Bot PRs dropped from 62% in 2022 to 15.5% in 2025. The automation bubble burst.
Bot PR Decline
2022 peak to 2025
-46.5pp
decline from peak
Based on 294 million PRs analyzed | GitHub Archive / BigQuery | 2020-2025
From 2020 to 2022, bot-generated pull requests dominated GitHub activity, peaking at 62% of all PRs. Then the collapse began. By 2025, bots account for just 15.5% of merged PRs.
| Year | Bot % | Human % | YoY Change |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2020 | 42% | 58% | - |
| 2021 | 54% | 46% | +12.0pp |
| 2022Peak | 62% | 38% | +8.0pp |
| 2023 | 47% | 53% | -15.0pp |
| 2024 | 34% | 66% | -13.0pp |
| 2025 | 15.5% | 84.5% | -18.5pp |
"Bot PRs collapsed from 62% (2022 peak) to just 15.5% in 2025. The automation gold rush is over."
2022 marked the peak of the automation era. Several factors converged to push bot PRs to an all-time high of 62%:
GitHub acquired Dependabot in 2019 and by 2022, it was deeply integrated into the platform. Automatic security alerts pushed adoption to near-universal levels.
The Log4j vulnerability (Dec 2021) sent shockwaves through the industry. Teams scrambled to automate dependency updates more aggressively than ever.
GitHub Actions reached maturity, making it trivial to create bot PRs for everything from version bumps to documentation updates.
Renovate Bot emerged as a powerful Dependabot alternative, offering more configuration options and monorepo support. Both tools created a PR explosion.
The drop from 62% to 15.5% happened fast. What caused this dramatic reversal?
Teams grew tired of noisy Dependabot PRs. Many configured less aggressive update schedules or disabled non-critical updates entirely.
Both Dependabot and Renovate added "grouped updates" features. One PR for many dependency updates instead of many PRs—dramatically reducing bot PR volume.
Teams enabled auto-merge for low-risk bot PRs. These PRs never sit open—they merge immediately, reducing the visible "bot PR" footprint.
AI coding assistants (Copilot, Cursor, Claude) boosted human productivity. Developers shipped more code faster, shifting the ratio back to humans.
"The bot collapse isn't a failure of automation—it's a maturation. Bots got smarter, quieter, and more efficient."
The 15.5% of PRs that are still bot-generated come from a concentrated set of tools. Dependency management dominates, with Dependabot and Renovate accounting for the majority of bot activity.
~70% of bot PRs
Dependabot and Renovate still dominate. Most teams keep them enabled for security updates but configure them to batch non-critical changes.
~20% of bot PRs
GitHub Actions and CI bots handle version bumps, changelog updates, and release automation. Steady but not growing.
The bot collapse is good news. It signals a shift from bot sprawl to intentional automation.
In 2022, every dependency update spawned its own PR. Teams drowned in bot noise, ignoring updates or blindly merging them. The 2025 reality is healthier: grouped updates, auto-merge for low-risk changes, and human attention reserved for what matters.
The 15.5% that remain are doing higher-value work. Security updates, breaking change migrations, and critical fixes. The "automate everything" phase is over. Welcome to the "automate intentionally" era.
If your bot PR percentage is significantly higher than 15%, you might be behind the curve. Here's what modern teams are doing:
Configure Dependabot or Renovate to batch related updates. One PR for all patch versions instead of 20 separate PRs.
Enable auto-merge for patch versions with passing CI. No human attention needed for safe changes.
Configure bots to open PRs only on specific days. Reduces noise and lets the team batch-review updates.
Use ignore rules for packages that update too frequently without meaningful changes (looking at you, eslint plugins).
This analysis covers merged pull requests from GitHub Archive / BigQuery spanning 2020-2025, totaling over 294 million PRs. Bot detection uses login name patterns (containing "[bot]", ending in "-bot", or matching known automation accounts like "dependabot", "renovate", "github-actions"). Historical percentages for 2020-2022 are derived from full-year totals; 2023-2025 use the most recent complete data available. The October 2025 snapshot shows 15.5% bot PRs from 475,905 bot PRs out of 3,070,806 total PRs. For full methodology, see the complete study.
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