The Count of Software Environments depends on – the team size, project and client type. Here are some general guidelines for the number of environments based on team size and project type/client:
Small Teams (1-5 developers)
- For simple projects or proof-of-concepts:
- 2 environments: Development and Production
- For medium-complexity projects:
- 3 environments: Development, Staging (or QA), and Production
Medium Teams (5-15 developers)
- For complex projects or enterprise-level applications:
- 4 environments: Development, Staging (or QA), UAT (User Acceptance Testing), and Production
- For large-scale or high-availability projects:
- 5 environments: Development, Staging (or QA), UAT, Production, and a possible Pre-Production or Canary environment
Large Teams (15+ developers)
- For very complex projects or large-scale enterprise applications:
- 6 environments: Development, Staging (or QA), UAT, Production, Pre-Production, and a possible Canary or Blue-Green environment
- For high-availability or mission-critical projects:
- 7 environments: Development, Staging (or QA), UAT, Production, Pre-Production, Canary, and a possible Disaster Recovery or Warm Standby environment
Project Types/Client
- Internal projects: 2-3 environments (Development, Staging, and Production)
- Client-facing projects: 4-5 environments (Development, Staging, UAT, Production, and a possible Pre-Production or Canary environment)
- High-risk or high-security projects: 5-7 environments (Development, Staging, UAT, Production, Pre-Production, Canary, and a possible Disaster Recovery or Warm Standby environment)
- Cloud-native or DevOps projects: 3-5 environments (Development, Staging, UAT, Production, and a possible Pre-Production or Canary environment)
Keep in mind that these are general guidelines, and the actual number of environments required may vary depending on your specific project needs, team size, and client requirements. Read more on software environments here: https://programtom.com/dev/2023/04/26/software-development-environments/