Finding how to submit pending review comments is VERY hard

Extension version: 0.144.0
VSCode Version: 1.120.0
OS: Linux
Repository Clone Configuration (single repository/fork of an upstream repository): Single repo
GitHub Product (GitHub.com/GitHub Enterprise version x.x.x): github.com

Steps to Reproduce:

Check out a PR branch
Use the "GitHub Pull Request" sidebar view to navigate files and add pending comments in the editor
Struggle to find the "submit review" button
Google how to do it, which suggests it should be in the command palette ... it is not
Give up and go submit the pending review with a web browser
Do this again 4 or 5 times
Eventually discover that the embedded webview version of the PR can submit the pending comments

Why is there no more accessible button to submit the pending review? Loading the full web view for the PR is both non-discoverable, and it certainly feels like a very heavy weight and obtuse way to show a text box and 3 buttons.

I only even found that because of random right-clicking on things to see what the extension could do, and randomly came across Open Pull Request Description To The Side and clicked it purely out of curiosity, having no expectation that it would provide the only means I've found so far of surfacing the "Submit Review" button.

You can submit it from the sidebar when you have it checked out (circled).

We've gotten this feedback before, so we have a "Go to Review" button in the comment widget (squared).

Where else did you click around to try to find it? Maybe I can add something in the places you looked.

Alex Ross (@alexr00)

Alex Ross (@alexr00) The Review Pull Request ... pane doesn't show for me at all. In the sidebar panel for the github pull requests extension, the only available panes are Changes in Pull Request and Comments. I checked in the ... menus there in case I had accidentally hidden that pane before, but it's not listed.

I was wondering if this is a preference I have changed, but I don't think so. I didn't see any preference for the extension that looks like it would do this, and these are the only prefs I have overridden for the extension:

	"githubPullRequests.terminalLinksHandler": "github",
	"githubPullRequests.fileAutoReveal": false,
	"githubPullRequests.hideViewedFiles": true,
	"githubPullRequests.pullBranch": "never",
	"githubPullRequests.allowFetch": false,
	"githubPullRequests.deleteBranchAfterMerge": true,
	"githubPullRequests.showPullRequestNumberInTree": true,
	"githubPullRequests.focusedMode": false,

And for the avoidance of any potential confusion, here's what the panel specifically looks like for me:

This is helpful, thanks! We don't show the "Review Pull Request #` view if you are in a multi-repo workspace and have multiple PRs checked out, as it doesn't have a lot of screen real-estate so show info for multiple PRs in.

I'll need to think about how else we could prompt users to find the "submit" button.

I'm this case, while I have a workspace open, there's only one root in it currently, and thus only one PR is / can be checked out

The workspace mainly exists so I can color code different windows without polluting the repo with my personal cosmetic choices

What do you see if you right click on the "CHANGES IN PULL REQUEST #..." title?

I get Changes In Pull Request and Comments only, not Review Pull Request

Do you have a command "GitHub Pull Request: Focus on Review Pull Request View" in the command palette?

I do not, see item 4 in the original description

there's only one root in it currently, and thus only one PR is / can be checked out

Ok, then I think we're back to it being multi-repo, not multi-root. Is it at all possible that you have more than one GitHub repository open? Like, maybe you opened even just a single file from another repo? Do you see more than one repo in the SCM view?

No, there is only one root and only one repo open:

Could you share the output from GitHub Pull Request?

