What 372 graded repositories reveal

Every repo RepoGrade scores feeds these aggregates: how quality tracks reach, age, and maintenance, and what separates the best repos from the rest.

Repositories
372
Go
Median score
88
out of 100
Median stars
2,838
GitHub stars
Median age
3.5 yr
196 measured
Ship releases
85%
199 measured
Are forks
1%
196 measured

How the corpus scores

Each dot is a repo, colored by grade. Corpus medians divide the four quadrants. Distributions below show the same data sliced by band and popularity tier.

Quality vs popularity

Hover a region to highlight it and see counts. Toggle the X axis between stars and contributors.

X axis
median 3kmed. 88HIDDEN GEMS81 · 22%EXEMPLARY119 · 33%NEEDS WORK97 · 27%VIRAL, MESSY67 · 18%02550751001101001k10k100kStars (log scale)Score

Score distribution

Repos per 10-point band, colored by grade

Score by popularity tier

Box = P25-P75, line = median, whisker = P10-P90. Colored by grade.

Group by
0204060708090100ABCDF< 10n=710-100n=26100-1kn=1121k-10kn=4510k+n=174

GitHub stars · box = P25-P75, line = median, whisker = P10-P90

Scores climb steadily with popularity

Median score within each star tier. The grade mix hides this because most repos have few stars - but quality and reach rise together.

What top repos do that the rest don't

Average pass rate for A/B vs D/F repos, by dimension and by check. Filtered to Go. Based on 184 repos.

Quality gap, by dimension

Average check pass rate across all checks in each category, for top-graded vs. bottom-graded repos.

Documentation+49pp
A/B
84%
D/F
36%

4 checks averaged

Engineering+46pp
A/B
90%
D/F
43%

6 checks averaged

Project health+26pp
A/B
100%
D/F
74%

2 checks averaged

Pass rates side by side

Each row is one check. Filled = A/B pass rate, hollow = D/F. +Npp = percentage-point gap.

D/F passA/B pass0%25%50%75%100%CI/CD+79ppTests+68ppInstall and run instructions+57ppLicense+48ppREADME+45ppIssue and PR templates+45ppContributing guide+45ppReproducibility+33ppLinting and formatting+30ppActivity+27ppHousekeeping+24ppDependency manifest+23pp

All checks

CheckA / B pass rateD / F pass rateGap
CI/CD
86%
7%
+79
Tests
99%
31%
+68
Install and run instructions
85%
28%
+57
License
100%
52%
+48
README
97%
52%
+45
Issue and PR templates
55%
10%
+45
Contributing guide
55%
10%
+45
Reproducibility
99%
66%
+33
Linting and formatting
99%
69%
+30
Activity
99%
72%
+27
Housekeeping
100%
76%
+24
Dependency manifest
99%
76%
+23

Does a better grade attract more attention?

Median traction signals per grade band. Toggle across stars, forks, watchers, open issues, and contributors.

Median traction by grade

Toggle across stars, forks, watchers, issues, contributors

Metric

How actively are repos maintained?

Release discipline and project posture signals - the upkeep story behind a grade.

Release discipline by grade

Share of repos shipping at least one tagged release, per grade band

Project posture

Fork quality penalty, archived repos, and release cadence

Quality: forks vs. original repos

Originals
87
Forks
58

Forks score 29 points lower on average (2 forks of 196 measured)

Archived (read-only)1%

1 of 196 measured

Ship releases85%

169 of 199 measured

Does age or size move the score?

Median score across how long a repo has existed and how large it is on disk.

Score by repo age

Median score across age cohorts

Score by repo size

Median score across size on disk

Most common topics, by quality

Topics repos tag themselves with - ranked by frequency, with the median score of all repos carrying each tag.

Top 20 topics
1golang
42
88
2go
23
88
3kubernetes
21
88
4cli
11
88
5ai
10
86
6ai-agents
9
88
7security
8
82
8self-hosted
7
88
9llm
7
90
10typescript
6
84
11automation
6
90
12gin
6
86
13gin-gonic
6
88
14hacktoberfest
6
88
15helm
6
90
16observability
6
92
17terraform
6
86
18docker
5
89
19developer-tools
5
90
20mcp
5
95