Table of contents

• What is Graphite?
• Enhanced code review efficiency
• Increased productivity
• Simplified conflict resolution
• Better traceability and accountability
• Full utilization of modern tools
• Practical implementation
• Scalability
• Minimized technical debt
• Organized codebase
• Cultural advancement
• Conclusion
• Frequently asked questions

What is Graphite?

Graphite is a developer tool designed to accelerate and enhance the code review process. It enables teams to use stacked pull requests (PRs), a workflow where changes are split into smaller, logically connected units. Stacked PRs make it easier to review, test, and merge incremental changes, reducing complexity and improving productivity. With Graphite, teams can maintain cleaner commit histories and accelerate their development cycles while ensuring high code quality.

In addition to stacked PRs, Graphite integrates advanced AI-driven features to further enhance the development workflow.

1. Enhanced code review efficiency

Stacking enables developers to break down changes into smaller, logical units, making each pull request more focused and manageable. This approach minimizes cognitive load during reviews, reduces the risk of errors, and fosters a culture of high-quality, maintainable code.

Graphite Agent, Graphite's AI code review tool, provides immediate, actionable feedback on PRs, identifying bugs and performance issues early. It has reviewed millions of PRs across thousands of customers, including massive teams like Snowflake, Duolingo, and Ramp ([Graphite.dev][1]).

2. Increased productivity

With stacked PRs, developers can work on subsequent tasks while earlier changes are still under review. Graphite's AI-driven insights mean faster identification and resolution of common issues, allowing teams to keep coding continuously without downtime. Graphite Agent's real-time feedback loop accelerates the entire review process, helping developers iterate on their code more quickly and merge PRs faster.

Additionally, Graphite's integration with Graphite Chat allows developers to interact directly within their PRs. They can ask questions, get fixes, and ship clean code without switching tabs or hunting for context. This conversational approach streamlines the review process, enabling developers to make changes in seconds—not minutes.

3. Simplified conflict resolution

Smaller, incremental changes inherently reduce the likelihood of conflicts, and when conflicts do occur, they are more straightforward to resolve. This means less time spent untangling complex merges and more time dedicated to building new features. Stacked diffs provide developers with the clarity and control needed to handle conflicts efficiently, leading to a smoother development process.

Graphite Chat further aids in this by providing context-aware feedback, making merges more straightforward and less time-consuming.

4. Better traceability and accountability

Stacked PRs create a clear, detailed record of each incremental change, making it easy to trace the origin and intent behind every modification. This transparency not only creates accountability within the team but also simplifies debugging and knowledge sharing. Teams can maintain a strong audit trail while fostering trust and alignment in their workflows.

Graphite Agent's detailed AI analysis enriches these insights, helping developers understand the broader impact of changes within the codebase.

5. Full utilization of modern tools

Designed specifically to manage stacked diffs, Graphite simplifies workflows, automates repetitive tasks, and ensures the review process is as seamless as possible. By leveraging its advanced capabilities and Graphite Agent, developers are freed from manual tasks so they can focus on writing high-quality code.

Graphite integrates seamlessly into GitHub repositories, providing instant, codebase-aware feedback that eliminates review bottlenecks.

6. Practical implementation

Stacked PRs enable teams to break features into discrete backend, API, and UI components, allowing each to be developed, tested, and reviewed independently. This layered approach reduces integration risks, accelerates deployment timelines, and ensures every part of the feature is fully optimized before release.

The Graphite Merge Queue automatically organizes and processes pull requests, ensuring that your main branch remains stable and up-to-date.

7. Scalability

As projects grow, so does the challenge of managing increasingly complex codebases. Stacked diffs offer a scalable solution by keeping changes modular and organized, reducing the chaos of large-scale updates. This structure supports smooth collaboration across growing teams and evolving projects.

Graphite Agent's ability to provide context-aware feedback ensures that even as codebases expand, code quality remains high.

8. Minimized technical debt

Frequent, incremental updates enabled by stacked PRs naturally address technical debt as part of the development process. Graphite Agent's codebase-aware AI further helps in proactively identifying and resolving potential technical debt issues before they accumulate, ensuring cleaner, maintainable codebases.

9. Organized codebase

Stacking naturally encourages a modular, disciplined approach to development. Instead of dealing with sprawling, unwieldy updates, teams work with well-defined, self-contained changes. Graphite Agent also enhances this by enforcing customizable coding standards and providing real-time feedback, maintaining order and clarity across the entire codebase.

10. Cultural advancement

Embracing Graphite and stacking signals a commitment to modern, forward-thinking engineering standards. It shifts team habits from reactive to proactive, emphasizing continuous improvement, accountability, and craftsmanship. By elevating your practices, you create an environment where developers thrive, code quality flourishes, and innovation becomes the norm. Graphite Agent's integration into the development workflow reinforces this culture by providing consistent, high-quality code reviews.

Conclusion

Switching to Graphite, stacked PRs, and AI-enhanced reviews isn't just about speeding up code reviews—it's about refining every aspect of your development process. This modern workflow transforms collaboration, conflict resolution, and code quality, enabling your team to consistently deliver cleaner, more reliable features. In short, it's an investment in lasting excellence that will elevate every line of code you write.

Ready to transform your development workflow? Get started with Graphite today.

Frequently asked questions

What is Graphite?

Graphite is a developer tool that integrates with GitHub to optimize the process of code review and change management. It builds on the concept of stacked diffs, which allows developers to stack code changes in a sequence that makes reviewing and merging more manageable and less error-prone.

How does Graphite improve code reviews?

Graphite improves code reviews by enabling stacked diffs—breaking large changes into smaller, sequential pull requests. This approach reduces cognitive load during reviews, makes conflicts easier to resolve, and provides clearer context for reviewers. Additionally, Graphite's AI-powered Graphite Agent tool provides immediate feedback on PRs.

Can I use Graphite with my existing GitHub workflow?

Yes, Graphite is designed to work seamlessly with existing GitHub repositories and workflows. It doesn't replace Git but enhances it with additional tooling and automation. You can start using Graphite immediately with your current repositories without any migration process.

What are stacked diffs?

Stacked diffs are a workflow pattern where large changes are broken down into smaller, dependent pull requests. Each diff builds on the previous one, making code reviews more manageable and reducing the complexity of large feature implementations. Graphite automates the creation and management of these stacked changes.

Is Graphite suitable for small teams?

Graphite is beneficial for teams of all sizes. Small teams particularly benefit from its simplified workflows and reduced Git complexity, while larger teams appreciate its automation features and ability to manage complex branching strategies more effectively.

How does Graphite Agent AI code review work?

Graphite Agent is Graphite's AI code review tool that provides immediate, actionable feedback on pull requests. It identifies bugs and performance issues early, has reviewed millions of PRs across thousands of customers, and helps maintain high code quality standards throughout the development process.