release-downloads

name	release-downloads
description	Use when checking GitHub release download counts, asset popularity, or tracking adoption across versions

Release Downloads

Overview

Report GitHub release download stats per version and asset. Only surfaces assets with 1+ downloads to cut noise.

When to Use

• Checking how many times releases have been downloaded
• Comparing adoption across versions
• Identifying which platforms users download (macOS, Windows, Linux)

Quick Reference

Run this script via Bash and present the output as-is:

total=0
for tag in $(gh release list --json tagName --jq '.[].tagName'); do
  assets=$(gh release view "$tag" --json assets --jq '[.assets[] | select(.downloadCount > 0) | {name, downloads: .downloadCount}]')
  if [ "$assets" != "[]" ]; then
    echo "## $tag"
    echo "$assets" | jq -r '.[] | "  \(.name): \(.downloads)"'
    subtotal=$(echo "$assets" | jq '[.[].downloads] | add')
    total=$((total + subtotal))
    echo "  Subtotal: $subtotal"
    echo ""
  fi
done
echo "Total downloads across all releases: $total"

Versions with zero downloads across all assets are omitted entirely.

Common Mistakes

• GitHub only counts downloads from the Releases page or API asset URLs — gh release download, git clone, and auto-updater fetches may not register.
• Draft releases don't track download counts.
• Counts can lag behind due to CDN caching.