diff --git a/.github/workflows/auto-start-ci.yml b/.github/workflows/auto-start-ci.yml
index 32fb224b97928e..840d4afe942f1e 100644
--- a/.github/workflows/auto-start-ci.yml
+++ b/.github/workflows/auto-start-ci.yml
@@ -10,8 +10,9 @@ on:
 
 concurrency: ${{ github.workflow }}
 
+# todo (node-fetch not working on 18, waiting for node-core-utils to fix)
 env:
-  NODE_VERSION: lts/*
+  NODE_VERSION: 16
 
 permissions:
   contents: read