2026-06-15 10:43:01.383 [info] [Activation] Extension version: 0.148.0
2026-06-15 10:43:01.423 [info] [Authentication] Creating hub for .com
2026-06-15 10:43:01.609 [info] [Activation] Registering built in git provider.
2026-06-15 10:43:01.609 [info] [Activation] Looking for git repository
2026-06-15 10:43:01.609 [info] [Activation] Found 0 repositories during activation
2026-06-15 10:43:01.609 [info] [Activation] Git repository found, initializing review manager and pr tree view.
2026-06-15 10:43:01.617 [info] [GitAPI] Registering git provider
2026-06-15 10:43:01.617 [info] [Review+0] Validate state in progress
2026-06-15 10:43:01.617 [info] [Review+0] Validating state...
2026-06-15 10:43:01.714 [info] [FolderRepositoryManager+0] Found GitHub remote for folder /workspaces/XYZZY
2026-06-15 10:43:01.715 [info] [GitPostCommitCommands] Trying to register post commit commands.
2026-06-15 10:43:01.804 [info] [Activation] Repo state for file:///workspaces/XYZZY changed.
2026-06-15 10:43:01.804 [info] [Activation] Repo file:///workspaces/XYZZY has already been setup.
2026-06-15 10:43:02.096 [info] [FolderRepositoryManager+0] Trying to use globalState for assignableUsers.
2026-06-15 10:43:02.096 [info] [GitPostCommitCommands] Trying to register post commit commands.
2026-06-15 10:43:02.096 [info] [GitPostCommitCommands] GitHub remote(s) found, registering post commit commands.
2026-06-15 10:43:02.096 [info] [GitPostCommitCommands] Looking for remote. Comparing 1 local repo remotes with 1 GitHub repositories.
2026-06-15 10:43:02.096 [info] [GitPostCommitCommands] Found a repo when getting post commit commands.
2026-06-15 10:43:02.096 [info] [GitPostCommitCommands] Looking for remote. Comparing 1 local repo remotes with 1 GitHub repositories.
2026-06-15 10:43:02.096 [info] [GitPostCommitCommands] Found a repo when getting post commit commands.
2026-06-15 10:43:02.263 [info] [FolderRepositoryManager+0] Using globalState assignableUsers for 1.
2026-06-15 10:43:03.823 [info] [Review+0] Found matching pull request metadata on GitHub for current branch feat/QUUX. Repo: ATIinc/XYZZY PR: NNNN
2026-06-15 10:43:03.823 [info] [PullRequestGitHelper] associate feat/QUUX with Pull Request #NNNN
2026-06-15 10:43:03.865 [info] [Review+0] Found matching pull request metadata for current branch feat/QUUX. Repo: ATIinc/XYZZY PR: NNNN
2026-06-15 10:43:03.865 [info] [Review+0] current branch feat/QUUX is associated with pull request #NNNN
2026-06-15 10:43:03.865 [info] [Review+0] Resolving pull request
2026-06-15 10:43:05.978 [info] [GitHubRepository+0] Fetch branch feat/QUUX - enter
2026-06-15 10:43:06.356 [info] [GitHubRepository+0] Fetch branch feat/QUUX - done: true
2026-06-15 10:43:06.357 [info] [Review+0] Resolved PR #NNNN, state is OPEN
2026-06-15 10:43:06.358 [info] [Review+0] Fetching pull request data
2026-06-15 10:43:06.358 [info] [PullRequestTree] Adding PR #NNNN to tree
2026-06-15 10:43:06.407 [info] [Review+0] Register comments provider
2026-06-15 10:43:06.408 [info] [Review+0] Register in memory content provider
2026-06-15 10:43:07.308 [info] [Review+0] Display pull request status bar indicator.
2026-06-15 10:43:07.308 [info] [Review+0] Using focus mode = false.
2026-06-15 10:43:07.308 [info] [Review+0] State validation silent = true.
2026-06-15 10:43:07.308 [info] [Review+0] PR show should show = false.
2026-06-15 10:48:01.618 [info] [Review+0] Polling for state change...
2026-06-15 10:50:10.121 [info] [PullRequestTree] Creating file and commit nodes for PR #NNNN
2026-06-15 10:50:10.129 [info] [PullRequestTree] Getting children for Files node
2026-06-15 10:50:10.129 [info] [PullRequestTree] Got all children for Files node

(private info censored as XYZZY, QUUX, and NNNN)

After mucking about searching through the extension source, it appears the issue is the githubPullRequests.focusedMode setting. I had changed this to false, because having the vscode window flop around madly whenever I ran git from the command line was infuriating, and I was trying to figure out which settings caused that. The changelog entries for this setting suggest it was part of my problem, though I'm not sure if it still is.

