GitHub · Pull requests · Hidden comments · Checked October 27, 2026

GitHub: a pull request comment is hidden

Organization moderators and anyone with write access to a repository can hide comments on pull requests, issues, discussions and commits, choosing a reason. A hidden comment is minimized, and people with read access to the repository can expand it (GitHub's managing disruptive comments, checked October 27, 2026). On a pull request, conversation comments, reviews and comments on lines can all be hidden, and the GraphQL API marks each one as minimized, with the reason.

Hide comment       Choose a reason              write access, or an organization moderator
Show comment       expands it                   read access
isMinimized        true
minimizedReason    abuse | off-topic | outdated | resolved | duplicate | spam | low-quality
minimizeComment    classifier: ABUSE | DUPLICATE | LOW_QUALITY | OFF_TOPIC | OUTDATED | RESOLVED | SPAM

What hiding does

Who hides it: organization moderators and anyone with write access to the repository. In the upper-right corner of the comment, open the menu, click Hide, choose a reason under "Choose a reason" and select Hide comment. GitHub suggests it for a comment that is off-topic, outdated or resolved, to keep a discussion focused or a pull request easier to review.
Who can read it: the comment is minimized, not removed: anyone with read access to the repository can expand it with Show comment.
Who unhides it: again organization moderators and anyone with write access. Click Show comment, then in the menu on the right of the expanded comment click Unhide.
In the GraphQL API: issue comments, reviews and review comments are Minimizable. isMinimized says whether a comment is minimized, and minimizedReason gives the reason as one of abuse, off-topic, outdated, resolved, duplicate, spam and low-quality; viewerCanMinimize and viewerCanUnminimize say whether you can hide or unhide it (GitHub's Minimizable).

What to do

Read it: click Show comment on the minimized comment; read access to the repository is enough.
Show it to everyone again: ask someone with write access, or an organization moderator, to unhide it.
Hide or unhide it from the API: minimizeComment takes the Node ID of the comment as subjectId and a classifier, one of ABUSE, DUPLICATE, LOW_QUALITY, OFF_TOPIC, OUTDATED, RESOLVED and SPAM; unminimizeComment takes the subjectId. GitHub notes that the case and formatting of minimizedReason differ from these inputs (GitHub's minimizeComment and ReportedContentClassifiers).
Edit it instead: anyone with write access can edit a comment and remove what does not belong, but anyone with read access can view its edit history from the edited dropdown. To take sensitive information out, the comment author or anyone with write access replaces it with [REDACTED], notes the edit, and deletes it from the edit history.
Delete it: anyone with write access can delete a comment, as a last resort. Deleting leaves a timeline event that anyone with read access can see; only people with write access see who deleted it. The body of the pull request itself cannot be deleted: edit it instead.
Not the same as Outdated: a comment on lines that a later commit changed is marked Outdated, which is not hiding; see outdated comments.

In IntelliJ IDEA: no Hide, and a hidden comment is not told apart

How the GitHub support built into IntelliJ IDEA deals with hidden comments, in its source (checked October 31, 2026; IntelliJ IDEA: GraphQL files, comment.graphql, pullRequestReviewComment.graphql, GithubApiRequests.kt):

It does not read whether a comment is hidden: none of its 78 GraphQL files asks for isMinimized or minimizedReason, so nothing in the IDE tells a hidden comment apart from the others.
It cannot hide or unhide: none of its 20 mutations is minimizeComment or unminimizeComment, and none of its REST requests hides a comment. Its comment mutations add, edit (updateIssueComment, updateReviewComment), delete (deleteIssueComment, deleteReviewComment) and add or remove reactions. Hiding and Show comment are done on GitHub.

GitHub pull requests in IntelliJ IDEA

Pull Request Inbox for GitHub, a plugin by Lesstep for JetBrains IDEs 2024.1 or later, shows a pull request's reviews, checks and conversations next to the diff, and merges it with the methods the target branch allows. A comment hidden on GitHub shows folded in the discussion with the reason, as on GitHub, and Show comment opens it (this is read through GraphQL, so it needs a token); the plugin does not hide, unhide, edit or delete comments, which is done on GitHub. The review inbox, diffs and conversations are free; approving, commenting, resolving and merging are Pro (US$1.50 a month, with a 30-day trial).

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