With the help of generative artificial intelligence (GAI), GitHub Copilot is a really amazing tool that can produce boilerplate and even sophisticated code for you. In order to allow other developers to build upon it, Microsoft has made the coding assistant's implementation in Visual Studio Code open source. The business has now disclosed some information regarding the extent to which it uses AI assistance in its own development procedures.
Microsoft claims to conduct code reviews using its in-house AI-powered coding assistant. Over 600,000 pull requests (PRs) are impacted by this technology each month, which accounts for nearly 90% of all PRs made by the company. This coding review assistant, which has no particular name, was developed with the assistance of the Developer Division's AI & Data team. The knowledge gained from this process was subsequently applied to GitHub Copilot code reviews for the benefit of external clients as well.
According to the Redmond tech company, one of the main problems with large-scale code reviews is that code writers frequently find it difficult to provide context in intricate PRs, while reviewers occasionally concentrate too much on syntax and overlook more important issues. Additionally, this causes PRs to be delayed. This is where AI-powered code reviews are useful because they can resolve the majority of these issues quickly.
This code review helper has the ability to automatically review the code, comment on it, highlight problems, recommend enhancements and optimizations, and create a PR summary. To have a deeper understanding of the code, human reviewers can also ask the assistant questions. Through personalized prompts, teams may also adapt the assistant to fit a particular issue.
Microsoft has bragged about the process's benefits, pointing to quicker review cycles, better code, and chances for reviewers and developers to learn. The company opted to make its own knowledge and tools available to external clients through GitHub Copilot code reviews, which went live in April 2025, because it thinks this is the way of the future for coding. We only hope that the Windows Vista startup sound in Windows 11 isn't caused by Redmond's internal AI tool.