diff --git a/.github/workflows/core.yml b/.github/workflows/core.yml
index b648bf2715..5ef6c1c1da 100644
--- a/.github/workflows/core.yml
+++ b/.github/workflows/core.yml
@@ -507,15 +507,16 @@ jobs:
       - uses: actions/checkout@v5
         with:
           ref: ${{ inputs.source_ref }}
+          fetch-depth: 0
       - uses: actions/setup-python@v5
         with:
           python-version: '3.13'
       - name: Setup flake8 annotations
         uses: rbialon/flake8-annotations@v1
       - name: Install linting packages
-        run: pip install flake8 pylint
+        run: pip install flake8 numpydoc pylint
       - name: Lint codebase
-        run: make lint GITHUB_ACTIONS_FORMATTING=1
+        run: make lint GITHUB_ACTIONS_FORMATTING=1 BASE=origin/${{ inputs.base_ref }}
 
   # Docs
 
diff --git a/Makefile b/Makefile
index cd8e2f651b..c3e5415fc8 100644
--- a/Makefile
+++ b/Makefile
@@ -7,7 +7,19 @@ modules:
 	@python setup.py build_ext --inplace > build.log 2>&1 || cat build.log
 
 .PHONY: lint
-lint: srclint actionlint dockerlint
+lint: srclint doclint actionlint dockerlint
+
+# CI passes BASE explicitly (it knows main vs release from the PR's base
+# branch/label). Locally, guess it: whichever of origin/main, origin/release
+# forked from HEAD more recently is the one this branch was cut from.
+BASE ?= $(shell \
+  m=$$(git merge-base HEAD origin/main 2>/dev/null); \
+  r=$$(git merge-base HEAD origin/release 2>/dev/null); \
+  if [ -n "$$r" ] && git merge-base --is-ancestor "$$m" "$$r" 2>/dev/null; then \
+    echo origin/release; \
+  else \
+    echo origin/main; \
+  fi)
 
 # Adds file annotations to Github Actions (only useful on CI)
 GITHUB_ACTIONS_FORMATTING=0
@@ -33,6 +45,12 @@ srclint:
 	@echo "    Linting TSFC"
 	@python -m flake8 $(FLAKE8_FORMAT) tsfc
 
+.PHONY: doclint
+doclint:
+	@echo "    Checking docstrings"
+	@git diff --name-only --diff-filter=ACM $(BASE)...HEAD -- '*.py' \
+	  | xargs -r python -m numpydoc lint
+
 .PHONY: actionlint
 actionlint:
 	@echo "    Pull latest actionlint image"
diff --git a/pyproject.toml b/pyproject.toml
index 2e2c32ff73..f6a0858548 100644
--- a/pyproject.toml
+++ b/pyproject.toml
@@ -72,12 +72,14 @@ check = [
 ]
 docs = [
   "bibtexparser",
+  "flake8",
   "ipykernel",  # kernel for executing the tutorial notebooks
   "ipympl",  # %matplotlib widget backend used by the tutorial notebooks
   "jupytext",  # convert the .py tutorial notebooks to .ipynb
   "matplotlib",  # needed to resolve API
   "nbsphinx",  # execute and render the tutorial notebooks
   "numpydoc",
+  "pylint",
   "pylit",
   "sphinx",
   "sphinx-autobuild",
@@ -190,3 +192,9 @@ pyop2 = [
   "*.pyx",
   "codegen/c/*.c",
 ]
+
+[tool.numpydoc_validation]
+checks = ["GL06", "GL07", "PR01", "PR02", "PR03", "SS03", "SS05"]
+# exclude matches the dotted object name; exclude_files matches the path.
+exclude = ['\.__init__$']
+exclude_files = ['^tests/', '^firedrake/_version\.py$']