GitHub PR has no assignee

[uh-toby]

How are you running Renovate?

A Mend.io-hosted app

If you're self-hosting Renovate, tell us which platform (GitHub, GitLab, etc) and which version of Renovate.

No response

Please tell us more about your question or problem

Hi team,

We've had a few PRs created by Renovate recently without an assignee. From the logs it looks like the API call to Github failed with a 404. That seems fine - sometimes requests fail - but I'm surprised that there was no retry either in the initial build that created the PR or future builds that touched the PR.

Is it possible to retry adding PR assignees?
Is it possible to get notified when a failure happens so we can add an assignee?

Kind regards,
Toby

Logs (if relevant)

Logs

DEBUG: PR created (branch="renovate/aws-5.x")
{
  "baseBranch": "main"
  "pr": 21487
  "draft": false
}

DEBUG: Adding labels '' to #21487 (branch="renovate/aws-5.x")
{
  "baseBranch": "main"
}

INFO: PR created (branch="renovate/aws-5.x")
{
  "baseBranch": "main"
  "pr": 21487
  "prTitle": "Update Terraform aws to ~> 5.98"
}

DEBUG: addParticipants(pr=21487) (branch="renovate/aws-5.x")
{
  "baseBranch": "main"
}

DEBUG: Adding assignees 'REDACTED' to #21487 (branch="renovate/aws-5.x")
{
  "baseBranch": "main"
}

DEBUG: POST https://api.github.com/repos/wearelyssna/hub/issues/21487/assignees = (code=ERR_NON_2XX_3XX_RESPONSE, statusCode=404 retryCount=0, duration=136) (branch="renovate/aws-5.x")
{
  "baseBranch": "main"
}

DEBUG: Failed to add assignees (branch="renovate/aws-5.x")
{
  "baseBranch": "main"
  "assignees": [
    "REDACTED"
  ]
  "err": {
    "name": "HTTPError",
    "code": "ERR_NON_2XX_3XX_RESPONSE",
    "timings": {
      "start": 1747389877343,
      "socket": 1747389877343,
      "lookup": 1747389877343,
      "connect": 1747389877343,
      "secureConnect": 1747389877343,
      "upload": 1747389877344,
      "response": 1747389877478,
      "end": 1747389877479,
      "phases": {
        "wait": 0,
        "dns": 0,
        "tcp": 0,
        "tls": 0,
        "request": 1,
        "firstByte": 134,
        "download": 1,
        "total": 136
      }
    },
    "message": "Response code 404 (Not Found)",
    "stack": "HTTPError: Response code 404 (Not Found)\n    at Request.<anonymous> (/usr/local/renovate/node_modules/.pnpm/[email protected]/node_modules/got/dist/source/as-promise/index.js:118:42)\n    at processTicksAndRejections (node:internal/process/task_queues:105:5)",
    "options": {
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        "accept": "application/json, application/vnd.github.machine-man-preview+json",
        "authorization": "***********",
        "content-type": "application/json",
        "content-length": "26",
        "accept-encoding": "gzip, deflate, br"
      },
      "url": "https://api.github.com/repos/wearelyssna/hub/issues/21487/assignees",
      "hostType": "github",
      "username": "",
      "password": "",
      "method": "POST",
      "http2": false
    },
    "response": {
      "statusCode": 404,
      "statusMessage": "Not Found",
      "body": {
        "message": "Not Found",
        "documentation_url": "https://docs.github.com/rest/issues/assignees#add-assignees-to-an-issue",
        "status": "404"
      },
      "headers": {
        "date": "Fri, 16 May 2025 10:04:37 GMT",
        "content-type": "application/json; charset=utf-8",
        "x-github-media-type": "github.v3; param=machine-man-preview",
        "x-accepted-github-permissions": "issues=write; pull_requests=write",
        "x-github-api-version-selected": "2022-11-28",
        "x-ratelimit-limit": "5000",
        "x-ratelimit-remaining": "4971",
        "x-ratelimit-reset": "1747392874",
        "x-ratelimit-used": "29",
        "x-ratelimit-resource": "core",
        "access-control-expose-headers": "ETag, Link, Location, Retry-After, X-GitHub-OTP, X-RateLimit-Limit, X-RateLimit-Remaining, X-RateLimit-Used, X-RateLimit-Resource, X-RateLimit-Reset, X-OAuth-Scopes, X-Accepted-OAuth-Scopes, X-Poll-Interval, X-GitHub-Media-Type, X-GitHub-SSO, X-GitHub-Request-Id, Deprecation, Sunset",
        "access-control-allow-origin": "*",
        "strict-transport-security": "max-age=31536000; includeSubdomains; preload",
        "x-frame-options": "deny",
        "x-content-type-options": "nosniff",
        "x-xss-protection": "0",
        "referrer-policy": "origin-when-cross-origin, strict-origin-when-cross-origin",
        "content-security-policy": "default-src 'none'",
        "vary": "Accept-Encoding, Accept, X-Requested-With",
        "content-encoding": "gzip",
        "transfer-encoding": "chunked",
        "x-github-request-id": "EC18:259D06:68899B:D23710:68270DB5",
        "server": "github.com"
      },
      "httpVersion": "1.1",
      "retryCount": 0
    }
  }
}

