Environment Levels

Unqork organizations operate across multiple environment levels, also called environment stages. Each level serves a distinct purpose in the application development lifecycle, and resources are promoted through them in sequence before reaching end-users in Production.

The standard progression is: Staging → Quality Assurance (QA) → User Acceptance Testing (UAT) → Production. An optional Pre-Production level might sit between UAT and Production. The platform does not enforce this sequence: Creators with promote permissions can promote to any available environment, including directly to Production. Following the full pipeline is a best practice, not a platform constraint.

Level Comparison

Staging, QA, and UAT support the same platform capabilities: full editing, branching, and versioning. Pre-Production and Production apply the same server-side restrictions. Staging and QA run a development build configuration (source maps retained); UAT, Pre-Production, and Production run a production build configuration (compressed, source maps removed). See the sections below for details on each level.

Staging

Staging is the starting point of the promotion pipeline and where all development begins. Creators build, configure, and iterate on applications here before promoting to testing environments. Branching, versioning, and Smart Component Draft are fully available, making it the most flexible environment in the pipeline.

Staging holds test data only. No live client data is stored here.

Quality Assurance (QA)

QA is where Creators, QA engineers, and testers verify that the application functions correctly and meets quality standards before it moves to stakeholder review. Because QA runs the development build configuration (source maps on), browser DevTools show readable stack traces and source locations. QA is the easiest environment to debug and the recommended stage for catching and resolving technical issues before the application advances.

Staging and QA are treated identically by the platform: the same full editing and tooling capabilities apply in both. The difference is purpose: Staging is for building, QA is for verifying.

QA holds test data only.

User Acceptance Testing (UAT)

UAT is where business stakeholders and end-users review the application and formally accept it before it moves to Production. Unlike Staging and QA, UAT runs the production build configuration (compressed, source maps removed). Stakeholders test the application in the same technical state end-users will experience.

Creators can still make corrections and promote updates through UAT before final sign-off. The full range of editing and tooling capabilities applies here.

UAT holds test data only.

Pre-Production (Optional)

Pre-Production is an optional environment level that sits between UAT and Production. It uses the Production build and enforces the same server-side restrictions as Production: draft-based development and Smart Component Draft are blocked. Pre-Production holds test data only, so teams can validate against Production behavior without risking live client data.

Pre-Production is the only non-Production environment that behaves exactly like Production. It is most valuable for catching issues that only surface in the Production build. A change can pass in UAT and fail in Production once source maps are removed and code is compressed.

Pre-Production is not included by default. Contact an Unqork representative to add it to an organization's environment set.

Production

Production is the live environment where end-users access the application and live client data is stored. Every change saved in Production is immediately visible to end-users with no draft buffer and no automatic rollback.

The platform blocks draft-based development and Smart Component Draft in Production to protect live data and prevent unreviewed changes from reaching end-users. Configuration, style management, and promotion remain available.

All development should take place in Staging and move to Production through the promotion pipeline; never directly in Production. The platform provides no warnings or confirmation dialogs when saving in Production, and every change goes live immediately.

For the full list of what is and is not available in Production, see Working in Production.

Identifying Your Environment

The platform does not display a dedicated banner or badge for the current environment level. For standard Unqork-hosted environments, the URL is the primary signal:

Environments with custom domains do not follow this pattern. Creators unsure which environment they are working in should confirm with their environment administrator before making changes.

Environment Configuration

Each environment level has its own independent configuration: authentication settings, session management, security policies, and integrations. Configuration is managed in Environment Administration and does not transfer when resources are promoted. After promoting a resource, verify that environment-level settings in the target environment are configured for the promoted resource.

Promoting Resources

Resources move between environment levels through the Promote action, available to Creators with the appropriate permissions. See Promoting Resources for how to promote applications, styles, groups, roles, and translations.