How can I use GitHub Actions with Vercel CLi while using turborepo?

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1

i have multiple apps in my turborepo and each app has a separate project created in vercel.
Each of the apps uses the same Database, where we are using Neon as the database provider and Prisma to manage migrations.

Here’s our current CI/CD pipeline

name: Deploy Preview

on: [pull_request]

env:
  NEON_API_KEY: ${{ secrets.NEON_API_KEY }}
  NEON_MAIN_BRANCH_NAME: ${{ secrets.NEON_MAIN_BRANCH_NAME }}
  NEON_PROJECT_ID: ${{ secrets.NEON_PROJECT_ID }}
  PG_DATABASE: ${{ secrets.PG_DATABASE }}
  PG_USERNAME: ${{ secrets.PG_USERNAME }}
  VERCEL_TOKEN: ${{ secrets.VERCEL_TOKEN }}
  VERCEL_TEAM_ID: ${{ secrets.VERCEL_TEAM_ID }}

jobs:
  deploy-preview:
    permissions: write-all
    runs-on: ubuntu-latest
    strategy:
      matrix:
        app: [web,admin]
    outputs:
      web_preview_url: ${{ steps.deploy.outputs.web_preview_url }}
      admin_preview_url: ${{ steps.deploy.outputs.admin_preview_url }}
      neon_branch_id: ${{ steps.create-branch.outputs.branch_id }}

    steps:
      - name: Get branch name
        id: branch-name
        uses: tj-actions/branch-names@v8

      - uses: actions/checkout@v4
        with:
          ref: ${{ steps.branch-name.outputs.current_branch }}

      - name: Create Neon Branch
        id: create-branch
        uses: neondatabase/create-branch-action@v5
        with:
          project_id: ${{ env.NEON_PROJECT_ID }}
          # parent: dev # optional (defaults to your primary branch)
          branch_name: preview/pr-${{ github.event.number }}-${{ steps.branch-name.outputs.current_branch }}
          username: ${{ env.PG_USERNAME }}
          api_key: ${{ env.NEON_API_KEY }}

      - name: Update environment variables
        run: |
          touch .env
          echo DATABASE_URL=${{ steps.create-branch.outputs.db_url_with_pooler }} >> .env

      - name: Install Vercel
        run: npm install --global vercel@34.2.5

      - name: Link Vercel to GitHub Repository
        run: vercel link --repo --yes --scope=${{ env.VERCEL_TEAM_ID}} --token=${{ env.VERCEL_TOKEN }}

      - name: Pull Vercel Environment Information
        run: |
          if [ "${{ matrix.app }}" == "web" ]; then
            vercel pull --yes --scope=${{ env.VERCEL_TEAM_ID}} --environment=preview --token=${{ env.VERCEL_TOKEN }} --cwd apps/web
          elif [ "${{ matrix.app }}" == "admin" ]; then
            vercel pull --yes --scope=${{ env.VERCEL_TEAM_ID}} --environment=preview --token=${{ env.VERCEL_TOKEN }} --cwd apps/admin
          fi

      - name: Build Project Artifacts
        run: |
          if [ "${{ matrix.app }}" == "web" ]; then
            vercel build --scope=${{ env.VERCEL_TEAM_ID}} --token=${{ env.VERCEL_TOKEN }} --cwd apps/web
          elif [ "${{ matrix.app }}" == "admin" ]; then
            vercel build --scope=${{ env.VERCEL_TEAM_ID}} --token=${{ env.VERCEL_TOKEN }} --cwd apps/admin
          fi

      - name: Deploy Preview to Vercel
        id: deploy
        run: |
          if [ "${{ matrix.app }}" == "web" ]; then
          echo web_preview_url=$(vercel deploy --prebuilt --env DATABASE_URL=${{ steps.create-branch.outputs.db_url_with_pooler }} --scope=${{ env.VERCEL_TEAM_ID}} --token=${{ env.VERCEL_TOKEN }} --cwd apps/web) >> $GITHUB_OUTPUT
          elif [ "${{ matrix.app }}" == "admin" ]; then
          echo admin_preview_url=$(vercel deploy --prebuilt --env DATABASE_URL=${{ steps.create-branch.outputs.db_url_with_pooler }} --scope=${{ env.VERCEL_TEAM_ID}} --token=${{ env.VERCEL_TOKEN }} --cwd apps/admin) >> $GITHUB_OUTPUT
          fi

  comment-preview:
    runs-on: ubuntu-latest
    needs: deploy-preview
    steps:
      - name: Comment on Pull Request
        uses: thollander/actions-comment-pull-request@v2
        with:
          # GITHUB_TOKEN: ${{ env.GH_TOKEN }}
          message: |
            VERCEL Web Preview URL :rocket: : ${{ needs.deploy-preview.outputs.web_preview_url }}
            VERCEL Admin Preview URL :rocket: : ${{ needs.deploy-preview.outputs.admin_preview_url }}
            Neon branch :elephant: : https://console.neon.tech/app/projects/${{ env.NEON_PROJECT_ID }}/branches/${{ needs.deploy-preview.outputs.neon_branch_id }}

2 things to note from the snippet above

  • We are updating the DATABASE_URL env value generated from neon database
  • After deployment is completed we are commenting on the PR with deployment url

The problem with the current approach

  • We are building common packages twice (defeats the purpose of using turborepo)
  • Prisma migrations must be ran on both the apps in parallel (Although, I would be somehow be able to avoid it in and run it only once ). Sometimes the builds fails because of this

I cannot use turbo build command since I wouldn’t be able to dynamically update env variable, access deployment url etc which the vercel cli provides with.

It would be good to have more options in the vercel cli to support this, similar to the --repo flag that was introduced some time back.

References:

2

Hi @amyegan , could you please forward this issue to the appropriate person who can assist me? Or would it be faster to reach out to customer support directly?

3

Note we don’t provide assistance with GitHub Action and only support Native GitHub integration. While our community member triage this, I will recommend checking with GitHub community / Support team incase they can provide any specific help / tips.

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