v5 fails with Path Validation Error in Post Run steps

[deviantintegral]

Description:

Upgrading to v5 causes a a workflow to fail with the following error:

Error: Path Validation Error: Path(s) specified in the action for caching do(es) not exist, hence no cache is being saved.

Action version:

5.0.0

Platform:

• Ubuntu
• macOS
• Windows

Runner type:

• Hosted
• Self-hosted

Tools version:

Node 22.19.0 / npx.

Repro steps:

• Failing PR: chore(deps): update actions/setup-node action to v5 - abandoned Lullabot/drainpipe#935
• Failing job: https://github.com/Lullabot/drainpipe/actions/runs/17513511413/job/49761979980?pr=935

Expected behavior:

No errors!

Actual behavior:

The error marks the job as failing.

[silas]

Looks like this happens if (npm|pnpm|yarn|...) install isn't run and packageManager is set.

The work around seems to be to disable caching for jobs that don't run install.

[priyagupta108]

Hello @deviantintegral 👋,
Thank you for your report. We'll investigate the issue and get back to you with the details!

[malice00]

I am having the same issue after the update to v5, however it happens ONLY on the windows arm64 branch of my matrix!?

[gowridurgad]

Hi @deviantintegral, Thank you for reporting this issue and providing the details.
Starting with actions/setup-node@v5, caching is enabled by default when a packageManager field is present in the package.json file, even if no cache inputs have been explicitly set in the workflow. For more information, please refer to this setup-node documentation.

In this scenario, caching is automatically enabled. The action will try to cache dependencies, but if the required paths are missing because the dependencies haven’t been installed yet, you may see the message "no cache is being saved." This is expected behaviour when there is nothing available to cache.

To resolve this, there are two options:
1. Disable caching: If caching is not needed, set package-manager-cache: false in the workflow. For example:

uses: actions/setup-node@v5
with:
  package-manager-cache: false

2. Enable caching properly: Ensure dependencies are installed before the cleanup or post-run step so that there is something to cache. For example:

name: Install dependencies
run: yarn install

For more details on caching behaviour, please refer Caching packages data – Setup-Node documentation.
Let us know if you have any questions or need further assistance!

Hi @malice00, please try the suggestions above to disable caching or to ensure dependencies are installed before caching.
If the issue persists after trying these steps, could you please share your workflow file or a reproduction link? This will help us investigate the issue and assist you further.

[deviantintegral]

but if the required paths are missing because the dependencies haven’t been installed yet, you may see the message "no cache is being saved."

Can this instead be downgraded to a warning or info message? It seems strict to throw an error, given there's no dependencies to be saved and nothing to be gained with a cache.

[submarines-and]

Hi @deviantintegral, Thank you for reporting this issue and providing the details. Starting with actions/setup-node@v5, caching is enabled by default when a packageManager field is present in the package.json file, even if no cache inputs have been explicitly set in the workflow. For more information, please refer to this setup-node documentation.

A common scenario is to only run e.g. yarn install if needed. Ideally, this should not then crash the build.

[gowridurgad]

Hi @deviantintegral,
The error/warning handling for cache path validation is actually managed by the underlying actions/toolkit repository, rather than by setup-node itself.
To request changing this behaviour from an error to a warning, could you please open an issue in the actions/toolkit repo? That would be the best place for this type of change to be discussed and considered.

Hi @submarines-and, thanks for pointing that out! This is indeed a common pattern. When a packageManager is specified in package.json, actions/setup-node@v5 automatically enables caching. If yarn install is skipped, the expected cache paths don't exist, which results in a path validation error during the post-run step. This is currently expected behaviour, as the action attempts to cache dependencies that aren’t there.
To prevent the build from failing in this scenario, you can either:

1. Disable caching explicitly using package-manager-cache: false.
2. Ensure dependencies are installed before the caching step runs.
   If you think this should be handled more gracefully, opening an issue in the actions/toolkit repo would be the best way to propose that change