Gradle test sharding

Requirements

The Tuist Gradle plugin installed and configured

The Tuist Gradle plugin includes built-in support for test sharding. It discovers test suites by scanning compiled test class files and uses the Tuist server to create balanced shard plans based on historical timing data.

How it works#

Test sharding follows a two-phase workflow:

Build phase: Tuist enumerates your tests and creates a shard plan on the server. The server uses historical test timing data from the last 30 days to distribute tests across shards so each shard takes roughly the same amount of time. The build phase outputs a shard matrix that your CI system uses to spawn parallel runners.
Test phase: Each CI runner receives a shard index and executes only the tests assigned to that shard.

Build phase#

Prepare test shards using the tuistPrepareTestShards task:

bash

./gradlew tuistPrepareTestShards \
  -PtuistShardMax=5

This task:

Compiles the test classes
Discovers test suites by scanning the compiled class files
Creates a shard plan on the Tuist server using historical timing data
Outputs a shard matrix for your CI system

Build options#

Configure sharding via Gradle project properties:

Property	Description
`-PtuistShardMax=<N>`	Maximum number of shards (default: 2)
`-PtuistShardMin=<N>`	Minimum number of shards
`-PtuistShardMaxDuration=<MS>`	Target maximum duration per shard in milliseconds

The shard reference is automatically derived from CI environment variables (GITHUB_RUN_ID, CI_PIPELINE_ID, etc.) or can be set explicitly via the TUIST_SHARD_REFERENCE environment variable.

Test phase#

Each shard runner executes its assigned tests using the standard test task. When TUIST_SHARD_INDEX is set, the plugin automatically fetches the shard assignment from the server and filters the test execution to include only the assigned test suites.

bash

TUIST_SHARD_INDEX=0 ./gradlew test

Continuous integration#

Tuist automatically detects the following CI providers:

GitHub Actions
GitLab CI
CircleCI
Buildkite
Codemagic
Bitrise

For other providers, refer to the .tuist-shard-matrix.json file to set up parallel jobs.

GitHub Actions#

Use a matrix strategy to run shards in parallel:

yaml

name: Tests
on: [pull_request]

jobs:
  build:
    name: Build test shards
    runs-on: ubuntu-latest
    outputs:
      matrix: ${{ steps.build.outputs.matrix }}
    steps:
      - uses: actions/checkout@v4
      - uses: actions/setup-java@v4
        with:
          distribution: 'temurin'
          java-version: '17'
      - uses: gradle/actions/setup-gradle@v4
      - run: tuist auth login
      - id: build
        run: ./gradlew tuistPrepareTestShards -PtuistShardMax=5

  test:
    name: "Shard #${{ matrix.shard }}"
    needs: build
    runs-on: ubuntu-latest
    strategy:
      fail-fast: false
      matrix:
        shard: ${{ fromJson(needs.build.outputs.matrix).shard }}
    env:
      TUIST_SHARD_INDEX: ${{ matrix.shard }}
    steps:
      - uses: actions/checkout@v4
      - uses: actions/setup-java@v4
        with:
          distribution: 'temurin'
          java-version: '17'
      - uses: gradle/actions/setup-gradle@v4
      - run: tuist auth login
      - run: ./gradlew test

GitLab CI#

Tuist generates a .tuist-shard-child-pipeline.yml that you trigger as a child pipeline. Define a .tuist-shard template job that the generated shard jobs extend:

yaml

# .gitlab-ci.yml
stages:
  - build
  - test

build-shards:
  stage: build
  script:
    - tuist auth login
    - ./gradlew tuistPrepareTestShards -PtuistShardMax=5
  artifacts:
    paths:
      - .tuist-shard-child-pipeline.yml

test-shards:
  stage: test
  needs: [build-shards]
  trigger:
    include:
      - artifact: .tuist-shard-child-pipeline.yml
        job: build-shards
    strategy: depend

The child pipeline needs a .tuist-shard job template:

yaml

# .gitlab/shard-template.yml
.tuist-shard:
  script:
    - tuist auth login
    - ./gradlew test

CircleCI#

Tuist generates a .tuist-shard-continuation.json with parameters for the continuation orb:

yaml

# .circleci/config.yml
version: 2.1
setup: true

orbs:
  continuation: circleci/continuation@1

jobs:
  build-shards:
    docker:
      - image: cimg/openjdk:17.0
    steps:
      - checkout
      - run:
          name: Build and plan shards
          command: |
            tuist auth login
            ./gradlew tuistPrepareTestShards -PtuistShardMax=5
      - continuation/continue:
          configuration_path: .circleci/continue-config.yml
          parameters: .tuist-shard-continuation.json

