Visual flashing causes a seizure risk on new Merge Requests

When scrolling to the bottom of a new Merge Request, the content of the sticky header changes multiple times per second causing visual flashing (strobing). This is a seizure risk for users who have photosensitive epilepsy.

The content flashes between the MR name and the MR meta information.

Screen recording of steps taken to reproduce:

I don't know which of these steps are important to what causing the bug… but here is how to reproduce it.

Commit to a new branch using the Web IDE.
Use commit message Fixed an incorrect URL (404) for the 'workflow label' hyperlink
Create an MR using the dialog that appears in the Web IDE
Replace the MR description with this text: Fixes a URL that was returning a 404 error for the 'workflow label' link.
Assign somebody to the MR who doesn't have permission to merge it
Scroll down while pipelines are running, and before there are comments. As the header becomes sticky, its content will strobe between the MR name and the MR metadata

The sticky header content flashes between two variants.

The sticky header content should remain consistent.

This bug happens on GitLab.com

To remediate high-severity issues requiring an internal release for single-tenant SaaS instances, refer to the internal release process for engineers.

Edited Aug 28, 2025 by Mark Unthank