05.3.4 · Skill in Controlled releases

Canary releases

Running a new version on a small slice of traffic first.

A canary release deploys new code to a small part of the infrastructure and compares its error rate and latency with the rest. If the canary looks unhealthy, it is pulled. It catches technical problems before most users meet them.

Your status · Canary releases

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Resources

articleStart here
Canary release ↗
Danilo Sato (martinfowler.com) · 5 min
Expose a new version to a small group first and widen it only while it stays healthy.
bookGo deeper
Canarying releases (The Site Reliability Workbook, chapter 16) ↗
Google SRE · 25 min
How big a canary should be, how long to wait, and which metrics decide whether to continue.

Tools

none yet

Tools for this topic are being researched.