Either way, having that setting make the sidebar panel non-functional seems weird, as the setting description seems like it's mostly focused on opening "editor" area views?

I really dislike having my command line git activities cause random editor views to open, so I don't want to have to bring that back.

Edit: yeah, resetting that setting is infuriating. Now even things like git commit from the command line not only cause the vscode window layout to change, but it steals focus from the terminal, so it has me unintentionally start typing into a diff view instead of the terminal. Yuck. That setting behaves as if I either never want to review PRs in VScode, or as if I never do anything else.

Now even things like git commit from the command line not only cause the vscode window layout to change, but it steals focus from the terminal, so it has me unintentionally start typing into a diff view instead of the terminal.

This should not be happening. Can you give some exact steps (what branch were you on, did the branch have a PR, etc. )?

This should not be happening. Can you give some exact steps (what branch were you on, did the branch have a PR, etc. )?

I had a branch checked out associated with a PR. I had been doing work and had various uncommitted changes. I had previously had the github pull request panel open, but now had a different panel selected in the sidebar. I used git commit to commit my work from the terminal. As soon as the git command completed, the sidebar was switched to the github pull request panel, the multidiff editor for the PR was opened, and took focus, so that the command I was starting to type into the terminal instead went into one of the files from the PR. That layout change & focus steal happened almost instantly, i.e. within less than a second of the git command completing.

I just had it change layout and steal focus again, this time without even editing any files or running any git or other commands in the terminal. It just randomly changed layout and stole input focus while I was typing into a different extension in the secondary sidebar.

Extension output log for the relevant time period (private data censored to NNNN / BRANCH / etc.)

2026-07-02 11:09:40.323 [info] [Review+0] Polling for state change...
2026-07-02 11:09:40.639 [info] [Review+0] Polling detected potential new PR activity while a PR is active. Refreshing state.
2026-07-02 11:09:40.639 [info] [Review+0] Validate state in progress
2026-07-02 11:09:40.639 [info] [Review+0] Validating state...
2026-07-02 11:09:40.676 [info] [FolderRepositoryManager+0] Found GitHub remote for folder /workspaces/REPO
2026-07-02 11:09:40.676 [info] [FolderRepositoryManager+0] Using in-memory cached mentionable users.
2026-07-02 11:09:40.676 [info] [FolderRepositoryManager+0] Using in-memory cached assignable users.
2026-07-02 11:09:41.015 [info] [Review+0] Skipping GitHub check for branch fix/BRANCH: no new PRs since last check
2026-07-02 11:09:41.015 [info] [Review+0] Found matching pull request metadata for current branch fix/BRANCH. Repo: ORG/REPO PR: NNNN
2026-07-02 11:09:41.015 [info] [Review+0] current branch fix/BRANCH is associated with pull request #NNNN
2026-07-02 11:09:41.015 [info] [Review+0] Resolving pull request
2026-07-02 11:09:43.041 [info] [GitHubRepository+0] Fetch branch main - enter
2026-07-02 11:09:43.334 [info] [GitHubRepository+0] Fetch branch main - done: true
2026-07-02 11:09:43.334 [info] [Review+0] Resolved PR #NNNN, state is OPEN
2026-07-02 11:09:43.334 [info] [Review+0] Fetching pull request data
2026-07-02 11:09:43.334 [info] [PullRequestTree] Adding PR #NNNN to tree
2026-07-02 11:09:43.334 [info] [PullRequestTree] PR #NNNN already exists in tree
2026-07-02 11:09:43.334 [info] [Review+0] Register comments provider
2026-07-02 11:09:43.348 [info] [Review+0] Register in memory content provider
2026-07-02 11:09:43.348 [info] [Review+0] Display pull request status bar indicator.
2026-07-02 11:09:43.348 [info] [Review+0] Using focus mode = true.
2026-07-02 11:09:43.348 [info] [Review+0] State validation silent = false.
2026-07-02 11:09:43.348 [info] [Review+0] PR show should show = false.
2026-07-02 11:09:43.348 [info] [FolderRepositoryManager+0] Using in-memory cached assignable users.
2026-07-02 11:09:43.410 [info] [Review+0] Polling detected change. Next poll in 300s.
2026-07-02 11:09:43.580 [error] [Jv] Already updating pull request view
2026-07-02 11:09:44.076 [info] [PullRequestTree] Local files have changed, refreshing Files node
2026-07-02 11:09:44.110 [info] [PullRequestTree] Getting children for Files node
2026-07-02 11:09:44.110 [info] [PullRequestTree] Got all children for Files node
2026-07-02 11:09:44.410 [info] [PullRequestTree] File viewed state has changed, refreshing Files node
2026-07-02 11:09:44.431 [info] [PullRequestTree] Getting children for Files node
2026-07-02 11:09:44.431 [info] [PullRequestTree] Got all children for Files node
2026-07-02 11:09:44.644 [info] [PullRequestTree] Review threads have changed, refreshing Files node
2026-07-02 11:09:44.644 [info] [PullRequestTree] Review threads have changed, refreshing Commits node
2026-07-02 11:09:44.645 [info] [PullRequestTree] Comments have changed, refreshing Files node
2026-07-02 11:09:44.645 [info] [PullRequestTree] Comments have changed, refreshing Commits node
2026-07-02 11:09:44.667 [info] [PullRequestTree] Getting children for Files node
2026-07-02 11:09:44.667 [info] [PullRequestTree] Got all children for Files node
2026-07-02 11:09:45.006 [info] [PullRequestTree] Getting children for Files node
2026-07-02 11:09:45.006 [info] [PullRequestTree] Got all children for Files node

