diff --git a/nixos/tests/all-tests.nix b/nixos/tests/all-tests.nix
index 785a5621f57e..81f5b0cf7fe4 100644
--- a/nixos/tests/all-tests.nix
+++ b/nixos/tests/all-tests.nix
@@ -243,6 +243,7 @@ in {
   ghostunnel = handleTest ./ghostunnel.nix {};
   gitdaemon = handleTest ./gitdaemon.nix {};
   gitea = handleTest ./gitea.nix { giteaPackage = pkgs.gitea; };
+  github-runner = handleTest ./github-runner.nix {};
   gitlab = handleTest ./gitlab.nix {};
   gitolite = handleTest ./gitolite.nix {};
   gitolite-fcgiwrap = handleTest ./gitolite-fcgiwrap.nix {};
diff --git a/nixos/tests/github-runner.nix b/nixos/tests/github-runner.nix
new file mode 100644
index 000000000000..033365d6925c
--- /dev/null
+++ b/nixos/tests/github-runner.nix
@@ -0,0 +1,37 @@
+import ./make-test-python.nix ({ pkgs, ... }:
+{
+  name = "github-runner";
+  meta = with pkgs.lib.maintainers; {
+    maintainers = [ veehaitch ];
+  };
+  nodes.machine = { pkgs, ... }: {
+    services.github-runners.test = {
+      enable = true;
+      url = "https://github.com/yaxitech";
+      tokenFile = builtins.toFile "github-runner.token" "not-so-secret";
+    };
+
+    systemd.services.dummy-github-com = {
+      wantedBy = [ "multi-user.target" ];
+      before = [ "github-runner-test.service" ];
+      script = "${pkgs.netcat}/bin/nc -Fl 443 | true && touch /tmp/registration-connect";
+    };
+    networking.hosts."127.0.0.1" = [ "api.github.com" ];
+  };
+
+  testScript = ''
+    start_all()
+
+    machine.wait_for_unit("dummy-github-com")
+
+    try:
+      machine.wait_for_unit("github-runner-test")
+    except Exception:
+      pass
+
+    out = machine.succeed("journalctl -u github-runner-test")
+    assert "Self-hosted runner registration" in out, "did not read runner registration header"
+
+    machine.wait_until_succeeds("test -f /tmp/registration-connect")
+  '';
+})
diff --git a/pkgs/development/tools/continuous-integration/github-runner/default.nix b/pkgs/development/tools/continuous-integration/github-runner/default.nix
index 91b593f72943..e6b22a99bd17 100644
--- a/pkgs/development/tools/continuous-integration/github-runner/default.nix
+++ b/pkgs/development/tools/continuous-integration/github-runner/default.nix
@@ -8,6 +8,7 @@
 , glibc
 , glibcLocales
 , lib
+, nixosTests
 , nodejs-16_x
 , stdenv
 , which
@@ -250,7 +251,10 @@ buildDotnetModule rec {
     runHook postInstallCheck
   '';
 
-  passthru.updateScript = ./update.sh;
+  passthru = {
+    tests.smoke-test = nixosTests.github-runner;
+    updateScript = ./update.sh;
+  };
 
   meta = with lib; {
     changelog = "https://github.com/actions/runner/releases/tag/v${version}";