ArcadeLab vs itch.io vs Glitch vs GitHub Pages — which to use?

The question of where to publish depends on what you're publishing and what you're willing to do. Here's how the major options compare.

Quick comparison table

When ArcadeLab is the right choice

• You have a single-file HTML game or visualization under 500KB
• You want to publish in seconds, not minutes
• You don't want to create an account
• Your audience is kids, students, or non-developers
• You're iterating quickly with an AI assistant and need fast publish/iterate loops
• You want the URL to be permanent and embeddable in blog posts

When ArcadeLab isn't the right choice

• You want to charge money for your game — use itch.io
• You need a backend or database — use Glitch or your own hosting
• Your game needs to load assets at runtime from a CDN — use itch.io or GitHub Pages
• You're showcasing a tiny snippet for code-sharing — use CodePen
• Your game is larger than 500KB — use itch.io
• You want commenting and rating features — use itch.io or Newgrounds

Why is ArcadeLab so much faster to publish on?

Because it's built around one specific shape: a single HTML file. Every other platform handles many shapes, which means setup steps, configuration, and UI dedicated to choosing among them. ArcadeLab has one path: paste, click, publish. No project pages to fill in, no zip files to upload, no build commands to configure.

Can I use multiple platforms?

Yes. They aren't exclusive. You might publish a polished long-form game to itch.io and publish quick experiments and prototypes to ArcadeLab. The single-file constraint of ArcadeLab makes it especially good for AI-generated content where the entire game often lives in one Claude or ChatGPT response.