RealHW

RealHW gives your project one runner identity and a hardware-aware execution plane. Keep using familiar GitLab tags for ordinary jobs, then ask for GPUs, KVM, NICs, SR-IOV, NUMA placement, hugepages, or a specific CPU architecture when the workload needs them. The web app manages project runners, pipeline placement, usage, and interactive hardware leases.

qemu-tests:
  tags:
    - realhw
    - arch:x86_64
    - kvm
  script:
    - ./run-qemu-tests.sh
  artifacts:
    when: always
    paths:
      - results/

The runner admits the request before the job starts, projects only allowlisted devices, streams logs through the lifecycle, and returns the job result to GitLab.

Choose your path

Open the dashboard

Manage project runners, inspect placement, and review usage in the RealHW app.

Select hardware

Browse the marker catalog and compose a request from stable capability tags.

Run an image locally

Use the local runner CLI to launch an existing OCI image and collect artifacts.

Debug placement

Trace tags, capacity, admission, and unsupported requests when a job waits.

Developer reference

Need	Start here
GitLab job examples	CI examples
CPU and architecture	CPU and architecture
GPUs and device counts	GPU markers
KVM, artifacts, and cloud-init	Run an image workload
Runner selection failures	Debug runner selection