How do you install and enable Renovate on a GitHub repository?

There are two main ways: the Mend Renovate GitHub App (hosted, easiest) and self-hosted Renovate. Both result in the same behaviour once configured.

# .github/workflows/renovate.yml — self-hosted on GitHub Actions
name: Renovate
on:
  schedule:
    - cron: "0 2 * * 1-5"
  workflow_dispatch:
jobs:
  renovate:
    runs-on: ubuntu-latest
    steps:
      - uses: actions/checkout@v4
      - uses: renovatebot/github-action@v40
        with:
          token: ${{ secrets.RENOVATE_TOKEN }}

# renovate.json — placed in repo root
{
  "$schema": "https://docs.renovatebot.com/renovate-schema.json",
  "extends": ["config:recommended"]
}

When Renovate first accesses a repository with no renovate.json, it raises an onboarding PR proposing a default configuration. Merging this PR activates Renovate for that repository.

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