Deployment readiness

This checklist is completed for every production deployment. Every item is Pass, or a justified N/A. A Fail blocks the release until it is resolved and re-verified.

The standard. A consistent pre-release assessment — the checklist in this document — that every production deployment passes.

Release details

Field	Value
Release / version
Application component(s)
Change / ticket reference
Target deployment date and window
Prepared by
Date prepared

A. Code quality and peer review

#	Item	Acceptance criterion	Owner	Status
1	Feature branch and versioning	Change developed on a feature/<ticket> branch from dev, linked to a tracked ticket	Developer
2	Pull request review	Approved by the required reviewers at every promotion; all comments resolved	Reviewers
3	Formatting and linting	Formatters and linters pass; pre-commit hooks green	Developer
4	No secrets committed	Secret scan and review show no credentials, keys or tokens	Developer / Reviewer

B. Automated testing

#	Item	Acceptance criterion	Owner	Status
5	Unit tests	All pass; coverage meets the agreed threshold	Developer / QA
6	Integration tests	Services connect to their dependencies; health checks pass	Backend
7	Build and image publish	Image builds, is tagged, and is pushed to the registry	DevOps
8	Static quality gate	Quality gate passed; no new blocker or critical issues	DevOps / QA

C. Security

#	Item	Acceptance criterion	Owner	Status
9	SAST	No new critical vulnerabilities or unreviewed hotspots	Security / DevOps
10	DAST	High-risk findings triaged and remediated or formally risk-accepted	Security
11	Image scan	No unresolved high or critical CVEs in the deployed images	DevOps / Security
12	Security posture	Security Hub and Config show no unresolved critical findings	Cloud / Security
13	IAM least privilege	Task and execution roles scoped to need; no wildcard admin	Cloud engineer
14	Secrets management	Secrets read at runtime from Secrets Manager or Parameter Store	DevOps

D. Infrastructure as code

#	Item	Acceptance criterion	Owner	Status
15	Terraform validate and lint	fmt, validate and tflint pass	DevOps
16	Plan reviewed	Plan approved; no unexpected destroy or replace	Cloud lead
17	Environment parity	Staging mirrors production and both come from the same definitions	DevOps
18	Networking and TLS	HTTPS enforced; certificate valid; security groups least-open	Cloud engineer
19	Auto-scaling	Scaling policies configured for expected production load	DevOps

E. Performance

#	Item	Acceptance criterion	Owner	Status
20	Load test	Meets p95 latency, throughput and error-rate targets at expected peak	QA / DevOps
21	Performance test	Within SLO; no regression against baseline	QA
22	Resource sizing	Compute sizing validated against observed load-test utilisation	DevOps

F. Resilience and disaster recovery

#	Item	Acceptance criterion	Owner	Status
23	Resiliency assessment	Resilience Hub score meets the target policy, including RTO/RPO	Cloud lead
24	Rollback path	Previous version available; automatic rollback on failed health checks confirmed	DevOps
25	High availability	Workload spans multiple AZs; database is Multi-AZ or the exception is recorded	Cloud engineer
26	Backup and restore	Automated backups enabled, retention meets policy, restore tested	DBA / Cloud

G. Monitoring and observability

#	Item	Acceptance criterion	Owner	Status
27	Dashboards	Dashboards exist for each component with the key metrics visible	DevOps
28	Alarms	Alarms configured for CPU, memory, error rate, latency and data-tier health, each with a target	DevOps
29	Centralised logging	Application and platform logs shipped with an appropriate retention period	DevOps
30	Alert routing	Critical alarms reach the on-call channel; delivery verified	DevOps

H. Data

#	Item	Acceptance criterion	Owner	Status
31	Migrations reviewed	Backward compatible or reversible; applied successfully in staging	Backend / DBA
32	Pre-deployment snapshot	Snapshot taken before any schema or data change	DBA
33	Data protection	Encrypted at rest and in transit; access least-privilege	Security

I. Configuration and release

#	Item	Acceptance criterion	Owner	Status
34	Environment configuration	Production parameters verified; no staging values leaking in	DevOps
35	Feature flags	New features gated for a controlled rollout	Product / Dev
36	Third-party integrations	Payment, messaging and logistics integrations validated in staging	Backend / QA
37	Release tagging	Git tag created with release notes	DevOps

J. Documentation and communication

#	Item	Acceptance criterion	Owner	Status
38	Release notes	Prepared and shared with stakeholders	Product / Dev
39	Runbook updated	Deployment and rollback runbooks updated for new components	DevOps
40	Stakeholder communication	Deployment window and impact communicated	Project lead
41	Maintenance window	If downtime is possible, scheduled in an agreed low-traffic window	Project lead

K. Final approval

#	Item	Acceptance criterion	Owner	Status
42	All items complete	Every item Pass, or a justified N/A recorded	Head of Engineering
43	Production sign-off	Authorised approver has signed off	Head of Engineering

Sign-off

Role	Name	Signature	Date
Prepared by (DevOps)
Reviewed by (QA / Security)
Approved by (Engineering lead)

Notes and justifications (required for any Fail or N/A):

Using this checklist well

• Start it at the beginning of the release, not the night before.
• An item marked N/A needs a written reason. "Not applicable" is not a reason.
• The checklist is evidence, not a formality — attach the referenced reports.
• If the same item fails repeatedly, the process behind it needs fixing, not a reminder.

Related standards

• Release workflows
• Build and test
• Runbooks
• Deployment checklist template