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- New tips file: claude-boris-2-tips-25-mar-26.md (squash merging + PR size distribution) - New Git / PR community tips section (5 tips) consolidating git/PR workflow tips - Updated README navigation, tip counts (84→86), and Boris workflow links Co-Authored-By: Claude <noreply@anthropic.com>
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Squash Merging & PR Size Distribution — Tips from Boris Cherny
A summary of insights shared by Boris Cherny (@bcherny), creator of Claude Code, on March 25, 2026.
| ← Back to Claude Code Best Practice |  |
1/ 266 Contributions in a Single Day — Always Squash
Boris shared his GitHub contribution graph showing 266 contributions on March 24th — from 141 PRs, always squashed with a median of 118 lines per PR.
- Squash merging combines all branch commits into a single commit on the target branch — keeping history clean and linear
- Each PR = one commit makes it easy to revert entire features and simplifies
git bisect - At high-velocity AI-assisted workflows (141 PRs/day), squash is the pragmatic choice — individual "fix lint", "try this" commits within a branch are noise
2/ PR Size Distribution — Keep PRs Small
Boris shared the size distribution across those 141 PRs, totaling 45,032 lines changed (additions + deletions):
| Metric | Lines (add+del) | Meaning |
|---|---|---|
| p50 | 118 | Median PR size — half of all PRs were 118 lines or fewer |
| p90 | 498 | 90% of PRs were under 500 lines |
| p99 | 2,978 | Only ~1 PR exceeded ~3K lines |
| min | 2 | Smallest PR — a quick 2-line fix |
| max | 10,459 | Largest single PR — likely a migration or generated code |
- A median of 118 lines means most PRs are focused and reviewable, even at 141 PRs/day
- The distribution is heavily right-skewed — the occasional large PR is inevitable (bulk renames, migrations), but the norm is tight
- Small PRs reduce merge conflict risk, are easier to review, and pair perfectly with squash merging for clean reverts
