Railway Not Rebuilding After a Git Push? Diagnose the Stalled Deployment Pipeline

You push a commit to your default branch, wait, and nothing happens on Railway. No new build, no deployment event, no error — the dashboard just sits on the previous deploy. This is almost always a break in the webhook-to-build chain rather than a build failure, and you can usually localize it in a few minutes by checking three things: the repository link, the branch filter, and the service's deployment triggers.

Recognizing the condition

The symptom is specific: pushes land on GitHub (or GitLab/Bitbucket), but Railway's Deployments tab shows no new entry at all. That distinguishes this problem from a failed build, where you would see a deployment record with an error state. If there is no record, Railway never received or never accepted the trigger — the problem is upstream of your code.

Likely causes at a glance

Cause	How to check	Typical fix
Repository link broken or pointing at the wrong repo	Project settings → connected repo; check the remote URL	Re-link the repository
Branch filter excludes the pushed branch	Service settings → source/branch configuration	Align the watched branch with your default branch
Webhook missing or failing on the git provider side	Repo settings → webhooks; look for recent failed deliveries	Re-add the repo connection so Railway recreates the webhook
Service paused or auto-deploy disabled	Service settings → deployment triggers	Re-enable automatic deploys
Commit filtered out (e.g., ignored paths or skip flags)	Check for path filters or commit-message skip conventions	Push a change outside the ignored paths

Ordered checks

1. Confirm the push actually landed. Run git log origin/main -1 locally (replace main with your default branch) and compare the SHA with what your git provider shows. A push to the wrong remote is a common false alarm.
2. Verify the connected repository. In the Railway dashboard, open your project and service, then check the source settings. Confirm the repository URL matches the remote you pushed to. If you renamed, transferred, or re-created the repo, the old link silently stops delivering events.
3. Check the watched branch. If Railway is configured to build main but your team recently switched to master or a trunk named something else, pushes to the new branch are ignored by design.
4. Inspect webhook deliveries on the provider. On GitHub: repository Settings → Webhooks, find the Railway hook, and open Recent Deliveries. Red responses or no deliveries at all confirm the trigger never reached Railway.
5. Confirm the service isn't paused. Check the service's deployment settings for a paused state or disabled auto-deploys, and check any path-ignore rules that might exclude your change.
6. Force a manual deploy as a control test. Trigger a deploy from the dashboard (redeploy or deploy latest commit). If a manual deploy builds your new commit fine, the build pipeline is healthy and the fault is definitely in the trigger path.

Fixes tied to findings

Broken or stale repo link: Disconnect and reconnect the repository from the dashboard, or use the CLI. Run this from your local project directory with the Railway CLI installed and authenticated (railway login first):

railway link          # select the project and service
railway status        # confirm the environment and service binding

Then re-attach the repository through the service's source settings in the dashboard. Reconnecting recreates the webhook on the provider, which fixes most silent-delivery failures. Note that reconnecting changes project state — it re-registers the integration — so do it deliberately, and expect the next push (or a manual redeploy) to be the first event on the new hook.

Branch mismatch: Update the watched branch in the service settings to match your actual default branch, then push a trivial commit (e.g., a whitespace change in a README) to confirm the trigger fires.

Webhook failing on the provider: If deliveries show 4xx/5xx responses, reconnecting the repo is the reliable fix because it issues a fresh hook with current credentials. If deliveries show success (2xx) but Railway still does nothing, the event is arriving and being rejected — recheck branch filters and path-ignore rules.

Paused service or disabled triggers: Re-enable automatic deployments in the service settings. If the service was paused for cost reasons, remember that resuming will also resume billing for compute.

Verifying the fix

Push a small, visible change to the default branch — a version string or log line works well. Within about a minute you should see a new deployment appear in the Railway dashboard, transition through building, and go live. Then confirm the change is actually served (fetch the endpoint or page that exposes it). A new deployment record plus the visible change is the complete verification; a deployment record alone only proves the trigger works, not that the right commit built.

When to escalate

Contact Railway support when you have all of the following: webhook deliveries show successful 2xx responses, the branch and repo settings are correct, a manual redeploy works, and pushes still produce no deployment record. Include your project ID, the service name, the commit SHA that failed to trigger, and a timestamped screenshot or export of the successful webhook delivery. That combination rules out everything on your side and points to a platform-side ingestion issue, which only Railway can resolve. Check the Railway status page first — webhook ingestion incidents do happen and will save you a support ticket.

Limitations

Exact setting names and CLI subcommands vary as Railway's dashboard evolves; the workflow above reflects established behavior but verify labels against the current UI. Monorepo setups add a wrinkle: if your service watches a subdirectory, pushes that only touch other directories are intentionally ignored — check the root-directory setting before assuming a fault.