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Pre-Production Readiness Checklist

This document ensures a Factory-generated or platform-based solution is ready for production. It is written for architects, engineers, DevOps, and project managers preparing for production deployment.

Production readiness requires thorough validation across functional, non-functional, operational, and security dimensions. This checklist ensures nothing is missed.

Important

No-Go Conditions: Do not proceed to production if critical security issues, data loss risks, or compliance violations exist. Address all critical items before production deployment.

Functional Readiness

Testing

  • All unit tests passing
  • All integration tests passing
  • All acceptance tests passing
  • Performance tests completed
  • Security tests completed
  • UAT signoff obtained

Functionality

  • Core features working as expected
  • Edge cases handled
  • Error handling validated
  • User workflows tested
  • Integration points tested

See: Testing Strategy for testing guidance.

Non-Functional Readiness

Performance

  • Performance benchmarks met
  • Load testing completed
  • Stress testing completed
  • Scalability validated
  • Response times acceptable

Resilience

  • Failure scenarios tested
  • Retry logic validated
  • Circuit breakers configured
  • Timeouts configured
  • Graceful degradation tested

Capacity

  • Capacity planning completed
  • Scaling assumptions validated
  • Resource limits configured
  • Monitoring thresholds set
  • Auto-scaling configured (if applicable)

See: Cloud-Native Mindset for resilience patterns.

Observability and Operations

Logging

  • Structured logging configured
  • Log levels appropriate
  • Log aggregation configured
  • Log retention policies set
  • Sensitive data redacted

Metrics

  • Key metrics identified
  • Metrics collection configured
  • Dashboards created
  • Alert thresholds set
  • Business metrics tracked

Tracing

  • Distributed tracing configured
  • Trace correlation working
  • Trace sampling configured
  • Trace retention policies set
  • Performance insights available

Health Checks

  • Health check endpoints implemented
  • Liveness probes configured
  • Readiness probes configured
  • Health check monitoring set up
  • Alerting on health failures

See: Observability-Driven Design for observability patterns.

Runbooks

  • Runbooks created
  • Incident procedures documented
  • Escalation paths defined
  • On-call rotation configured
  • Team trained on runbooks

See: Operations & Runbooks for runbook guidance.

Security and Compliance

Authentication and Authorization

  • Authentication configured correctly
  • Authorization rules validated
  • RBAC configured (if applicable)
  • Token validation working
  • Session management secure

Data Protection

  • Data encryption at rest
  • Data encryption in transit
  • Secrets management configured
  • PII handling validated
  • Data retention policies set

Compliance

  • Compliance requirements met
  • Audit logging configured
  • Data residency validated
  • Privacy policies implemented
  • Compliance documentation complete

See: Security & Compliance, Data Residency for security and compliance requirements.

Vulnerability Management

  • Security scanning completed
  • Vulnerabilities addressed
  • Dependency updates applied
  • Security patches applied
  • Penetration testing completed (if required)

Go-Live Decision

Go Criteria

  • All critical checklist items completed
  • Stakeholder approval obtained
  • Rollback plan tested
  • Support team ready
  • Communication plan executed

No-Go Conditions

  • Critical security issues unresolved
  • Data loss risks present
  • Compliance violations exist
  • Critical functionality broken
  • Performance unacceptable

Important

No-Go Conditions: Do not proceed to production if any of these conditions exist: 1. Critical security issues unresolved 2. Data loss risks present 3. Compliance violations exist 4. Critical functionality broken 5. Performance unacceptable

Go-Live Process

  1. Final Review - Final checklist review
  2. Stakeholder Approval - Get stakeholder approval
  3. Communication - Communicate go-live plan
  4. Deployment - Execute deployment
  5. Monitoring - Monitor closely post-deployment
  6. Support - Provide immediate support