How to track open pull requests on a repository

Notch Metrics2 min read

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How do you count open pull requests?

The search API, same as issues, with the type flipped.

curl -s 'https://api.github.com/search/issues?q=repo:owner/name+is:pr+is:open&per_page=1' \
  -H 'Authorization: Bearer <token>' | jq '.total_count'

One request, total_count, no paging. The alternative is /repos/{owner}/{repo}/pulls?state=open, which returns the rows and makes you page them to count them. Use that when you need the pull requests themselves.

Do drafts count?

Yes, and the argument for it is simple: a draft is open and it is work in flight. Somebody is building something and has shown you. Excluding drafts means your number only moves when work is finished, which is exactly when you no longer need a leading indicator.

If you disagree, is:pr is:open draft:false excludes them. What matters is picking one and not changing it quietly, because the series is only useful compared against itself.

The number that actually matters

The open count is a stock. What you usually want is the flow, and specifically how long things sit.

# Open, and not touched in a fortnight.
q=repo:owner/name+is:pr+is:open+updated:<2026-09-27

Search supports date qualifiers on created, updated, merged and closed, which makes a surprising amount of analysis a single query:

Query What it tells you
is:pr is:open created:<DATE How much is old
is:pr is:open review:none Nothing has looked at it
is:pr is:open draft:false Ready and waiting
is:pr merged:>DATE Throughput

review:none is the sharpest of those. A pull request with no review is not slow, it is ignored, and the difference matters to the person who wrote it.

Open against merged is the real health signal

The open count alone says nothing. Fifty open pull requests on a project merging thirty a week is healthy. Twelve on a project merging one a month is a graveyard.

Query both and divide: open count over weekly merge rate gives you a rough queue time in weeks. That single number tells a contributor whether their work will be looked at, and it is the one that decides whether they come back.

Rate limits

The search API is 30 requests per minute authenticated, separate from the 5,000 per hour the rest of REST gets. Each of the queries above is one request, so a handful of repositories is fine and a polling loop over fifty is not.

Cache. A pull request queue does not change in seconds.

Forks, and where contributions come from

Most outside contributions arrive as a pull request from a fork. The pull request lives on your repository, so it is counted here regardless of where the branch is, and head.repo.full_name tells you whether it came from inside or outside.

Splitting internal from external is worth doing once. A project whose external pull requests are all old is not short of contributors, it is short of reviewers.

In the notch

Notch Metrics reports GitHub open pull requests as a count, drafts included, with the repository picked per widget. Place it beside open issues and the two say whether the project is blocked on maintainers or on contributors.

Everything GitHub reports, or download Notch Metrics.

  • github
  • pull-requests
  • api

Questions

How do I count open pull requests on GitHub?
Use the search API with q=repo:owner/name+is:pr+is:open and per_page=1, then read total_count. The pulls endpoint returns rows instead and makes you page them to count them.
Should draft pull requests count as open?
Usually yes. A draft is open and it is work in flight. Excluding drafts means the number only moves when work is finished, which is when you no longer need a leading indicator. Use draft:false if you disagree, and keep the choice consistent.
How do I find GitHub pull requests nobody has reviewed?
Search with is:pr is:open review:none. A pull request with no review is not slow, it is ignored, and the difference matters to whoever wrote it.
Is a high open pull request count bad?
Not on its own. Fifty open on a project merging thirty a week is healthy; twelve on a project merging one a month is a graveyard. Divide the open count by the weekly merge rate to get a rough queue time.
How do I tell internal from external GitHub contributions?
Read head.repo.full_name on the pull request. Outside contributions arrive from a fork, and a project whose external pull requests are all old is short of reviewers rather than contributors.