Code Review Best Practices

16 items · Technical · Medium difficulty · 30 min

Quick, practical code review checklist for reviewers and authors.

• Run the code and verify functionality

  Execute key flows or demo scenarios to confirm expected behavior

• Run the test suite and confirm all tests pass

  Run local and CI tests (unit, integration) to catch regressions

• Add or update unit tests for new logic

  Cover success and failure paths for changed units

• Add integration or end-to-end tests for user flows

  Exercise cross-component interactions and workflows

• Confirm tests cover edge cases and error conditions

  Include boundary values, timeouts, and invalid inputs

• Verify input validation and sanitize external data

  Check types, ranges, required fields, and normalization

• Review code for SQL injection vulnerabilities

  Prefer parameterized queries; avoid string concatenation

• Review code for XSS and insecure output encoding

  Escape/encode HTML and use safe templating APIs

• Confirm authentication and authorization checks are enforced

  Verify permission checks before sensitive actions or data access

• Check naming clarity for functions, variables, and classes

  Prefer descriptive, consistent names and avoid abbreviations

• Ensure code follows DRY; extract duplicated logic

  Refactor repeated code into shared functions or helpers

• Assess algorithmic complexity in hot paths

  Spot N^2 or worse algorithms and consider improvements

• Identify obvious performance bottlenecks and optimize

  Look at loops, database queries, allocations, and network calls

• Verify error handling and logging are clear and safe

  Provide meaningful errors and avoid leaking secrets in logs

• Update documentation and add inline comments where needed

  Explain why code exists and update README or changelogs

• Provide constructive, specific review comments with suggested fixes

  Be respectful, cite examples, and propose actionable improvements

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