Rubber-Stamp Reviews

Rubber-Stamp Reviews is an anti-pattern where pull requests are approved with little or no review. This behavior undermines the intent of code reviews, reducing accountability, missing defects, and eroding collaboration.

Background and Context

Code reviews are one of the most important quality and knowledge-sharing practices in software engineering. But when they are rushed, ignored, or treated as a formality, they stop delivering value. Rubber-stamp reviews often emerge when teams are overloaded or when metrics are misused.

Root Causes of Shallow Code Reviews

This anti-pattern typically results from time pressure or cultural avoidance. Common causes include:

• Incentives to approve quickly rather than thoroughly
• PRs too large or unclear to reasonably review in one sitting
• Lack of team norms around what a good review looks like
• Fear of slowing others down or appearing confrontational

If reviews are too fast to be thoughtful, they are not reviews. They are checkboxes.

Impact of Unreviewed Code

Rubber-stamp reviews carry significant long-term risks. Effects include:

• Increased bugs and regressions due to unchecked changes
• Missed architectural or design opportunities
• Reduced trust in quality and the review process
• Lack of clarity over team standards and expectations

Skipping review may feel efficient, but fixing poor code later is costly.

Warning Signs of Approval Without Insight

This anti-pattern shows up in behavioral patterns and tooling history. Look for:

• PRs approved within minutes of being opened
• Repetitive “LGTM” or “Looks good” comments with no substance
• Reviewers frequently approving code they have not read
• No follow-up discussion despite significant logic or architecture changes

If your team treats code review like a formality, it probably is.

Metrics to Detect Rubber-Stamping

These minware metrics can help identify insufficient review activity:

Metric	Signal
Thorough Review Rate (TRR)	Low TRR suggests reviewers are not leaving meaningful feedback.
Review Latency	Very short latency combined with fast approvals may indicate reviews are not happening at all.
Merge Success Rate	Low success rate after rubber-stamp approvals reflects quality and coordination issues.

If PRs are approved faster than they can reasonably be understood, that is a red flag.

How to Prevent Rubber-Stamp Reviews

To restore quality and collaboration to the review process:

• Set expectations around review depth and response time
• Break down large PRs to make review manageable
• Encourage collaborative feedback instead of binary approval
• Use checklists or rubrics to guide reviewers

Review is not a gate. It is an opportunity to learn, align, and improve.

How to Recover If Your Reviews Are Superficial

If this anti-pattern is already common:

• Run a retro on recent PRs with poor feedback or regressions
• Establish shared review norms and link them in your templates
• Acknowledge reviewers who ask good questions or find issues
• Audit recent PRs and flag high-risk merges for follow-up

Reviewing well is not about slowing down. It is about improving together.