How we cut review time from 3.4 hours to 52 minutes
A queue of its own, a one-line summary on every request, and what 90 days of data told us.
Developer Experience
7 min read
Reviews were the slowest step
In March we looked at 11,482 pull requests across 316 teams. The median one waited 3.4 hours for its first review, longer than it took to write.
Most of that time wasn't spent reviewing. It was spent noticing. Reviewers found out about requests from a stream of notifications that also carried deploy logs, comments and bot messages.
What we changed
We split review requests out of the notification stream into a queue of their own, sorted by how long each request had been waiting rather than by when it arrived.
Each request now carries a one-line summary of what changed and which files matter most, so a reviewer can decide in seconds whether it is theirs to take.
“We weren't slow at reviewing. We were slow at noticing there was something to review.”
Results after 90 days
Median time to first review fell from 3.4 hours to 52 minutes. Requests left waiting overnight dropped by 71%.
The number of comments per review stayed flat, which was the result we cared about most: faster didn't mean shallower.
What's next
Next quarter we're testing suggested reviewers based on who last touched the code. If you'd like early access, turn on Labs in your workspace settings.
Written by
Sara Okafor
Sara leads developer experience at Lumen. Before that she ran docs at Kitebase for five years.
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