Host on GitLab

GitLab makes it incredibly easy to build, deploy, and host your Hugo website via their free GitLab Pages service, which provides native support for Hugo, as well as numerous other static site generators.

Assumptions

Working familiarity with Git for version control
Completion of the Hugo Quick Start
A GitLab account
A Hugo website on your local machine that you are ready to publish

Create .gitlab-ci.yml

cd your-hugo-site

In the root directory of your Hugo site, create a .gitlab-ci.yml file. The .gitlab-ci.yml configures the GitLab CI on how to build your page. Simply add the content below.

gitlab-ci.yml


image: monachus/hugo

before_script:
  - git submodule init
  - git submodule update --force

pages:
  script:
  - hugo
  artifacts:
    paths:
    - public
  only:
  - master

Push Your Hugo Website to GitLab

Next, create a new repository on GitLab. It is not necessary to make the repository public. In addition, you might want to add /public to your .gitignore file, as there is no need to push compiled assets to GitLab or keep your output website in version control.

# initialize new git repository
git init

# add /public directory to our .gitignore file
echo "/public" >> .gitignore

# commit and push code to master branch
git add .
git commit -m "Initial commit"
git remote add origin https://gitlab.com/YourUsername/your-hugo-site.git
git push -u origin master

Wait for Your Page to Build

That’s it! You can now follow the CI agent building your page at https://gitlab.com/<YourUsername>/<your-hugo-site>/pipelines.

After the build has passed, your new website is available at https://<YourUsername>.gitlab.io/<your-hugo-site>/.

Next Steps

GitLab supports using custom CNAME’s and TLS certificates. For more details on GitLab Pages, see the GitLab Pages setup documentation.