[rarkins]

A 404 response is not something which a client should immediately retry at the http layer. This seems like a GitHub bug, maybe a race condition between DB replicas or something like that.

In theory renovate could try to remember this failure and retry adding assignees on a later run, but is that code that you'd be willing to contribute yourself or sponsor? This seems like a low priority edge case

[rarkins]

You need to consider the case where:

• Renovate added assignees
• Assignees removed themselves
• Renovate runs again

You don't want Renovate "force" re-assigning them

[sceee]

This 404 issue is something I am seeing more often lately - with the same effect the PR has no assignee.

I also suspect it's probably because the PR is not yet created/"available" through all Github replicas or something like this and therefore the assignee call sometimes fails with 404 to set the assignee because the PR "does not yet exist".

However, based on the rate of the occurrence it seems it's not a really rare edge case but more something that regularly happens (even though probably at a lower percentage).

Just to give a rough impression on the occurrence, it has happened to 3 PRs out of 25 in the last day in one repo, so ~10%.

[rarkins]

I think we could introduce an intentional delay between PR creation and assignee/reviewer adding to see if the error rate can be reduced or eliminated. But first we want to be able to measure it. Does anyone have a job log where such an error is reported?

[sceee]

Here's an extract from the job log of an affected job:

Job Log

2025-07-10T09:41:26.8506593Z DEBUG: Creating PR (repository=org/repo, branch=auto-dep-update/react-i18next-15.x)
2025-07-10T09:41:26.8508598Z        "prTitle": "Update dependency react-i18next to ^15.6.0"
2025-07-10T09:41:26.8509752Z DEBUG: prHourlyLimit of the upgrades present in this branch (repository=org/repo, branch=auto-dep-update/react-i18next-15.x)
2025-07-10T09:41:26.8511018Z        "limits": [{"depName": "react-i18next", "prHourlyLimit": 0}]
2025-07-10T09:41:26.8512526Z DEBUG: prHourlyLimit of this branch is unlimited, because atleast one of the upgrade has it's prHourlyLimit set to "No limit" ie. 0 or null (repository=org/repo, branch=auto-dep-update/react-i18next-15.x)
2025-07-10T09:41:26.8514233Z DEBUG: prConcurrentLimit of the upgrades present in this branch (repository=org/repo, branch=auto-dep-update/react-i18next-15.x)
2025-07-10T09:41:26.8514997Z        "limits": [{"depName": "react-i18next", "prConcurrentLimit": 8}]
2025-07-10T09:41:26.8515737Z DEBUG: Calculated lowest prConcurrentLimit among the upgrades present in this branch is 8. (repository=org/repo, branch=auto-dep-update/react-i18next-15.x)
2025-07-10T09:41:26.8516513Z DEBUG: Creating PR (repository=org/repo, branch=auto-dep-update/react-i18next-15.x)
2025-07-10T09:41:26.8516970Z        "title": "Update dependency react-i18next to ^15.6.0",
2025-07-10T09:41:26.8517336Z        "head": "org:auto-dep-update/react-i18next-15.x",
2025-07-10T09:41:26.8517625Z        "base": "master",
2025-07-10T09:41:26.8517825Z        "draft": false
2025-07-10T09:41:27.5537227Z DEBUG: PR created (repository=org/repo, branch=auto-dep-update/react-i18next-15.x)
2025-07-10T09:41:27.5537984Z        "pr": 4564,
