List Artifacts REST API returns 500 Error

[curbengh]

🏷️ Discussion Type

Bug

💬 Feature/Topic Area

API

Body

Actions using List Artifacts API (in my case, https://github.com/curbengh/freetube-nightly connects to https://github.com/proxy/api.github.com/repos/FreeTubeApp/FreeTube/actions/artifacts) returning HTTP 500 since yesterday. It uses default actions' GITHUB_TOKEN.

Encountered this issue initially when using python script with default urllib library, before replicating this issue on octokit.

I could also replicate this issue on curl with PAT albeit inconsistently; using Python-urllib/3.14.7 curbengh/freetube-nightly user-agent may return HTTP 500, but Python-urllib/3.14 curbengh/freetube-nightly (without python patch version) worked ok, then error when I try again.

Browsers (Firefox & Chrome) without PAT initially worked consistently, but has since been failing as of writing.

Perhaps issue with the repo? https://github.com/FreeTubeApp/FreeTube

@octokit/request 10.0.16

file:///home/runner/work/freetube-nightly/freetube-nightly/node_modules/@octokit/request/dist-bundle/index.js:124
    throw new RequestError(toErrorMessage(octokitResponse.data), status, {
          ^

RequestError [HttpError]
    at fetchWrapper (file:///home/runner/work/freetube-nightly/freetube-nightly/node_modules/@octokit/request/dist-bundle/index.js:124:11)
    at process.processTicksAndRejections (node:internal/process/task_queues:103:5)
    at async file:///home/runner/work/freetube-nightly/freetube-nightly/script.js:17:13 {
  status: 500,
  request: {
    method: 'GET',
    url: 'https://github.com/proxy/api.github.com/repos/FreeTubeApp/FreeTube/actions/artifacts',
    headers: {
      accept: 'application/vnd.github.v3+json',
      'user-agent': 'octokit-request.js/10.0.16 Node.js/22',
      authorization: 'token [REDACTED]'
    }
  },
  response: {
    url: 'https://github.com/proxy/api.github.com/repos/FreeTubeApp/FreeTube/actions/artifacts',
    status: 500,
    headers: {
      'access-control-allow-origin': '*',
      'access-control-expose-headers': 'ETag, Link, Location, Retry-After, X-GitHub-OTP, X-RateLimit-Limit, X-RateLimit-Remaining, X-RateLimit-Used, X-RateLimit-Resource, X-RateLimit-Reset, X-OAuth-Scopes, X-Accepted-OAuth-Scopes, X-Poll-Interval, X-GitHub-Media-Type, X-GitHub-SSO, X-GitHub-Request-Id, Deprecation, Sunset, Warning',
      'content-length': '0',
      'content-security-policy': "default-src 'none'",
      'content-type': 'application/json; charset=utf-8',
      date: 'Tue, 29 Sep 2026 11:07:57 GMT',
      'referrer-policy': 'origin-when-cross-origin, strict-origin-when-cross-origin',
      server: 'github.com',
      'strict-transport-security': 'max-age=31536000; includeSubdomains; preload',
      vary: 'Accept-Encoding, Accept, X-Requested-With',
      'x-accepted-github-permissions': 'actions=read',
      'x-content-type-options': 'nosniff',
      'x-frame-options': 'deny',
      'x-github-api-version-selected': '2022-11-28',
      'x-github-edge-region': 'iad',
      'x-github-media-type': 'github.v3; format=json',
      'x-github-request-id': 'C000:305B8C:11B835:3B0394:6ABB9C05',
      'x-ratelimit-limit': '5000',
      'x-ratelimit-remaining': '4997',
      'x-ratelimit-reset': '1790680654',
      'x-ratelimit-resource': 'core',
      'x-ratelimit-used': '3',
      'x-xss-protection': '0'
    },
    data: ''
  },
  [cause]: undefined
}

Node.js v22.23.2
Error: Process completed with exit code 1.

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[Sagargupta16]

Reproduced from an unrelated account, so it is not your token, user agent or client library.

What I saw against GET /repos/FreeTubeApp/FreeTube/actions/artifacts today (2026-09-29):

• Around 12:30-12:33 UTC: the default page returned 500 on 3 of 3 attempts, per_page=25 returned 500, and per_page=5&page=5 returned 500. per_page=5, 10, 20, 29 and pages 1-4 and 6-8 at per_page=5 were 200. Fetching artifacts 21-25 one at a time was 200 each.
• By 12:36 UTC the exact same requests, including the default page and page 5, were all 200, authenticated and unauthenticated.
• repos/cli/cli/actions/artifacts was 200 the whole time.
• GET /repos/FreeTubeApp/FreeTube/actions/runs/36523489614/artifacts (the Build run that produced the nightly-7826 files) returned 200 with all 29 artifacts while the repo-wide list was failing.

So the repo-wide listing, which has to page across 9,692 artifacts for that repo, is failing intermittently on GitHub's side, and the per-run listing is not affected.

Two changes that make freetube-nightly stop depending on it:

1. List runs, then that run's artifacts. Same actions: read permission on GITHUB_TOKEN, and it also stops you relying on the ordering of a repo-wide list that interleaves CodeQL and stale-PR runs:

run_id=$(gh api "repos/FreeTubeApp/FreeTube/actions/runs?branch=development&status=success&per_page=20" \
  --jq '[.workflow_runs[] | select(.name == "Build")][0].id')
gh api "repos/FreeTubeApp/FreeTube/actions/runs/$run_id/artifacts" --jq '.artifacts[].name'

In Octokit that is actions.listWorkflowRunsForRepo({ owner, repo, branch: "development", status: "success" }) followed by actions.listWorkflowRunArtifacts({ owner, repo, run_id }).

2. Retry 5xx with backoff regardless. @octokit/plugin-retry does it for Octokit; with urllib, catch HTTPError where code >= 500, sleep, retry two or three times.

For GitHub's side, the x-github-request-id you already captured (C000:305B8C:11B835:3B0394:6ABB9C05) is what Support needs to trace a 500; this category is product feedback and staff do not always read it. If you still see it tomorrow, file it at support.github.com with two or three of those ids and the timestamps.

[curbengh]

Thank you, listing artifacts of Build workflow only instead of repo-wide fixed it.
I'll try the backoff.