Improved pull request merge experience (public preview) feedback

[willsmythe]

Important

• This new experience is rolling out gradually and is not available to everyone yet.
• When it's available to you, a link will appear below the current merge experience on the PR page.
• See Known issues 👇 for latest on known bugs and feature parity gaps.

Thanks ❤️ and happy previewing!

About the new experience

To help you better understand the state of your pull request and get it merged faster, the merge experience on the pull request page has been improved! This experience is currently in public preview.

What's new

We've maintained the familiar look of the existing merge experience while incorporating several usability improvements:

• Checks grouped by status: checks are now grouped by status with failing checks prioritized at the top of the list, making it easier to identify issues that need attention
• Checks ordered alphabetically: status checks are now ordered alphabetically to make it easier to find a specific check
• Commit metadata validation: errors from failing commit metadata rules (like non-compliant commit messages) can now be corrected and retried
• Improved accessibility: consistent keyboard navigation, focus management, and landmarks help make the experience more accessible to everyone

Try it out

Once available, you will see a Try the new merge experience link below the merge box on the pull request page:

Click it to switch to the improved experience. A link is also available for easily switching back to the existing experience. You can also toggle the experience via the feature preview dialog.

🔴 🔴 🔴 Known issues 🔴 🔴 🔴

You will run into some bugs and missing features (let us know when you do if not listed here).

Bugs

1. IMPORTANT: in certain cases, an incorrect commit author email address will be shown when confirming merge or a different email address will be used from what's displayed
2. Misalignment/wonkiness with check status icon (Safari-only)
3. Clicking the Resolve conflicts button results in a 404/Not Found in certain cases
4. Bypass checkbox not visible / user blocked from merging with The base branch does not accept merge commits.
5. Squash and auto-merge button (to enable auto-merge) is too easily confused for Squash and merge (to directly merge) because of similar text and styling *FIX IN PROGRESS
6. Documentation URLs appear as text and are not clickable

Recently fixed

• FIXED 2024-11-09: Enabling auto-merge fails with a "not found" error
• FIXED 2024-11-12: Admin bypass checkbox not always appearing preventing users from bypassing merge requirements
• FIXED 2024-11-14: Styling of the Delete branch button is sometimes missing (fixed by reloading the page)
• FIXED 2024-11-22: The browser tab icon (favicon) does not currently reflect the pull request's merge status
• FIXED 2024-11-25: A page refresh is sometimes required to show latest status and correct actions/buttons (like after all checks have completed)
• FIXED 2024-11-25: Clicking Delete branch / Restore branch fails with a Couldn't update branch message (likely occurs only in PRs from forks)
• SUPPORTED: Reviews can be dismissed and re-requested
• SUPPORTED: Command line instructions are missing
• FIXEX: Restore branch button is easily confused for Delete branch (we moved the Restore branch button out of the new merge experience so the only button that will appear here is Delete branch)
• FIXED: Use natural/logical ordering for status checks to help with numeric matrix build ordering

Missing features

Features currently missing, but are coming:

• Approving GitHub Actions workflows
• Selecting a different commit author email when merging
• Status check durations (showing how long a check has been running / took to run)
• Add your review action in the Reviewers section (workaround: navigate to the Files Changed tab and click Review changes)

Looking for feedback 🔈 🔈

• Collapse the grouping of "passing" checks by default
• Show the grouping of "in progress" status checks above the grouping of "pending"
• In the current experience, the confirmation form (which appears after clicking "merge") replaces the entire merge experience, but is simply appended in the new experience. Like? Some options:
  • Replicate the behavior of the current experience?
  • Open a dialog?

Feedback

We want to hear from you! Post your comments, questions, likes, and dislikes below.

[codeithuman]

Where is the "Merge without waiting for requirements to be met (bypass branch protections)" checkbox?

Old

New

[willsmythe]

A fix for the bypass checkbox not appearing is in the queue (should get deployed today).

There also may still be an issue with this checkbox not appearing until the page is refreshed. We're tracking this.

[willsmythe]

@codeithuman - can you check if the bypass checkbox is appearing as expected now?

[Rockyspade]

Where is the "Merge without waiting for requirements to be met (bypass branch protections)" checkbox?

Old

New

[laurmaedje]

@willsmythe It's still not working for me.

New:

Old:

[purajit]

Not working for me either when I first create a draft and then mark it ready for review (which is my default process)

[willsmythe]

Thanks for the feedback / write-up. Definitely agree. This check box appears for some users in some scenarios, but there's clearly a bug here where it's not appearing for everyone. We're investigating.

