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Comments and threads

DETAILS: Tier: Free, Premium, Ultimate Offering: GitLab.com, Self-managed, GitLab Dedicated

GitLab encourages communication through comments, threads, and suggesting changes for code. Comments support Markdown and quick actions.

Two types of comments are available:

  • A standard comment.
  • A comment in a thread, which you can resolve.

You can suggest code changes in your commit diff comment, which the user can accept through the user interface.

Places you can add comments

You can create comments in places like:

  • Commit diffs
  • Commits
  • Designs
  • Epics
  • Issues
  • Merge requests
  • Snippets
  • Tasks
  • OKRs

Each object can have as many as 5,000 comments.

Mentions

You can mention a user or a group (including subgroups) in your GitLab instance with @username or @groupname. GitLab notifies all mentioned users with to-do items and emails. Users can change this setting for themselves in the notification settings.

You can quickly see which comments involve you, because GitLab highlights mentions for yourself (the signed-in user) in a different color.

Mentioning all members

FLAG: The availability of this feature is controlled by a feature flag. For more information, see the history.

Avoid mentioning @all in comments and descriptions. @all mentions more than just the participants of the project, issue, or merge request, but all members of that project's parent group. All these users receive an email notification and a to-do item, and might interpret it as spam.

When you enable this feature flag, typing @all in comments and descriptions results in plain text instead of mentioning all users. When you disable this feature, existing @all mentions in the Markdown texts are unchanged, and remain as links. Only future @all mentions appear as plain text.

Notifications and mentions can be disabled in a group's settings.

Mention a group in an issue or merge request

When you mention a group in a comment, every member of the group gets a to-do item added to their to-do list.

  1. On the left sidebar, select Search or go to and find your project.
  2. For merge requests, select Code > Merge requests, and find your merge request.
  3. For issues, select Plan > Issues, and find your issue.
  4. In a comment, type @ followed by the user, group, or subgroup namespace. For example, @alex, @alex-team, or @alex-team/marketing.
  5. Select Comment.

GitLab creates a to-do item for all the group and subgroup members.

For more information on mentioning subgroups, see Mention subgroups.

Add a comment to a merge request diff

When you add comments to a merge request diff, these comments persist, even when you:

  • Force-push after a rebase.
  • Amend a commit.

To add a commit diff comment:

  1. On the left sidebar, select Search or go to and find your project.
  2. Select Code > Merge requests, and find your merge request.
  3. Select the Commits tab, then select the commit message.
  4. By the line you want to comment on, hover over the line number and select Comment ({comment}). You can select multiple lines by dragging the Comment ({comment}) icon.
  5. Enter your comment.
  6. To add your comment immediately, select Add comment now, or use the keyboard shortcut:
    • macOS: Shift + Command + Enter
    • All other OSes: Shift + Control + Enter
  7. To leave your comment unpublished until you finish a review, select Start a review, or use the keyboard shortcut:
    • macOS: Command + Enter
    • All other OSes: Control + Enter

The comment displays on the merge request's Overview tab.

The comment is not displayed on your project's Code > Commits page.

NOTE: When your comment contains a reference to a commit included in the merge request, it's converted to a link in the context of the merge request. For example, 28719b171a056960dfdc0012b625d0b47b123196 becomes 28719b17 that links to https://gitlab.example.com/example-group/example-project/-/merge_requests/12345/diffs?commit_id=28719b171a056960dfdc0012b625d0b47b123196.

Reply to a comment by sending email

If you have "reply by email" configured, you can reply to comments by sending an email.

  • When you reply to a standard comment, it creates another standard comment.
  • When you reply to a threaded comment, it creates a reply in the thread.
  • When you send an email to an issue email address, it creates a standard comment.

You can use Markdown and quick actions in your email replies.

Edit a comment

You can edit your own comment at any time. Anyone with at least the Maintainer role can also edit a comment made by someone else.

To edit a comment:

  1. On the comment, select Edit comment ({pencil}).
  2. Make your edits.
  3. Select Save changes.

Edit a comment to add a mention

By default, when you mention a user, GitLab creates a to-do item for them, and sends them a notification email.

If you edit an existing comment to add a user mention that wasn't there before, GitLab:

  • Creates a to-do item for the mentioned user.
  • Does not send a notification email.

Prevent comments by locking the discussion

You can prevent public comments in an issue or merge request. When you do, only project members can add and edit comments.

Prerequisites:

  • In merge requests, you must have at least the Developer role.
  • In issues, you must have at least the Reporter role.

