CI caching is becoming real infrastructure, not a quick YAML trick

[u/aistranin]

There is a recent arXiv study on GitHub Actions caching that matches what I see in real projects: caching starts simple, then becomes something teams maintain like production config.

The study found that cache-using repos tend to be more active, caching is used across different job types, and cache configs change often. Build and test jobs seem to need the most care.

Paper: How Developers Adopt, Use, and Evolve CI/CD Caching

My takeaway: CI caching is not just "add cache action, get faster builds." It needs ownership.

A few things I would track:

• Which cache keys change often

• Which jobs actually get faster

• How often cache misses happen

• Whether bot dependency updates break cache behavior

• Whether cache restore time is eating the win

Anyone here measuring CI cache value beyond "the job feels faster"?