>**Note:** While these instructions will always work for users on gitlab.com, if you are an administrator of a self-hosted GitLab instance, you will need to enable the [GitHub integration](https://docs.gitlab.com/ee/integration/github.html) in order for users to follow the preferred import method described on this page. If this is not enabled, users can alternatively import their GitHub repositories using a [personal access token](https://docs.gitlab.com/ee/user/project/import/github.html#authorize-access-to-your-repositories-using-a-personal-access-token) from GitHub, but this method will not be able to associate all user activity (such as issues and pull requests) with matching GitLab users.
>As an administrator of a self-hosted GitLab instance, you can also use the [GitHub rake task](https://docs.gitlab.com/ee/administration/raketasks/github_import.html) to import projects from GitHub without the constraints of a Sidekiq worker.
When issues and pull requests are being imported, the importer attempts to find their GitHub authors and assignees in the database of the GitLab instance. (Note that pull requests are called "merge requests" in GitLab.)
For this association to succeed, prior to the import, each GitHub author and assignee in the repository must have either previously logged in to a GitLab account using the GitHub icon **or** have a GitHub account with a [public email address](https://help.github.com/articles/setting-your-commit-email-address-on-github/) that matches their GitLab account’s email address.
If a user referenced in the project is not found in GitLab's database, the project creator (typically the user that initiated the import process) is set as the author/assignee, but a note on the issue mentioning the original GitHub author is added.
The importer creates any new namespaces (groups) if they do not exist, or, if the namespace is taken, the repository is imported under the namespace of the user who initiated the import process. The namespace/repository name can also be edited, with the proper permissions.
The importer will also import branches on forks of projects related to open pull requests. These branches will be imported with a naming scheme similar to GH-`SHA-Username/Pull-Request-number/fork-name/branch`. This may lead to a discrepancy in branches compared to those of the GitHub repository.
Before you begin, ensure that any GitHub users who you want to map to GitLab users have either:
1. A GitLab account that has logged in using the GitHub icon.
\- or -
2. A GitLab account with an email address that matches the [public email address](https://help.github.com/articles/setting-your-commit-email-address-on-github/) of the GitHub user.
User-matching attempts occur in that order, and if a user is not identified either way, the activity is associated with the user account that is performing the import.
>**Note:** For a proper author/assignee mapping for issues and pull requests, the GitHub integration method (above) should be used instead of the personal access token. If you are using gitlab.com or a self-hosted GitLab instance with the GitHub integration enabled, that should be the preferred method to import your repositories. Read more in the [How it works](#how-it-works) section.
1. Go to [https://github.com/settings/tokens/new](https://github.com/settings/tokens/new).
2. Enter a token description.
3. Select the repo scope.
4. Click **Generate token**.
5. Copy the token hash.
6. Go back to GitLab and provide the token to the GitHub importer.
7. Hit the **List Your GitHub Repositories** button and wait while GitLab reads your repositories' information. Once done, you'll be taken to the importer page to select the repositories to import.
1. By default, the proposed repository namespaces match the names as they exist in GitHub, but based on your permissions, you can choose to edit these names before you proceed to import any of them.
2. Select the **Import** button next to any number of repositories, or select **Import all repositories**.
3. The **Status** column shows the import status of each repository. You can choose to leave the page open and it will update in realtime or you can return to it later.
4. Once a repository has been imported, click its GitLab path to open its GitLab URL.
Depending your GitLab tier, [project mirroring](../../../workflow/repository_mirroring.md) can be set up to keep your imported project in sync with its GitHub copy.
For large projects it may take a while to import all data. To reduce the time necessary you can increase the number of Sidekiq workers that process the following queues:
For an optimal experience we recommend having at least 4 Sidekiq processes (each running a number of threads equal to the number of CPU cores) that *only* process these queues. We also recommend that these processes run on separate servers. For 4 servers with 8 cores this means you can import up to 32 objects (e.g. issues) in parallel.
Reducing the time spent in cloning a repository can be done by increasing network throughput, CPU capacity, and disk performance (e.g. by using high performance SSDs) of the disks that store the Git repositories (for your GitLab instance). Increasing the number of Sidekiq workers will *not* reduce the time spent cloning repositories.