workflows:
  setup:
    jobs:
      - build-shards

yaml

# .circleci/continue-config.yml
version: 2.1

parameters:
  shard-indices:
    type: string
    default: ""
  shard-count:
    type: integer
    default: 0

jobs:
  test-shard:
    docker:
      - image: cimg/openjdk:17.0
    parameters:
      shard-index:
        type: integer
    steps:
      - checkout
      - run:
          name: Run shard
          command: |
            export TUIST_SHARD_INDEX=<< parameters.shard-index >>
            tuist auth login
            ./gradlew test

workflows:
  test:
    jobs:
      - test-shard:
          matrix:
            parameters:
              shard-index: [<< pipeline.parameters.shard-indices >>]

Buildkite#

Tuist generates a .tuist-shard-pipeline.yml with one step per shard. Upload it with buildkite-agent pipeline upload:

yaml

# pipeline.yml
steps:
  - label: "Build test shards"
    command: |
      tuist auth login
      ./gradlew tuistPrepareTestShards -PtuistShardMax=5
      buildkite-agent pipeline upload .tuist-shard-pipeline.yml

Each generated step has TUIST_SHARD_INDEX set in its environment. Add the test command to each shard step using a shared script:

bash

# .buildkite/shard-step.sh
#!/bin/bash
tuist auth login
./gradlew test

Codemagic#

Codemagic does not support dynamic matrix jobs, so define a separate workflow per shard. Tuist writes TUIST_SHARD_MATRIX and TUIST_SHARD_COUNT to the CM_ENV file for use within each workflow:

yaml

# codemagic.yaml
workflows:
  build-shards:
    name: Build test shards
    instance_type: linux_x2
    environment:
      java: 17
    scripts:
      - name: Build and plan shards
        script: |
          tuist auth login
          ./gradlew tuistPrepareTestShards -PtuistShardMax=5

  test-shard-0: &shard-workflow
    name: "Shard #0"
    instance_type: linux_x2
    environment:
      java: 17
      vars:
        TUIST_SHARD_INDEX: 0
    scripts:
      - name: Run shard
        script: |
          tuist auth login
          ./gradlew test

  test-shard-1:
    <<: *shard-workflow
    name: "Shard #1"
    environment:
      java: 17
      vars:
        TUIST_SHARD_INDEX: 1

  test-shard-2:
    <<: *shard-workflow
    name: "Shard #2"
    environment:
      java: 17
      vars:
        TUIST_SHARD_INDEX: 2

  test-shard-3:
    <<: *shard-workflow
    name: "Shard #3"
    environment:
      java: 17
      vars:
        TUIST_SHARD_INDEX: 3

  test-shard-4:
    <<: *shard-workflow
    name: "Shard #4"
    environment:
      java: 17
      vars:
        TUIST_SHARD_INDEX: 4

Bitrise#

On Bitrise, Tuist writes .tuist-shard-matrix.json to the BITRISE_DEPLOY_DIR, making it available as a build artifact for downstream pipeline stages. Use Bitrise Pipelines with pre-defined parallel workflows:

yaml

# bitrise.yml
pipelines:
  test-pipeline:
    stages:
      - build-stage: {}
      - test-stage: {}

stages:
  build-stage:
    workflows:
      - build-shards: {}
  test-stage:
    workflows:
      - test-shard-0: {}
      - test-shard-1: {}
      - test-shard-2: {}
      - test-shard-3: {}
      - test-shard-4: {}

workflows:
  build-shards:
    steps:
      - script:
          title: Build and plan shards
          inputs:
            - content: |
                tuist auth login
                ./gradlew tuistPrepareTestShards -PtuistShardMax=5

  test-shard-0: &shard-workflow
    envs:
      - TUIST_SHARD_INDEX: 0
    steps:
      - script:
          title: Run shard
          inputs:
            - content: |
                tuist auth login
                ./gradlew test
  test-shard-1:
    <<: *shard-workflow
    envs:
      - TUIST_SHARD_INDEX: 1
  test-shard-2:
    <<: *shard-workflow
    envs:
      - TUIST_SHARD_INDEX: 2
  test-shard-3:
    <<: *shard-workflow
    envs:
      - TUIST_SHARD_INDEX: 3
  test-shard-4:
    <<: *shard-workflow
    envs:
      - TUIST_SHARD_INDEX: 4

Tip

Bitrise does not support dynamic parallel job creation at runtime. Define a fixed number of shard workflows in your pipeline stages — workflows within a stage run in parallel automatically.