[seesharprun]

I like this feature so far, but the only transient bug I've seen is sometimes the checks show up fine while they are processing, but once all checks have passed, they all disappear. If you select the arrow to expand, it shows an empty list. I need to refresh the browser to see the passing checks.

Again, just a small client-side issue that I'm seeing in Edge 130.0.2849.68

[willsmythe]

Thanks for reporting. If you (or anyone else) is able (and comfortable) to capture a quick video and include here as a reply, please do!

If you select the arrow to expand

Are you referring to the caret 1) on the right side of the merge box, or 2) next to "X successful checks"?

[willsmythe]

I added this issue to the Known issues > Bugs section in the description above. Check there for updates, and to see other issues we're tracking.

[chamini2]

Again, just a small client-side issue that I'm seeing in Edge 130.0.2849.68

for a second I thought you commented your IP

[jessicaDura]

again non diversitalizing materials the only truely honest traite available to be earned.

[cipacera]

Do you find it helpful to record and report bugs like this for quicker resolution?

[thomas-bc]

The "view command line instructions" can be handy. It used to be a clickable element that extends to show CLI commands. It is not anymore. Could be good to add back in?

[willsmythe]

Thanks for the feedback. This is coming! See the Known issues > Feature gaps list above.

[Tilka]

The second command of Step 1 points to the wrong repository. It should point to the repo of the branch being merged, not the repo of the branch it's being merged into. The instructions of the "classic merge experience" are correct.

[tzing]

The new look on that PR successfully merged message confused me.

Its appearance is quite similar to the message of you can click this button to delete the branch on the classic pane. This look makes me wonder if the auto delete branch feature is broken.

[caarlos0]

same here... thought it didn't delete the branch, and clicked restore 🤦🏻

[jonkoops]

This ha 100% tripped me up multiple times, the classic merge experience does this much better.

[DingGGu]

I think this feedback is deployed now.

[richardhj]

@willsmythe It shows "...has been merged and deleted" (see above) to me but my branch is protected (and if it would have been deleted in fact, it would be a disaster because of deployment).

[jonathan-bird]

@richardhj +1 here too

[kaoths]

---

The "Delete branch" button CSS/style sometimes doesn't load.
This sometimes appears after merging a PR.
It does not affect any functionalities. Just the visual issue, reloading the page fixes it.

[tarilabs]

Same problem, google chrome on Mac

[a-stankevich]

Same happens occasionally in Firefox, Windows

[kaoths]

Sorry for late reply, I'm seeing this on Arc browser.

[willsmythe]

This should be resolved now. If anyone is still experiencing this, let us know!

[Ivnfrolov13]

yes

[getchoo]

Here is the new experience on a PR with an approval from a reviewer without write access, that has also passed all CI:

Displaying red around this feels a bit odd to me. My first thought when I see it is that CI has failed, changes have been requested, or maybe that there are required approvals/checks still being waited on? (None of these are the case in this repository, which is nixpkgs)

In comparison, the classic merge experience has a green accent:

(I also noticed the new experience shows the approval of the reviewer w/o write access. This is an awesome addition for nixpkgs, so thanks!)

The use of green lets a PR author or committer know at a glance that it should be good to merge. I'd much rather keep this behavior :)

[BhaaLseN]

Adding my +1 here. Having both the symbol and the border red when nothing else inside the box is red is feels weird, as if there is something to do for someone to address an issue. As someone that simply doesn't have merge permissions, the old experience had it green (because everything's fine, no checks failed, no reviews blocking it) The only thing that "blocks" anything is me not having merge permissions.

And it feels odd to force the red border with the previous suggestions of adding a failed thing in there just to have more red.

I always saw that box at the end as "PR status (as far as the project is concerned)" and not "PR status (as far as I'm concerned)". And if someone can merge it no problem, then it should be green in my head (even if I can't merge it).

I do see some value in making this different for the PR author if it adds value for them, but as project member doing reviews I don't see the added value of bringing something to my attention in a rather distracting way that I both know of and can't do anything about myself.

[thaJeztah]

I just enabled the new view, and also adding my "+1" here. The red border and red "PR icon" is overshadowing the status of checks, and when looking it's easy to consider it "CI failed", whereas the status is more "pending review" (which would be true for most PRs that are not merged yet).

