GitHub has introduced draft pull requests to facilitate early-stage collaboration by allowing developers to signal when their code is not yet ready for formal review or merging. This feature is particularly useful for projects like hackathons or preliminary discussions, enabling contributors to label their work as a draft, thus indicating it's a work in progress. Draft pull requests are visually distinct and prevent merging until the status is changed to "Ready for review," ensuring that feedback is focused on development rather than final approval. Additionally, draft pull requests suppress notifications to CODEOWNERS, minimizing unnecessary alerts until the code is ready for review. This functionality is available for use in both public and private repositories, enhancing collaboration across various GitHub environments.