TL;DR: Code reviews are slow and require constant chasing. GitKarma, a GitHub App fixes this: reviewers earn karma for quality reviews; authors must spend karma to get their PR merged. This creates a balanced economy where reviews actually happen, and critical work gets prioritized fairly. Visit gitkarma.dev to try it.
The problem — unglamorous, universal, and ridiculously costly
Every engineering team knows this scene: a developer opens a PR at 9:03am, goes for coffee, and returns at 11:18am to find the PR still waiting. Days pass. Context is lost. Rollbacks happen. Momentum dies.
We treat code review like honorary volunteer work. It’s something good teammates should do, but it’s also the first thing to slip when calendars get tight or m…
TL;DR: Code reviews are slow and require constant chasing. GitKarma, a GitHub App fixes this: reviewers earn karma for quality reviews; authors must spend karma to get their PR merged. This creates a balanced economy where reviews actually happen, and critical work gets prioritized fairly. Visit gitkarma.dev to try it.
The problem — unglamorous, universal, and ridiculously costly
Every engineering team knows this scene: a developer opens a PR at 9:03am, goes for coffee, and returns at 11:18am to find the PR still waiting. Days pass. Context is lost. Rollbacks happen. Momentum dies.
We treat code review like honorary volunteer work. It’s something good teammates should do, but it’s also the first thing to slip when calendars get tight or managers move on. That cost is subtle — missed deadlines, overloaded engineers, and increased risk — but it compounds faster than you think.
Slow reviews are a productivity tax. We pay it with wasted cycles, frustrated developers, and shipped bugs.
Meet GitKarma — make reviews fair, fast, and final
GitKarma flips the script. Instead of relying on goodwill, chasing down developers, or leaving everyone to fend for themselves, it creates a transparent system for review labor inside your team.
The rules are simple and human-friendly:
- Review to Earn: Developers earn karma points for reviewing PRs. The more you review, the more you earn.
- Spend to Merge: Authors must spend karma to pass the GitKarma check and merge their PR. No karma? No merge. If you run out, you review someone else’s PR to earn more. This isn’t optional — it’s the gate that makes the system work.
- Full Visibility Dashboard: GitKarma provides a comprehensive dashboard showing PR status, time to merge, review activity, and karma distribution across your team. No more guessing where bottlenecks are — the data is right there.
- Scoreboard > Politics: Karma is visible. Who consistently reviews thoroughly? Who hoards approvals? The data is there.
- Admin guardrails: When a hotfix needs to ship or production is down, admins can bypass the karma check entirely — no waiting, no blockers. GitKarma enforces process when it matters and gets out of the way when urgency demands it.
- Bounties! Need a critical PR reviewed fast? Wrestling with a gnarly refactor that deserves extra recognition? Or just want to spice things up? Admins can add a bounty with
gk add bounty <karma points>(e.g.,gk add bounty 50) to offer bonus karma to reviewers. Use it to fast-track urgent work, reward heroic reviews of complex PRs, or simply add a little competitive fun to your workflow.
The result: reviews happen consistently, critical work moves forward, and contribution is measured fairly.
Real scenario: Ship faster, not harder
Here’s how it works in practice:
Sarah opens a refactoring PR on Monday morning. She has 100 karma points. Her PR costs 100 karma to merge. Two teammates review it Tuesday afternoon — they each earn 50 karma. Sarah spends her 100 karma, merges the PR, and ships by Wednesday.
Next week, Sarah’s karma is low (25 points). She needs to merge another PR (100 karma cost). She reviews two PRs from teammates — earns 100 karma — then merges her own. The cycle continues. Reviews happen. Work moves.
No chasing. No guilt trips. Just a system that runs itself.
Built for real teams
GitKarma is designed to work with how teams actually operate, not against them:
- Full configurability: All settings — karma earned per review, karma cost to merge, and more — can be configured by admins to match your team’s needs and priorities.
- Automate urgency incentives: Set bonus karma for timely reviews — for example, award extra points for reviews completed within the first 24 hours of a PR being opened.
- Karma is a signal, not a decree: Team leads still exercise judgment. GitKarma informs decisions; it doesn’t replace human oversight.
How to get started — 60 seconds, zero config
GitKarma is completely free. Install it once, and it works immediately with battle-tested defaults. No credit card. No trial period. Just install and go.
- Visit gitkarma.dev
- Click “Install” and select your repositories
- Open a PR — GitKarma is now enforcing fair reviews
That’s it. Your team starts earning and spending karma immediately.
Want to customize? Fine-tune settings at gitkarma.dev/admin (login required). Adjust karma costs, earning rates, and bonus timers to match your team’s workflow.
Recommended: Run a pilot with one team for 2–4 sprints. Watch velocity improve. Adjust rules based on real usage. Scale to other teams when you’re ready.
Mission
We want fewer stalled PRs, fewer burnouts, and fewer cliff-hanger mornings waiting for feedback. That’s not marketing fluff — that’s the product. GitKarma’s mission is simple:
Make review labor visible. Reward the people who do it well. Restore velocity without sacrificing quality.
No drama. No moralizing. Just a system that respects time and improves outcomes.
Stop waiting. Start shipping.
Your PRs shouldn’t rot in review limbo. Your best reviewers shouldn’t burn out covering for everyone else.
Install GitKarma in 60 seconds at gitkarma.dev — no configuration needed, completely free. Fix your review bottleneck today.
Try a pilot. Enforce the rules. Watch your velocity improve.