The action will first check the local cache for a version match. If a version is not found locally, it will pull it from the `main` branch of the [go-versions](https://github.com/actions/go-versions/blob/main/versions-manifest.json) repository. On miss or failure, it will fall back to downloading directly from [go dist](https://storage.googleapis.com/golang). To change the default behavior, please use the [check-latest input](#check-latest-version).
The `check-latest` flag defaults to `false`. Use the default or set `check-latest` to `false` if you prefer stability and if you want to ensure a specific Go version is always used.
If `check-latest` is set to `true`, the action first checks if the cached version is the latest one. If the locally cached version is not the most up-to-date, a Go version will then be downloaded. Set `check-latest` to `true` if you want the most up-to-date Go version to always be used.
> Setting `check-latest` to `true` has performance implications as downloading Go versions is slower than using cached versions.
The action has a built-in functionality for caching and restoring go modules and build outputs. It uses [actions/cache](https://github.com/actions/cache) under the hood but requires less configuration settings. The `cache` input is optional, and caching is turned off by default.
The action defaults to search for the dependency file - go.sum in the repository root, and uses its hash as a part of the cache key. Use `cache-dependency-path` input for cases when multiple dependency files are used, or they are located in different subdirectories.
**Caching without specifying dependency file path**
The `go-version-file` input accepts a path to a `go.mod` file or a `go.work` file that contains the version of Go to be used by a project. As the `go.mod` file contains only major and minor (e.g. 1.18) tags, the action will search for the latest available patch version sequentially in the runner's directory with the cached tools, in the [version-manifest.json](https://github.com/actions/go-versions/blob/main/versions-manifest.json) file or at the go servers.