Open source · MIT · v1.0

Put your GitHub Projects board on autopilot.

Boardly is a free, open-source GitHub Action that automates GitHub Projects (v2) — sprint rollover & start, auto-assign, stale-card nudges, sub-issue gating, digests, standups, priority sorting, and Slack/email notifications — all from one YAML file.

Get started free See how it works
  • No server to run
  • Your token, your scopes
  • Full audit trail

Everything your board needs

Eleven automations, one config file

Turn each feature on or off in YAML. Boardly reads your board once, applies your rules, and records every action.

Sprint rollover

When an iteration ends, unfinished cards move into the next sprint automatically — nothing stranded in a closed iteration. Optionally tag each rolled card with the new sprint's label and strip stale ones like pulled-in.

Sprint start

When a sprint becomes active, promote the cards you pre-parked in it — e.g. Backlog → Ready. Only touches cards parked before the sprint started.

Auto-assign by label

A CODEOWNERS-style label → owner map. Unassigned Ready tickets get their owner — UI → @zach, security → @rajan. Never overrides a human.

Sprint runway warning

GitHub never auto-creates iterations. Boardly warns when too few future sprints are planned — so you add the next one before rollover runs dry.

Stale-card nudges

@-mention owners when a card sits in a column too long — or the PR's pending reviewers, auto-detected from the linked pull request. De-duped, so it never spams the same card twice.

Sub-issue gating + roll-up

Block a card from staying Done while sub-issues are open, and write live completion % into a progress field.

Sprint digest

At iteration end, post completed-vs-carried-over counts and velocity to an issue, Slack, or email.

Daily standup

A summary of what moved in the last N hours, grouped by assignee — async standup without the meeting.

Priority auto-sort

Keep the board ordered by your Priority field so the most important work always floats to the top.

Slack & email

Deliver digests, standups, and alerts to a Slack channel and inboxes — not just GitHub comments.

Audit trail + dry-run

Every action lands in the job summary. Preview everything with dry-run before it touches your board.

Live in minutes

How it works

No app to host, no database, no dashboard to babysit. It runs as a scheduled GitHub Action inside your own repo.

  1. 1

    Create a token

    A fine-grained PAT or App token with Projects + Issues access, stored as an encrypted secret.

  2. 2

    Add your config

    Describe your rules in .github/project-automation.yml — start from the example and tweak.

  3. 3

    Add a workflow

    One uses: cdrrazan/Boardly@v1 step on a cron. Run with dry-run first to preview.

  4. 4

    Ship it

    Flip dry-run off. Boardly keeps your board honest on every schedule, and logs what it did.

Full step-by-step guide ↗

A linear, ~15-minute walkthrough you can do entirely from the GitHub web UI — including a quick 5-step install and an org rollout section.

Copy, paste, done

The whole setup is two files

.github/project-automation.yml
project: { owner: my-org, type: org, number: 5 }
doneStatuses: ["Done", "Released"]
features:
  staleNudge:
    enabled: true
    rules:
      - { status: "In Review", days: 2 }
  prioritySort: { enabled: true, order: ["High", "Low"] }
notifications:
  slack: { enabled: true, webhookEnv: SLACK_WEBHOOK_URL }
.github/workflows/boardly.yml
on:
  schedule: [{ cron: "0 8 * * 1-5" }]
permissions: { contents: read, issues: write }
jobs:
  automate:
    runs-on: ubuntu-latest
    steps:
      - uses: cdrrazan/Boardly@v1
        with:
          token: ${{ secrets.PROJECT_AUTOMATION_TOKEN }}
        env:
          SLACK_WEBHOOK_URL: ${{ secrets.SLACK_WEBHOOK_URL }}

Real-world recipes

Ready-made for how teams actually work

Sixteen copy-pasteable recipes in the docs — here are a few favorites.

Carry work into the next sprint →

Never hand-move unfinished tickets on Monday again.

Promote cards when a sprint starts →

Pre-parked Backlog tickets flip to Ready the day the sprint begins.

Never run out of sprints →

Boardly nags you to add the next iteration before the board runs dry.

Auto-assign by label →

UI to Zach, security to Rajan — no more hand-assigning.

Stop premature “Done” →

Gate epics until every sub-issue is closed.

Keep the backlog sorted by priority →

The most important work floats to the top, automatically.

Nudge owners about stale cards →

@-mention the owner when a card sits too long — de-duped, never spammy.

Auto-post a sprint retro digest →

Completed-vs-carried-over counts and velocity at sprint end.

Async daily standup →

What moved yesterday, grouped by assignee — across time zones.

Digests in Slack & inbox →

Deliver sprint reports where your team already lives.

Preview safely with dry-run →

See exactly what it would do before it does anything.

Browse all 16 recipes →

The full cookbook in the repo docs.

Free & open, forever

No paywall. No telemetry. No lock-in.

Boardly is MIT-licensed and runs entirely inside your GitHub. It only ever uses the token you provide, with the scopes you grant — and every action is auditable.

  • Self-contained GitHub Action driven by a plain YAML file you own
  • Uses your token & scopes — nothing phones home
  • Transparent audit trail on every run
  • 48 unit tests & CI gating every change
View source ❤ Sponsor 🥟 Buy me a Momo
11automations
16use-case recipes
62passing tests
MITlicensed

Automate your board in minutes.

Point Boardly at a project, add a YAML file, and let it keep things tidy while you ship.

Get started free Star on GitHub