2025-07-10T09:41:27.5539387Z        "draft": false
2025-07-10T09:41:27.5556658Z DEBUG: Adding labels '' to #4564 (repository=org/repo, branch=auto-dep-update/react-i18next-15.x)
2025-07-10T09:41:27.5559617Z  INFO: PR created (repository=org/repo, branch=auto-dep-update/react-i18next-15.x)
2025-07-10T09:41:27.5562702Z        "pr": 4564,
2025-07-10T09:41:27.5563184Z        "prTitle": "Update dependency react-i18next to ^15.6.0"
2025-07-10T09:41:27.5564060Z DEBUG: addParticipants(pr=4564) (repository=org/repo, branch=auto-dep-update/react-i18next-15.x)
2025-07-10T09:41:27.5565240Z DEBUG: Adding assignees 'User123' to #4564 (repository=org/repo, branch=auto-dep-update/react-i18next-15.x)
2025-07-10T09:41:27.7738754Z DEBUG: POST https://api.github.com/repos/org/repo/issues/4564/assignees = (code=ERR_NON_2XX_3XX_RESPONSE, statusCode=404 retryCount=0, duration=213) (repository=org/repo, branch=auto-dep-update/react-i18next-15.x)
2025-07-10T09:41:27.7760175Z DEBUG: Failed to add assignees (repository=org/repo, branch=auto-dep-update/react-i18next-15.x)
2025-07-10T09:41:27.7767725Z        "assignees": ["@User123"],
2025-07-10T09:41:27.7768594Z        "err": {
2025-07-10T09:41:27.7768899Z          "name": "HTTPError",
2025-07-10T09:41:27.7769299Z          "code": "ERR_NON_2XX_3XX_RESPONSE",
2025-07-10T09:41:27.7769705Z          "timings": {
2025-07-10T09:41:27.7770230Z            "start": 1752140487556,
2025-07-10T09:41:27.7770644Z            "socket": 1752140487556,
2025-07-10T09:41:27.7771023Z            "lookup": 1752140487556,
2025-07-10T09:41:27.7771426Z            "connect": 1752140487556,
2025-07-10T09:41:27.7771860Z            "secureConnect": 1752140487556,
2025-07-10T09:41:27.7772455Z            "upload": 1752140487556,
2025-07-10T09:41:27.7772965Z            "response": 1752140487768,
2025-07-10T09:41:27.7773364Z            "end": 1752140487769,
2025-07-10T09:41:27.7773727Z            "phases": {
2025-07-10T09:41:27.7774053Z              "wait": 0,
2025-07-10T09:41:27.7774363Z              "dns": 0,
2025-07-10T09:41:27.7774655Z              "tcp": 0,
2025-07-10T09:41:27.7774965Z              "tls": 0,
2025-07-10T09:41:27.7775286Z              "request": 0,
2025-07-10T09:41:27.7775642Z              "firstByte": 212,
2025-07-10T09:41:27.7813912Z              "download": 1,
2025-07-10T09:41:27.7814861Z              "total": 213
2025-07-10T09:41:27.7815227Z            }
2025-07-10T09:41:27.7815499Z          },
2025-07-10T09:41:27.7815881Z          "message": "Response code 404 (Not Found)",
2025-07-10T09:41:27.7817812Z          "stack": "HTTPError: Response code 404 (Not Found)\n    at Request.<anonymous> (/usr/local/renovate/node_modules/.pnpm/[email protected]/node_modules/got/dist/source/as-promise/index.js:118:42)\n    at processTicksAndRejections (node:internal/process/task_queues:105:5)",
2025-07-10T09:41:27.7819420Z          "options": {
2025-07-10T09:41:27.7819745Z            "headers": {
2025-07-10T09:41:27.7820575Z              "user-agent": "RenovateBot/41.29.1 (https://github.com/renovatebot/renovate)",
2025-07-10T09:41:27.7821382Z              "accept": "application/json, application/vnd.github.v3+json",
2025-07-10T09:41:27.7821989Z              "authorization": "***********",
2025-07-10T09:41:27.7822491Z              "content-type": "application/json",
