Changelog Generator

A changelog is a chronological record of all notable changes made to a project, product, or software application. Unlike commit logs which are written for developers, changelogs are written for users—they explain what changed and why it matters in language that non-technical stakeholders can understand.

Good changelogs build trust with your users. They demonstrate that your product is actively maintained, show that you're responsive to feedback, and help users understand what new capabilities are available. For SaaS products, changelogs are often the first place power users check to see what's new.

Changelogs also serve important internal purposes: they create institutional memory of what was shipped and when, help onboard new team members, and provide a clear record for compliance and audit purposes.

While often used interchangeably, changelogs and release notes serve different purposes:

Changelogs are comprehensive, cumulative records of all changes across all versions. They're typically formatted as a continuous document (often a CHANGELOG.md file) that grows with each release. The audience is usually technical—developers, power users, and integrators who need to understand exactly what changed.

Release notes focus on a single release and are often more marketing-oriented. They highlight the most user-relevant changes, may include screenshots or demos, and are designed to generate excitement about new features. Release notes often omit minor bug fixes and technical changes that changelogs would include.

Many teams maintain both: a detailed changelog for technical users and polished release notes for broader communication. This tool can generate either style depending on your needs.

Follow these best practices to create changelogs that users actually want to read:

Write for humans, not machines: "Fixed null pointer exception in UserService.getProfile()" means nothing to most users. Instead: "Fixed a bug that caused profile pages to fail loading for some users." Explain the user impact, not the technical implementation.

Group changes by type: Organize entries into categories like "New Features," "Improvements," "Bug Fixes," and "Breaking Changes." This helps users quickly find what's relevant to them. Breaking changes should always be prominently called out.

Be consistent: Use the same format, terminology, and level of detail across all entries. Consistency builds trust and makes changelogs scannable. Many teams follow the Keep a Changelog format.

Include context when helpful: For significant changes, briefly explain why the change was made. "Redesigned the dashboard based on user feedback requesting faster access to key metrics" tells a better story than just "Redesigned dashboard."

Manually writing changelogs is tedious and often gets skipped. That's why many teams automate the process by generating changelogs directly from git commit messages.

Conventional Commits: The key to good automated changelogs is structured commit messages. The Conventional Commits specification uses prefixes like feat:, fix:, and docs: to categorize changes. This tool understands conventional commits and automatically groups them appropriately.

AI enhancement: Raw commit messages are still often too technical for user-facing changelogs. This tool uses AI to transform developer-speak into user-friendly language while preserving the essential information. It groups related commits, removes duplicates, and creates a polished final output.

Multiple formats: Different channels need different formats. Markdown works for documentation sites and GitHub releases. Slack-formatted output is perfect for team announcements. Plain text works for email newsletters. Generate once, publish everywhere.