I love the new view for grouping checks by status, which is gonna be a huge time-saver for finding that "one" failed check in a list of 160 other checks, but this part is a regression and making it much harder to spot if a PR is failing CI.

Here's a before/after (note the "PR" icon is grey, which at least makes it look less as "failing";

[ShalokShalom]

Sorry, only saw this now. https://github.com/orgs/community/discussions/143787#discussioncomment-11460074

[daveisfera]

Saw this as well and was confused about what was broken with my PR, but then realized that it was fine and the new UI just shows this as red for some reason

[evans-jahja-paypay]

A red merge button is easily confused with "Closed PR", so now it has dual meaning: closed and blocked. I think if we want to use another color, it should be something else that is unused.

[asilbek-ismoilov]

Very good

[khoatranthanh]

[willsmythe]

Thanks for reporting. We're planning to move the Restore branch button (see Known issues > Planned changes). Regarding the missing styling, this is something we're tracking for the Delete branch button too (see Known issues > Bugs).

[willsmythe]

This should be fixed now.

[halamix2]

"Enable auto-merge" button is replaced with "Squash and auto-merge" which is broken:
Instead of marking the PR to be auto-merged it simply displays "Not Found" error below the button

Console logs just displays 404 on POST to https://github.com/<org>/<repo>/pull/531/page_data/enable_auto_merge

[willsmythe]

Thanks for reporting. We're investigating.

[willsmythe]

The team is reviewing a fix for this.

[willsmythe]

A fix for this problem rolled out on Friday! 🎉

Let us know if you're still seeing this problem.

[halamix2]

It's fixed now, thanks <3

[leoskyrocker]

it's buggy and requires a page refresh before the merge button works even when all the checks are already passing, overall it feels less real time than before

[willsmythe]

Thanks for the feedback. Definitely a problem. We're investigating.

[willsmythe]

Are there any required status checks? Or just optional? Or a mix?

[dg6862]

I have the same issue. We have several optional checks and one required.

[willsmythe]

A fix is underway for this. Should deploy by early next week.

[jcviljoen]

Hey Will 👋. I ran into a simpler case where, if you merge the base branch and the checks pass, the "enable auto merge" button stays visible until you refresh. Seemed like an extension to this feedback 🙌.

Great update btw! 🚀

[Lamparter]

Merge is not an allowed merge method in this repository.
You're not authorized to push to this branch. Visit https://docs.github.com/repositories/configuring-branches-and-merges-in-your-repository/managing-protected-branches/about-protected-branches for more information.

files-community/Files#16445

Sorry for the oversized screenshot! I noticed the text merge is not an allowed merge method in this repository in a repository I don't control - I'm assuming this isn't intended and so reporting it here.

[jsoref]

The "Merge is not an allowed merge method in this repository." part of argoproj/argo-cd#21064:

Merging is blocked
Merge is not an allowed merge method in this repository.
1 review requesting changes by reviewers with write access.

definitely doesn't make sense.

[kennytv]

I like that the list of checks is grouped collapsed now, though when expanding it, I'd want all of them to be opened by default, including successful checks. In the example below, it currently only expands skipped checks:

I also feel like the red outline for awaiting reviews is a bit too aggressive, especially when coupled with removing so much green (no full checkmark as well as including skipped checks as gray in the outline).

[spytheman]

I do not want the list of checks to expand like that - I have over 40 jobs, and expanding just the section I clicked on, is exactly as it should be.

If I want to see/check the successful ones, I can just click on them.

[qmonnet]

While it probably makes sense for most users to collapse the list of checks, I've a high screen and my own preference is also to have all checks expanded to glance at the full list at once. I'd appreciate if there were opt-in options to 1) expand all lists, including successful checks, and 2) remove the max-height for the whole merge box (which some folks currently do by injecting custom CSS).

[spytheman]

Checks grouped by status: checks are now grouped by status with failing checks prioritized at the top of the list, making it easier to identify issues that need attention

THANK YOU 🙇🏻‍♂️ ❤️ 🥳 !

[spytheman]

I have a repository that has over 40 jobs that are commonly running and sometimes depending on what is changed, that can grow up to 76. Previously I had to scroll/hunt for the failing jobs A LOT.
The improvement in this alone, made my daily Github experience a lot better 🥳 .

[Lukeghenco]

We are glad to hear about this. GitHub developers have infinitely more than 76 on many of our repos (as do a ton of larger repositories using GitHub), so this was something we felt would really help the DX. Thank you for the feedback.