To lock an issue or merge request:

  1. On the left sidebar, select Search or go to and find your project.
  2. For merge requests, select Code > Merge requests, and find your merge request.
  3. For issues, select Plan > Issues, and find your issue.
  4. In the upper-right corner, select Merge request actions or Issue actions ({ellipsis_v}), then select Lock discussion.

GitLab adds a system note to the page details.

You must unlock all locked discussions in closed issues or merge requests before you can reopen the issue or merge request.

Add an internal note

Use internal notes to protect information added to a public issue, epic, or merge request. Internal notes differ from public comments:

  • Only project members with least the Reporter role can view the internal note.
  • You can't convert internal notes to regular comments.
  • All replies to internal notes are also internal.
  • Internal notes display an Internal note badge and are shown in a different color than public comments:

Internal notes

Prerequisites:

  • You must have at least the Reporter role for the project.

To add an internal note:

  1. On the issue, epic, or merge request, in the Comment text box, enter a comment.
  2. Below the comment, select Make this an internal note.
  3. Select Add internal note.

You can also mark an entire issue as confidential, or create confidential merge requests.

Show only comments

In discussions with many comments, filter the discussion to show only comments or history of changes (system notes). System notes include changes to the description, mentions in other GitLab objects, or changes to labels, assignees, and the milestone. GitLab saves your preference, and applies it to every issue, merge request, or epic you view.

  1. On a merge request, issue, or epic, select the Overview tab.
  2. On the right side of the page, from the Sort or filter dropdown list, select a filter:
    • Show all activity: Display all user comments and system notes.
    • Show comments only: Display only user comments.
    • Show history only: Display only activity notes.

Change activity sort order

Reverse the default order and interact with the activity feed sorted by most recent items at the top. GitLab saves your preference in local storage and applies it to every issue, merge request, or epic you view.

To change the activity sort order:

  1. Open the Overview tab in a merge request, issue, or epic.
  2. On the right side of the page, from the Sort or filter dropdown list, select the sort order Newest first or Oldest first (default).

View description change history

DETAILS: Tier: Premium, Ultimate Offering: GitLab.com, Self-managed, GitLab Dedicated

You can see changes to the description listed in the history.

To compare the changes, select Compare with previous version.

Assign an issue to the commenting user

You can assign an issue to a user who made a comment.

  1. In the comment, select the More Actions ({ellipsis_v}) menu.
  2. Select Assign to commenting user: Assign to commenting user
  3. To unassign the commenter, select the button again.

Create a thread by replying to a standard comment

When you reply to a standard comment, you create a thread.

Prerequisites:

  • You must have at least the Guest role.
  • You must be in an issue, merge request, or epic. Threads in commits and snippets are not supported.

To create a thread by replying to a comment:

  1. In the upper-right corner of the comment, select Reply to comment ({reply}) to display the reply section.
  2. Enter your reply.
  3. Select Reply or Add comment now (depending on where in the UI you are replying).

GitLab converts the top comment to a thread.

Create a thread without replying to a comment

You can create a thread without replying to a standard comment.

Prerequisites:

  • You must have at least the Guest role.
  • You must be in an issue, merge request, commit, or snippet.

To create a thread:

  1. Enter a comment.
  2. Below the comment, to the right of Comment, select the down arrow ({chevron-down}).
  3. From the list, select Start thread.
  4. Select Start thread again.

Create a thread

Resolve a thread

You can resolve a thread when you want to finish a conversation.

Prerequisites:

  • You must be in an issue, task, objective, key result, or merge request.
  • You must have at least the Developer role or be the author of the issue or merge request.

To resolve a thread:

  1. Go to the thread.
  2. Do one of the following:
    • In the upper-right corner of the original comment, select Resolve thread ({check-circle}).
    • Below the last reply, in the Reply field, select Resolve thread.
    • Below the last reply, in the Reply field, enter text, select the Resolve thread checkbox, and select Add comment now.

Additionally, in merge requests, you can do more with threads, such as move unresolved threads to an issue or prevent merging until all threads are resolved.

Summarize issue discussions with Duo Chat

DETAILS: Tier: For a limited time, Ultimate. In the future, Ultimate with GitLab Duo Enterprise. Offering: GitLab.com, Self-managed

FLAG: The availability of this feature is controlled by a feature flag. For more information, see the history. This feature is available for testing, but not ready for production use.

Generate a summary of discussions on an issue.

Prerequisites:

To generate a summary of issue discussions:

  1. In an issue, scroll to the Activity section.
  2. Select View summary.

The comments in the issue are summarized in as many as 10 list items. You can ask follow up questions based on the response.

Provide feedback on this beta feature in issue 407779.

Data usage: When you use this feature, the text of all comments on the issue are sent to the large language model listed on the GitLab Duo page.