Code Review Checklist

Code Review Checklist

Quick Review Checklist

Correctness

• Code does what it's supposed to do
• Edge cases handled
• Error handling in place
• No obvious bugs

Security

• Input validated and sanitized
• No SQL/NoSQL injection vulnerabilities
• No XSS or CSRF vulnerabilities
• No hardcoded secrets or sensitive credentials
• AI-Specific: Protection against Prompt Injection (if applicable)
• AI-Specific: Outputs are sanitized before being used in critical sinks

Performance

• No N+1 queries
• No unnecessary loops
• Appropriate caching
• Bundle size impact considered

Code Quality

• Clear naming
• DRY - no duplicate code
• SOLID principles followed
• Appropriate abstraction level

Testing

• Unit tests for new code
• Edge cases tested
• Tests readable and maintainable

Documentation

• Complex logic commented
• Public APIs documented
• README updated if needed

🏗️ Architectural Review (Senior/Staff Level)

Look beyond the lines of code. Look at the system.

• Failure Domains: If this service dies, what else dies? (Cascading failures?)
• Scalability: Will this work with 10x data? 100x? (Unbounded lists, memory leaks)
• Idempotency: What happens if the message queue delivers this event twice?
• Observability: How will we know it's broken in production? (Logs, Metrics, Traces)
• Migration Path: How does this deploy? (Database locks, API versioning)

🔄 Operational Review

• Feature Flags: Is this behind a flag? Can we turn it off without a deploy?
• Config: Are secrets separated from config? Defaults sane?
• Rollback: Is this change backwards compatible? Can we revert safely?

AI & LLM Review Patterns (2025)

Logic & Hallucinations

• Chain of Thought: Does the logic follow a verifiable path?
• Edge Cases: Did the AI account for empty states, timeouts, and partial failures?
• External State: Is the code making safe assumptions about file systems or networks?

Prompt Engineering Review

// ❌ Vague prompt in code
const response = await ai.generate(userInput);

// ✅ Structured & Safe prompt
const response = await ai.generate({
  system: "You are a specialized parser...",
  input: sanitize(userInput),
  schema: ResponseSchema
});

Anti-Patterns to Flag

// ❌ Magic numbers
if (status === 3) { ... }

// ✅ Named constants
if (status === Status.ACTIVE) { ... }

// ❌ Deep nesting
if (a) { if (b) { if (c) { ... } } }

// ✅ Early returns
if (!a) return;
if (!b) return;
if (!c) return;
// do work

// ❌ Long functions (100+ lines)
// ✅ Small, focused functions

// ❌ any type
const data: any = ...

// ✅ Proper types
const data: UserData = ...

Review Comments Guide

// Blocking issues use 🔴
🔴 BLOCKING: SQL injection vulnerability here

// Important suggestions use 🟡
🟡 SUGGESTION: Consider using useMemo for performance

// Minor nits use 🟢
🟢 NIT: Prefer const over let for immutable variable

// Questions use ❓
❓ QUESTION: What happens if user is null here?