Six categories, weighted by how much the mess costs
Every repo is scored across six categories, and they don't count equally. Structure & size and readability & complexity carry weight 20 each, two-fifths of the total between them. Giant files and unreadable logic are what make a codebase slow and risky to change. Duplication, dead code & leftovers, consistency & style, and repo hygiene carry 15 each.
That's the opinionated part, and it's tuned to vibe-coded apps: AI tools are happy to grow one file forever and to paste the same block four times, so the categories those habits land in get the most influence. A repo with tidy hygiene but one 2,000-line file holding the whole app scores worse than a repo with clean structure and a missing README. That matches how much trouble each one will actually cause you.
How findings turn into a number
Each category starts at a perfect 100. Every finding in that category deducts points by severity: a critical finding costs 40, a high costs 22, a medium costs 10, a low costs 4. The deductions stack, so a category with one high and two medium findings sits at 100 − 22 − 10 − 10 = 58. The overall score is then the weighted average of the six category scores.
Worked example: a 1,500-line file (one high, so structure drops to 78) and two blocks of commented-out code (two mediums, so dead code drops to 80), everything else clean. The overall score = (78×20 + 100×20 + 100×15 + 80×15 + 100×15 + 100×15) / 100 = 92.6. Still an A, but the report names the two habits to break before they compound. The ranking runs on the same math, so the findings that recover the most weighted points sit at the top.
Grades, and what the score is not
The number maps to a letter: A at 90 or above, B at 80+, C at 65+, D at 50+, F below 50. An A means the scan found little to flag. A C means real mess, and a tidy-up session's worth of it. A D or F usually means structural problems (giant files, heavy duplication, committed build artifacts) that make every future change slower than it should be.
Two boundaries to keep in mind. Cleanliness isn't correctness: quality·vibes doesn't execute your code or run your tests, so a 95 says the repo is tidy and won't tell you the logic is right. And the score does its best work as a delta. Scan, paste the fix prompts into Claude Code, re-scan, watch the grade move. Every report shows the change since your last scan, and the free tier is sized for the loop: two scans, one to find and one to verify.
quality·vibes's scoring system at a glance
| Component | Value | Meaning |
|---|---|---|
| Structure & size | weight 20 | Giant files, flat folder trees, cluttered repo roots |
| Readability & complexity | weight 20 | Six-deep nesting, very long lines, logic nobody can hold in their head |
| Duplication | weight 15 | The same block pasted across files, repeats within one file |
| Dead code & leftovers | weight 15 | Commented-out code, TODO piles, console.logs left in |
| Consistency & style | weight 15 | Mixed indentation, competing filename conventions, two package managers |
| Repo hygiene | weight 15 | Committed node_modules, junk files, no README, no lockfile, no tests |
| Deductions per finding | crit −40 / high −22 / med −10 / low −4 | Stacking, from each category's starting 100 |
| Grades | A ≥90 · B ≥80 · C ≥65 · D ≥50 · F <50 | The overall score = weighted average of the six categories |
frequently asked
Why do structure and readability outweigh the others?
Because they're where the cost of mess compounds. A junk file is annoying once; a 1,800-line file taxes every single change anyone ever makes. The weights put the score's attention where your future time goes.
Can a category score go below zero?
Deductions stack per finding, so a category with many findings bottoms out at zero. Past that point the exact number matters less than the message: that whole category needs a dedicated tidy-up session, in the ranked order the report gives you.
Is a score of 100 a guarantee my code is good?
No. It means the scan found nothing across its checks, which is a good sign on its own, but quality·vibes measures cleanliness, not correctness. It doesn't run your code or your tests, and it can't judge whether your business logic is right. Treat 100 as a tidy repo, not a verified one.
How do I improve my score fastest?
Follow the ranked findings top-down, since the ranking already accounts for severity and category weight. If you're chasing points, splitting one giant file recovers more of them than deleting every stray console.log, and the per-finding Claude prompts make each fix a paste rather than a project.
Last updated June 10, 2026