Flutter CI/CD on Github actions without fastlane

Quick and short example of how to run flutter release on github actions without fastlane.

Alexander Thiele · November 25th, 2024 – 2 minute read

You don't need fastlane for a flutter release.

Just use the command flutter release ipa to build and release your Flutter app to the apple app store or google play store.

How?

It is actually very simple. There are just a few steps you need to consider:

Use the macOS runner and install your Apple certificate and provisioning profile.
Install Flutter
Build your Flutter IPA file
Upload to appstoreconnect

Install Apple Certificates

The magic lies in how you install the apple certificates.

This is the build step of the Github action that saves my created Apple certificates to keychain.

      - name: Install apple certificate and provisioning profile
        env:
          BUILD_CERTIFICATE_BASE64: ${{ secrets.CERTIFICATES_P12 }}
          P12_PASSWORD: ${{ secrets.CERTIFICATE_PASSWORD }}
          BUILD_PROVISION_PROFILE_BASE64: ${{ secrets.PROVISIONING_PROFILE }}
          KEYCHAIN_PASSWORD: ${{ secrets.APPLE_APP_PASS }}
        run: |
          # create variables
          CERTIFICATE_PATH=$RUNNER_TEMP/build_certificate.p12
          PP_PATH=$RUNNER_TEMP/build_pp.mobileprovision
          KEYCHAIN_PATH=$RUNNER_TEMP/app-signing.keychain-db

          # import certificate and provisioning profile from secrets
          echo -n "$BUILD_CERTIFICATE_BASE64" | base64 --decode -o $CERTIFICATE_PATH
          echo -n "$BUILD_PROVISION_PROFILE_BASE64" | base64 --decode -o $PP_PATH

          # create temporary keychain
          security create-keychain -p "$KEYCHAIN_PASSWORD" $KEYCHAIN_PATH
          security set-keychain-settings -lut 21600 $KEYCHAIN_PATH
          security unlock-keychain -p "$KEYCHAIN_PASSWORD" $KEYCHAIN_PATH

          # import certificate to keychain
          security import $CERTIFICATE_PATH -P "$P12_PASSWORD" -A -t cert -f pkcs12 -k $KEYCHAIN_PATH
          security set-key-partition-list -S apple-tool:,apple: -k "$KEYCHAIN_PASSWORD" $KEYCHAIN_PATH
          security list-keychain -d user -s $KEYCHAIN_PATH

          # apply provisioning profile
          mkdir -p ~/Library/MobileDevice/Provisioning\ Profiles
          cp $PP_PATH ~/Library/MobileDevice/Provisioning\ Profiles

The Github Action is now ready to build a flutter app with your own signings.

Install Flutter

We still need to install flutter, but that's easy.

      - name: Install Flutter
        uses: subosito/flutter-action@v2
        with:
          channel: 'stable'
          flutter-version-file: pubspec.yaml
          cache: true

build your ipa

And finally build your release ipa including env-dart-define-file, your build number & build name

      - name: Building IPA
        run: |
          flutter build ipa --release \
          --export-options-plist=ios/Runner/ExportOptions.plist \
          --dart-define-from-file=env.staging.json \
          --build-number $BUILD_NUMBER \
          --build-name ${{ github.event.inputs.app_version }}

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