A wireless device may decode a polar coded codeword using a successive cancellation list (SCL) decoder. The decoder may implement a distributed feedback architecture, where the decoder stores one or more state maps and a set of bit arrays in memory for each layer of decoding. For different phases of decoding in a layer, the decoder may update the state maps and sets of bit arrays to limit the resources used. Additionally, when performing bit updating following the decoding of a bit of the codeword, the decoder may not update each layer of the decoding process. Instead, each sub-decoder may send a state map up to the calling layer for bit updating when the sub-decoder has completed its invocation, and may not return any intermediate state maps prior to completing invocation. Thus, each decoder and sub-decoder may perform bit updating just twice, reducing the complexity and latency of decoding.