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Canary release

Also called Phased rollout

What is Canary release?

Releasing a change to a small group of users first so the team can catch problems before the change reaches everyone.

A canary release is a cautious rollout strategy. A small percentage of traffic gets the new version first, and the team watches for crashes, slowdowns, or user complaints before expanding it.

How it relates to Orbit

Orbit’s Sandbox gives agent work a similar safety step before it reaches your default branch: run it in an isolated worktree, then promote or discard it. See Sandbox for details.

When you would use it

You use a canary release when a change could affect many users and you want an early warning if something is wrong.

Common operations

  • Gradual feature launches
  • Risk reduction before full release
  • Monitoring live behavior safely

Related terms

Where this is taught

No learning path uses this term yet. Browse the Learning Atlas for guided sequences through related ideas.