2025-07-10T09:41:27.7822975Z              "content-length": "27",
2025-07-10T09:41:27.7823456Z              "accept-encoding": "gzip, deflate, br"
2025-07-10T09:41:27.7823863Z            },
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2025-07-10T09:41:27.7824958Z            "hostType": "github",
2025-07-10T09:41:27.7825304Z            "username": "",
2025-07-10T09:41:27.7825640Z            "password": "",
2025-07-10T09:41:27.7825981Z            "method": "POST",
2025-07-10T09:41:27.7826777Z            "http2": false
2025-07-10T09:41:27.7827261Z          },
2025-07-10T09:41:27.7827570Z          "response": {
2025-07-10T09:41:27.7827936Z            "statusCode": 404,
2025-07-10T09:41:27.7828384Z            "statusMessage": "Not Found",
2025-07-10T09:41:27.7828799Z            "body": {
2025-07-10T09:41:27.7829160Z              "message": "Not Found",
2025-07-10T09:41:27.7830140Z              "documentation_url": "https://docs.github.com/rest/issues/assignees#add-assignees-to-an-issue",
2025-07-10T09:41:27.7830889Z              "status": "404"
2025-07-10T09:41:27.7831225Z            },
2025-07-10T09:41:27.7831508Z            "headers": {
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2025-07-10T09:41:27.7833273Z              "x-github-media-type": "github.v3",
2025-07-10T09:41:27.7833589Z              "x-github-api-version-selected": "2022-11-28",
2025-07-10T09:41:27.7833882Z              "x-ratelimit-limit": "5000",
2025-07-10T09:41:27.7834158Z              "x-ratelimit-remaining": "4368",
2025-07-10T09:41:27.7834575Z              "x-ratelimit-reset": "1752141547",
2025-07-10T09:41:27.7834849Z              "x-ratelimit-used": "632",
2025-07-10T09:41:27.7835121Z              "x-ratelimit-resource": "core",
2025-07-10T09:41:27.7836415Z              "access-control-expose-headers": "ETag, Link, Location, Retry-After, X-GitHub-OTP, X-RateLimit-Limit, X-RateLimit-Remaining, X-RateLimit-Used, X-RateLimit-Resource, X-RateLimit-Reset, X-OAuth-Scopes, X-Accepted-OAuth-Scopes, X-Poll-Interval, X-GitHub-Media-Type, X-GitHub-SSO, X-GitHub-Request-Id, Deprecation, Sunset",
2025-07-10T09:41:27.7837685Z              "access-control-allow-origin": "*",
2025-07-10T09:41:27.7838169Z              "strict-transport-security": "max-age=31536000; includeSubdomains; preload",
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2025-07-10T09:41:27.7839734Z              "referrer-policy": "origin-when-cross-origin, strict-origin-when-cross-origin",
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2025-07-10T09:41:27.7841204Z              "content-encoding": "gzip",
2025-07-10T09:41:27.7841478Z              "transfer-encoding": "chunked",
2025-07-10T09:41:27.7841832Z              "x-github-request-id": "4440:32CFC1:16225FB:2CC4599:686F8AC7",
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2025-07-10T09:41:27.7842382Z            },
2025-07-10T09:41:27.7842564Z            "httpVersion": "1.1",
2025-07-10T09:41:27.7842785Z            "retryCount": 0
2025-07-10T09:41:27.7842980Z          }
2025-07-10T09:41:27.7843130Z        }

[rarkins]

This log shows no retries (which is to be expected). But maybe for this particular REST call we might be able to use the underlying library ("got") to retry. PR welcome if anyone can figure that out