth strategy is to move existing customers from Premium to Ultimate, sell AI usage on top of seats, and win platform consolidation deals in large enterprises and the public sector. In 2025-2026 it shipped the Duo Agent Platform, GitLab Credits, GitLab Flex, GitLab Secrets Manager (a usage-based add-on) and the Orbit context graph.
Competitive advantage
GitLab's advantage is breadth in one product. Source code, merge requests, CI/CD pipelines, security scan results, planning and deployment data sit in one application with one permission model, so customers can replace several point tools and enforce compliance policies in one place.
Questions about GitHub vs GitLab
Which company has higher revenue — GitHub, Inc. or GitLab Inc.?
GitHub, Inc. reported $2.0B (FY2024), while GitLab Inc. reported $955.2M (FY2026). By last reported revenue, GitHub, Inc. is the larger business, with GitLab Inc. reporting a smaller revenue base. Note: these are from different fiscal years and are not a direct like-for-like comparison.
What is the market cap of GitHub, Inc. vs GitLab Inc.?
GitLab Inc. has a market capitalisation of $8.2B. A public market cap figure for GitHub, Inc. was not available (it may be privately held).
Which is more financially efficient — GitHub, Inc. or GitLab Inc.?
GitHub, Inc. generates $667k / employee in revenue per employee, while GitLab Inc. generates $370k / employee. GitHub, Inc. shows higher revenue efficiency per headcount, though this reflects business model differences — capital-light software companies routinely outperform labour-intensive manufacturers on this metric.
How do GitHub, Inc. and GitLab Inc. make money?
GitHub, Inc. and GitLab Inc. generate revenue in fundamentally different ways. GitHub, Inc.: GitHub runs a freemium subscription model. GitLab Inc.: GitLab makes money mainly by selling per-seat subscriptions to its Premium and Ultimate tiers, delivered either as SaaS on GitLab.
Is GitHub, Inc. bigger than GitLab Inc.?
By last reported revenue, GitHub, Inc. ($2.0B (FY2024)) is the larger company compared to GitLab Inc. ($955.2M (FY2026)). Revenue scale is one dimension of size — market capitalisation, employee count, and geographic reach are also relevant depending on the context.
Figures come from each company's filings and the sources linked beside them. Amounts reported in another currency are shown in US dollars at an approximate rate and marked with ~. Back to the GitHub vs GitLab overview