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MergeWatch can deliberately skip pull requests that do not need review. Skipped PRs are logged with a reason and visible in the dashboard, but no review comments are posted to GitHub.

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What “Skipped” means

When a PR is skipped:
  • MergeWatch receives the webhook but does not run any agents against the diff.
  • The PR appears in the dashboard Reviews table with a status of Skipped and a reason explaining why.
  • Skipped reviews do not count toward billing. You are only billed for reviews that run agents against a diff.
Skipping is not the same as ignoring files. When individual files match ignorePatterns but other files in the PR do not, the PR is still reviewed — the matching files are simply excluded from the diff sent to agents.

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Auto-skip rules

The following conditions cause MergeWatch to skip a pull request automatically:
ConditionDefault behaviorOverride
Draft PRSkipSet rules.skipDrafts: false
PR exceeds rules.maxFiles (default 50)SkipRaise rules.maxFiles
rules.autoReview: false and review not @mergewatch-triggeredSkip with a user-actionable check run (see Auto-review off)Set rules.autoReview: true or mention @mergewatch
PR has a label in rules.ignoreLabels (default: skip-review)SkipRemove the label or adjust ignoreLabels
All changed files match built-in trivial patterns (lock files, *.md, dist/**, build/**, node_modules/**, minified files, CI/editor config)SkipPass the PR through by changing a non-trivial file too
Bot comment loops are prevented at the webhook layer: @mergewatch mentions from senders of type Bot are ignored outright. This is orthogonal to skip rules — it applies to comment-triggered reviews regardless of your config.

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Path-based exclusion

MergeWatch has two path-filtering mechanisms, and it’s important to understand they do different things:

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Built-in PR-level skip (not configurable)

If every changed file in a PR matches one of the built-in trivial patterns, the PR is skipped entirely with a reason like “Only docs changed” or “Only lock files + config changed”. This list is baked in — you can’t add to it or remove from it. Built-in patterns include: lock files (*.lock, package-lock.json, yarn.lock, pnpm-lock.yaml, Gemfile.lock, Pipfile.lock, poetry.lock, composer.lock, go.sum), docs (*.md, *.mdx, *.txt, *.rst, docs/**, CHANGELOG*, LICENSE*), build artifacts (*.min.js, *.min.css, *.map, dist/**, build/**, node_modules/**), and editor/CI config (.github/**, .vscode/**, tsconfig.json, renovate.json, .eslintrc*, .prettierrc*, etc.).

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File-level diff exclusion (configurable)

excludePatterns (top-level) filters individual files out of the diff sent to agents. It does not cause PR-level skipping — the PR is still reviewed as long as at least one non-built-in-skipped file is present.
.mergewatch.yml
version: 1
excludePatterns:
  - "**/*.generated.ts"
  - "**/fixtures/**"
  - "vendor/**"
  - "third_party/**"
rules.ignorePatterns is deprecated. New configurations should use top-level excludePatterns only — entries under rules.ignorePatterns are folded into excludePatterns at parse time and a one-time deprecation warning is emitted.
Patterns use standard glob syntax relative to the repository root:
PatternMatches
*.lockAny file ending in .lock at any depth
dist/**All files under the dist/ directory
docs/*.mdMarkdown files directly in the docs/ directory
**/*.generated.tsGenerated TypeScript files at any depth

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Force-include with includePatterns

Use includePatterns to opt PRs back into review when every changed file would otherwise be classified as built-in trivial. This operates at the PR-skip layer, not the diff-filter layer — it doesn’t change what gets sent to agents on a PR that’s already being reviewed. Common uses: review docs changes inside a security-sensitive directory, force review of a top-level SECURITY.md, or treat a critical config path as non-trivial.
.mergewatch.yml
version: 1
includePatterns:
  - "SECURITY.md"
  - "docs/policy/**"
  - ".github/workflows/deploy.yml"
A PR that touches only files matching includePatterns is reviewed even though it would otherwise be PR-skipped as docs-only or config-only.

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Auto-review off

When rules.autoReview: false is set, MergeWatch does not run the review pipeline on PR open or synchronize events — but it does post a user-actionable check run to the PR’s merge box so the author knows reviews are intentionally off and how to trigger one: 
✓ Auto-review is disabled for this repository
   Comment @mergewatch review on this PR to run a review.
The check run uses the neutral conclusion so it does not block branch protection. Mention-triggered reviews (@mergewatch review, @mergewatch summary) bypass the gate and post a normal review comment as usual.
This user-actionable copy is specific to the autoReviewOff skip kind. Other rule-based skips (drafts, label-ignored, maxFiles exceeded, reviewOnMention: false) post a generic “Review skipped” check run with the detailed reason as summary — those are intentional skips that don’t need user-facing instructions.

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Label-based skip

Use ignoreLabels to skip PRs that carry specific GitHub labels:
.mergewatch.yml
version: 1
rules:
  ignoreLabels:
    - "skip-review"
    - "dependencies"
    - "automated"
When a PR has any label in the ignoreLabels list, it is skipped. This is useful for bot-generated PRs (such as Dependabot or Renovate) that you label consistently.

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Skip log

Every skipped PR is logged to DynamoDB with the following information:
  • Repository and PR number
  • Skip reason (e.g., “All files matched ignorePatterns”, “Draft PR”, “Label: skip-review”)
  • Timestamp
You can view the full skip log in the dashboard:
1

Open the Reviews table

Navigate to Dashboard > Reviews and filter by status Skipped.
2

View the skip reason

Click on any skipped review to open the detail drawer. The Reason field explains why the PR was skipped.

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Disabling configurable auto-skip

If you want MergeWatch to review every PR regardless of draft status, labels, or file patterns, relax the configurable rules:
.mergewatch.yml
version: 1
rules:
  skipDrafts: false
  ignoreLabels: []
  maxFiles: 10000
excludePatterns: []
These settings relax the configurable rules. The built-in PR-level skip (lock-only, docs-only, build-artifacts-only) is not configurable — if every file in a PR is trivial, it is always skipped. Use @mergewatch review in a PR comment to force a review of a would-otherwise-be-skipped PR.

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Next steps

Review Behavior

Understand when reviews trigger, status values, and re-triggering.

Custom Instructions

Inject project-specific guidance into agent prompts.