What changed (I think) on the PR was a new code review was submitted.

Thank you for the info! I regressed this 3 months ago. Fix is now on main, and there's a new pre-release build going now (should be available within 30 min if you want it). Next stable release will be available by Wednesday.

Thanks! I've updated to the pre-release version and will confirm here (and on #8826) once I have results

It's better, e.g. git commit doesn't trigger layout changes, but things like switching branches still do.

I don't understand why having the usable sidebar layout is tied to having it change layout and steal focus.

It isn't supposed to be. We should only be doing layout changes when you check out a PR from the one of the PR extension UI entry points. Can you confirm which pre-release version you have, and can you share the output of GitHub Pull Request next time you get an unexpected layout change?

It keeps switching back to the release version which makes it confusing which bugs are new/old
It just did it to me on switching back to the pre-release version (0.157.2026070710)

logs:

2026-07-13 17:58:16.275 [warning] /home/vscode/.ssh/config: ENOENT: no such file or directory, open '/home/vscode/.ssh/config'
2026-07-13 17:58:16.275 [info] [Activation] Extension version: 0.157.2026070710
2026-07-13 17:58:16.295 [info] [Authentication] Creating hub for .com
2026-07-13 17:58:16.437 [info] [Activation] Registering built in git provider.
2026-07-13 17:58:16.437 [info] [Activation] Looking for git repository
2026-07-13 17:58:16.437 [info] [Activation] Found 0 repositories during activation
2026-07-13 17:58:16.437 [info] [Activation] Git repository found, initializing review manager and pr tree view.
2026-07-13 17:58:16.439 [info] [GitAPI] Registering git provider
2026-07-13 17:58:16.558 [info] [GitPostCommitCommands] Trying to register post commit commands.
2026-07-13 17:58:16.768 [info] [Activation] Git initialization state changed: state=initialized
2026-07-13 17:58:16.768 [info] [Review+0] Validate state in progress
2026-07-13 17:58:16.768 [info] [Review+0] Validating state...
2026-07-13 17:58:16.985 [info] [FolderRepositoryManager+0] Found GitHub remote for folder /workspaces/REPO
2026-07-13 17:58:17.307 [info] [Activation] Repo state for file:///workspaces/REPO changed.
2026-07-13 17:58:17.307 [info] [Activation] Repo file:///workspaces/REPO has already been setup.
2026-07-13 17:58:17.551 [info] [FolderRepositoryManager+0] Trying to use globalState for assignableUsers.
2026-07-13 17:58:17.551 [info] [GitPostCommitCommands] Trying to register post commit commands.
2026-07-13 17:58:17.551 [info] [GitPostCommitCommands] GitHub remote(s) found, registering post commit commands.
2026-07-13 17:58:17.551 [info] [GitPostCommitCommands] Looking for remote. Comparing 1 local repo remotes with 1 GitHub repositories.
2026-07-13 17:58:17.551 [info] [GitPostCommitCommands] Found a repo when getting post commit commands.
2026-07-13 17:58:17.551 [info] [GitPostCommitCommands] Looking for remote. Comparing 1 local repo remotes with 1 GitHub repositories.