[joshhunt]

Bringing failing checks to the top is a huge win. Thanks for this 🙌

[genintho]

Checks ordered alphabetically: status checks are now ordered alphabetically to make it easier to find a specific check

The sorting is braking. little bit when using matrix with numbers.

[willsmythe]

Totally agree. We have an internal issue tracking this. I'll add it to the list of Known issues > Planned changes above.

[willsmythe]

@genintho - can you give this another try? We rolled out a fix today to order status checks more logically.

[genintho]

@willsmythe it looks fixed! Thank you!

[nunosilva800]

Stuck in this check for minutes... switched back to old UI, no waiting needed.

[hughesjs]

I love it! No notes.

Scratch that, I have one request:

It would be really nice if we could get a little indicator on here as to which stage the pipeline run is on

Possibly ⬤-⬤-◯-◯ style for jobs where there's enough space for that, or maybe make it a collapsible subpanel

[Groxx]

New:

Vs old:

Merging is blocked
Merge is not an allowed merge method in this repository.

This is technically correct, but this repo is configured to use squashing onto master so it's kinda irrelevant. The old experience doesn't show this.

[awoimbee]

The "This branch is out-of-date with the base branch" section got downgraded (less readable because text wrapping and no highlight, doesn't say which of my emails if gonna be used).
Before:

After:

All in all I prefer the old style (I like every other recent changes on github).

[jamierajewski]

The theme does not seem to match my selected theme of "dark dimmed" which doesn't look great since the rest of the page is themed correctly:

Here it is in the old experience:

[Sofia-Ortega]

I like seeing the all the tests at once and by one and seeing the green checkmarks as the tests pass one by one. I like the old version's progressive experience.

Other than that, great look!

[glen-84]

1. The (pull_request) text is ugly, and probably doesn't need to be displayed at all times. Could it be moved to a tooltip?
2. "Started 3m ago" makes (3) "This check has started..." quite redundant.

• As mentioned above, this hover effect doesn't look great, and it might make sense to just link the whole row.

Finally, there is quite a lot of page scrollbar movement. This could potentially be avoided by giving the expanded area a fixed (but resizeable) height.

[petvaizAkhtar]

Test net sui

[m-anwr]

Red frame around it is a little intimidating

[petvaizAkhtar]

Sui Action me I test net all uses program

[ruxandrafed]

We're noticing an odd bug when users switch to the new merge experience. Everything is fine in the classic merge experience, but if they use the new one they are unable to merge because supposedly there is a failing ruleset. However, the specific ruleset is displayed as passed under insights and that is the expected/correct evaluation (the commit message in question is chore(nimble): extend sub retention to 1 week).

I've attached some screenshots below.

New merge experience - blocking merge because of rule violation:

Rule insights - pass:

Rule definition:

Classic merge experience - merge is allowed:

Is it me/us? What am I missing? :) Thank you!

[fingolfin]

First impression: where are all the test? Ah, there is a tiny chevron that I have to guess is a UI element and click to make them visible. Please make this more visible and recognizable as something one can interact with.

Also, what is with the love for low contrast?

I see "20 successful checks" as a link target in darkish gray on light gray; very small text, small target area. Not good in terms of accessibility.

Once I managed to open it, I see that "Required" now also has reduced visibility.
Before:

After:

Maybe someone thinks this looks "nicer" but it impairs usability.

[Alex17Li]

"Code owner review required by reviewers with write access." is too vague, in the old version it would say something like
"Waiting on code owner review from type-a-approvers".

For me it's even the old version is too confusing because sometimes there are multiple review groups and the message would say
"Waiting on code owner review from type-a-approvers, type-b-approvers, and/or type-c-approvers." and it wasn't clear what and/or actually meant- the ownership in the repo got fairly complicated so sometimes it would be an or and sometimes an and.

[jhm-ciberman]

Feedback: I liked that in the old experience I could identify the problem just by seeing the position of the test it failed at a glance. For example I have 3 checks:

• Backend Tests
• Style Check
• Frontend Tests

So at a glance I could see which test failed. It sounds stupid, but now I have to actually read the test name in order to identify the problem. It takes only 2 seconds, but it adds a tiny mental overhead that didn't exist in the previous experience. Maybe it would be cool to only show the new style if you have more than... 6 or 10 checks?

[chrisjenx]

Won't tell you why it won't auto merge when the branch is required to be uptodate.

[SukkaW]

Here is what I see after an approved review. I can't clearly see if the PR is ready to go or not.