---
title: >
  Which branch should be in which environment?
pubDate: 2023-09-26
permalink: >-
  daily/2023/09/26/which-branch-should-be-in-which-environment
tags:
  - software-development
  - git
  - trunk-based-development
  - feature-flags
---

A common question is which [Git] branch should be on which environment.

Most projects I've worked on have two or more environments: production, staging (or test) and development.

Earlier in my career, we used Git Flow heavily. A Git branching workflow based on having different branches - i.e. `develop`, `master` and any arbitrary short-lived feature, hotfix and release branches.

These matched nicely with our three environments.

Usually, the `develop` branch would be used in the development environment. The `master` branch would be on staging and a tagged release from `master` on production.

## What about now?

I prefer trunk-based development, where there is one long-lived branch to which everyone commits their changes.

There's only one branch, so you can either follow continuous deployment and use the same branch for all environments - including production - or separate production using a dedicated branch or tag if you need more control.

The mainline branch is used in all pre-production environments, such as staging and development.

## What about differences between the environments?

What if we need differences, such as a feature that must be enabled in a particular environment if the same code is on both?

My go-to approach is feature flagging, and this approach is something I'll describe more in tomorrow's email.