2026-07-13 17:58:17.551 [info] [GitPostCommitCommands] Found a repo when getting post commit commands.
2026-07-13 17:58:18.041 [info] [FolderRepositoryManager+0] Using globalState assignableUsers for 1.
2026-07-13 17:58:18.648 [info] [Review+0] Found matching pull request metadata on GitHub for current branch feat/BRANCH. Repo: ORG/REPO PR: NNNN
2026-07-13 17:58:18.648 [info] [PullRequestGitHelper] associate feat/BRANCH with Pull Request #NNNN
2026-07-13 17:58:18.765 [info] [Review+0] Found matching pull request metadata for current branch feat/BRANCH. Repo: ORG/REPO PR: NNNN
2026-07-13 17:58:18.765 [info] [Review+0] current branch feat/BRANCH is associated with pull request #NNNN
2026-07-13 17:58:18.765 [info] [Review+0] Resolving pull request
2026-07-13 17:58:20.837 [info] [GitHubRepository+0] Fetch branch main - enter
2026-07-13 17:58:21.083 [info] [GitHubRepository+0] Fetch branch main - done: true
2026-07-13 17:58:21.085 [info] [Review+0] Resolved PR #NNNN, state is OPEN
2026-07-13 17:58:21.085 [info] [Review+0] Fetching pull request data
2026-07-13 17:58:21.085 [info] [PullRequestTree] Adding PR #NNNN to tree
2026-07-13 17:58:21.156 [info] [Review+0] Register comments provider
2026-07-13 17:58:21.157 [info] [Review+0] Register in memory content provider
2026-07-13 17:58:21.729 [info] [Review+0] Display pull request status bar indicator.
2026-07-13 17:58:21.729 [info] [Review+0] Using focus mode = true.
2026-07-13 17:58:21.729 [info] [Review+0] State validation silent = true.
2026-07-13 17:58:21.729 [info] [Review+0] PR show should show = false.
2026-07-13 17:58:23.133 [info] [PullRequestTree] Creating file and commit nodes for PR #NNNN
2026-07-13 17:58:23.194 [info] [PullRequestTree] Getting children for Files node
2026-07-13 17:58:23.194 [info] [PullRequestTree] Got all children for Files node

Matthew Gabeler-Lee (@fastcat)

Matthew Gabeler-Lee (@fastcat) thank you for your help tracking this down! I have made another fix (available in the latest pre-release, requires the latest VS Code insiders again). Please let me know if it resolves the issue.

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Finding how to submit pending review comments is VERY hard #8751

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Finding how to submit pending review comments is VERY hard #8751

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alexr00 commented on Jun 3, 2026

fastcat commented on Jun 5, 2026

alexr00 commented on Jun 8, 2026

fastcat commented on Jun 8, 2026

alexr00 commented on Jun 8, 2026

fastcat commented on Jun 8, 2026

alexr00 commented on Jun 12, 2026

fastcat commented on Jun 12, 2026

alexr00 commented on Jun 12, 2026

fastcat commented on Jun 12, 2026

alexr00 commented on Jun 15, 2026

fastcat commented on Jun 15, 2026

fastcat commented on Jul 1, 2026

alexr00 commented on Jul 2, 2026

fastcat commented on Jul 2, 2026

fastcat commented on Jul 2, 2026

alexr00 commented on Jul 3, 2026

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alexr00 commented on Jul 9, 2026

fastcat commented on Jul 13, 2026

alexr00 commented on Jul 16, 2026

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