Saving review comments in the submit review page

[Slimshilin]

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Hi,

I was recently frustrated by the update for the PR review page, where if we click elsewhere in the "submit review page", the review comment draft will be gone. This was super annoying after writing a long review. Previously it didn't have this problem so I kind of kept the habit of navigating code files when drafting the the comment, but now it bothered me a lot. Wonder if there's a solution to that or if we can fix that soon! Thank you so much!!!

[aguiarcode]

If you haven’t already, I’d strongly recommend filing this as a Bug report (or upvoting an existing one.

A workaround in the meantime is to just draft longer review comments in an external editor (or even a comment on the PR that you don’t submit yet), then paste them in when ready.

[mhughes-monzo]

Existing bug report: https://github.com/orgs/community/discussions/183653

[sahilbhat1]

Hi @Slimshilin,
That is incredibly frustrating! I have lost reviews that way too. Adding to @aguiarcode's suggestion, here is a native workflow that prevents this without needing an external text editor:

1. The "Line Comment" Strategy
   The "Review Summary" box is indeed volatile. Instead of writing your long feedback there:
   Add your main points as comments on specific lines of code (even on the first line of a file if it's general).
   Select "Start a review".
   These comments are saved as "Pending" drafts on the server automatically. If you close the tab or click away, they persist.
   Use the final "Review changes" box only for a short summary (e.g., "See detailed comments above").
2. Immediate Recovery Trick
   If the box closes on you again, do not refresh the page. Try clicking the green Review changes button again immediately. Often, the form input is still cached in the browser's DOM and the text will reappear as long as the page hasn't reloaded.
   Hope this saves your next review!