[DL.CD.7] Remove manual approvals to practice continuous deployment

Category: OPTIONAL

Fully automate all stages of the deployment process, allowing developers to push new code into the production environment using fully automated delivery pipelines—with no manual approval stages required. This is referred to as continuous deployment. Removing all manual deployment steps reduces potential errors and increases deployment speed. It allows developers to focus more on coding and less on deployment logistics, improving efficiency and productivity.

Create fully automated pipelines which perform continuous integration and continuous deployment. A pipeline should trigger upon code changes being merged into the main release branch. This pipeline should perform all necessary quality assurance tests, build the application, and deploy the new version to the production environment. Automated governance capabilities ensure that guardrails are being followed, while observability functions such as alerts and logs provide visibility.

This level of automation is a hallmark of mature DevOps practices. However, it is an optional capability as it is not always achievable or desired, especially in heavily regulated industries or in organizations with strict governance controls.

Related information: