Draft Release

draft-release

Generate release notes from merged PRs since the last release. The agent auto-categorizes changes, writes a readable summary, and saves the notes as markdown and HTML.

When to Use It

• Preparing a GitHub release and writing the description
• After a sprint when you need to document what shipped
• Before tagging a version to build the release notes document first
• Sharing a changelog with stakeholders before a release goes live

How to Launch It

In GitHub Copilot Chat:

/draft-release owner/repo

With an explicit version or base:

/draft-release owner/repo v2.1.0
/draft-release owner/repo since v2.0.0
/draft-release owner/repo since 2026-02-01

What to Expect

1. Find previous release — Determines the last published release or tag to use as the baseline
2. Collect merged PRs — Fetches all PRs merged since that baseline with titles, authors, and labels
3. Auto-categorize — Sorts PRs into 7 categories based on labels and title patterns
4. Write summary — Produces a human-readable release description
5. Save — Written to .github/reviews/releases/release-notes-{version}-{date}.md and .html

Auto-Category Rules

Category	Label or title signals
Breaking changes	breaking, breaking-change, title contains "BREAKING:"
New features	enhancement, feature, title contains "feat:"
Bug fixes	bug, fix, title contains "fix:"
Performance	performance, perf, title contains "perf:"
Security	security, vulnerability, Dependabot PRs
Documentation	documentation, docs, title contains "docs:"
Chores	chore, refactor, ci, dependencies

Sample Output

# Release v2.1.0

## What's New

### New Features
- Add dark mode support (#112) — @alice
- CSV export for data tables (#98) — @bob

### Bug Fixes
- Fix login form double-submit on mobile (#108) — @charlie
- Correct broken pagination on page 2+ (#95) — @alice

### Security
- Bump lodash from 4.17.20 to 4.17.21 (#103) — Dependabot

### Documentation
- Update accessibility guide with WCAG 2.2 changes (#101) — @alice

**Full changelog:** v2.0.0...v2.1.0

Readiness Checklist

The agent also produces a pre-publish checklist:

Release readiness:
  ✅ 14 PRs included since v2.0.0
  ✅ No critical Dependabot alerts unpatched
  ⚠️  2 PRs labeled "needs-test" — verify coverage
  ✅ CHANGELOG.md updated

Output Files

File	Contents
.github/reviews/releases/release-notes-{version}-{date}.md	Release notes draft
.github/reviews/releases/release-notes-{version}-{date}.html	Accessible HTML version

Example Variations

/draft-release owner/repo                    # Auto-detect version
/draft-release owner/repo v2.1.0             # Specify version
/draft-release owner/repo since v2.0.0       # Explicit base tag

Connected Agents

Agent	Role
daily-briefing agent	Executes this prompt

Related Prompts

• release-prep — guided 8-step release readiness workflow
• my-prs — verify which PRs are included