What is the difference between alpha and beta release?

Question

I want to deploy my software in a different environment and provide features phase by phase. When and where should I use alpha and beta versions?

Answer 1

Alpha Release - This is the release when the feature which you are developing is incomplete or partially complete. Suppose in a Ticket booking system you have developed the seat selection but the payment implementation is remaining. In this case you can release it to testers to test the initial phase of the feature. Lots of open source products have Alpha releases.

Beta Release - This release is done when the product feature is complete and all the development is done but there are possibilities that it could contain some bugs and performance issues. This release is mostly distributed to users who test the product and who can report the bugs. Even UAT (User Acceptance Testing) phase could be considered a Beta release.

For more details read the wiki

Answer 2

Existing answers could be correct depending on the product/business environment, and are specifically correct in context of older Business-IT systematics. I provide further thoughts on why I don't like them at the bottom of my answer.

Alpha and Beta Release Purpose

In any case, your minimum viable- product, feature, or feature group is incomplete; however, you need tangible understanding of what's really needed in an effective production release that establishes trust with your production users , and if early product/feature designs will be valuable there or if you need to adjust, add, or remove things beforehand.

You "Pilot" through these type of releases. The timelines are irrelevant earlier on, until you're ready to commit to production after late alpha and early beta phases. You fail fast, and try again if things don't work out.

"Application", "Product", "Technology", "Prototype", should be considered the same. This is a business process, not a technology process.

Alpha Releases may mean a flagged feature is released for a small, or selectively-large, group of users. Releasing this feature usually means zero documentation or training for users- which you ultimately hope a quality user experience doesn't require much of, and that an Alpha feature fits right in where it's intended, is self-explainable, and be well received with sentiment such as"ah, yes, I like this, I needed this!" The point is that these early users can provide relevant and user centric QA within the actual scope of an application's utility.

• Alpha releases are important, and should be a part of early design testing phases - UI design is never truly operating in context of the actual application's utility. You don't want to realize design flaws in production. Fail fast.
• It's also good to enable user/stakeholder audiences who are interested in progressive application enhancements, in addition to early feedback from these groups in isolated testing. You expect their perspectives to provide a narrow focus on helping you improve the eventual UX vs meeting their expectations of production UX. Gain new insights.
• There should be flexibility/agility in the release timeline, and without hard dates to hit Beta Releases. Fail fast.

Beta Releases should be used for the same reasons as above, with additional sought outcomes as the Beta Release timeline progresses. In context to the Alpha Release, here you should iteratively provide for more broad usage, with disclaimers in terms of use, clear feature toggling, and/or with invite-only or signup-only access for larger user groups. Unlike Alpha Releases, the Beta Release allows your product team to consider expanded perspectives for active feedback, passive UX analytics gathering, as well as live performance monitoring of scaled-up application usage.

• As you progress, so does the stabilization, and QA, of the product/feature itself. You're addressing edge cases & defects as you wrap things up.
• Final production release planning, documentation, training, SLAs, future roadmapping, and budget/business value decisions, etc. are finalized here.

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I don't agree with the existing answers' implicit incompleteness objectives associated to some timeline in software/tech product development... maybe if we were stagnant robot beings living in a precisely executed and static world.

I still disagree even if money/resources can dictate tech restrictions, in which case the existing answers are either:

• not applicable: you're in a critical mission operation (e.g., societal infrastructure) or
• outdated or ineffective business-IT strategy: your business model sucks – e.g. limited in timeline scope with capped waterfall budgets (why are you trying to build this type of system through inadequate release phases in a waterfall process?)... Or you're operating in the exploitive nature of professional Agile delivery iteration process vs agility in being modeled to adapt… Or even your business model enables freedom through previous success - so you buy 100 high-quality teams expected to build more success in the prior poor ways of working (good luck).

"Testing matters"

• Technical testing needs to be more agile, less about restrictions, and more about better engineering foundations upfront (tests on bad code are lock-in traps for product development).  Binding release timelines with testing is a messy recipe for sustainment.
• There needs to be less nuance in IT comfort in technical culture and governance… more about alignment to continuous value release. "I care about this product being effective in its purpose more than I care about 80% test coverage by this date."
• With some novel tech, you have very few real test cases.

User & customer expectations, perpetual tech progression, competitive advancements,etc and the combined nature of them all means technical/software products are never complete.

Answer 3

Basically there are two types of testing procedures commonly known as alpha testing and beta testing. Generally alpha testing is done by developer to make ensure that the designed and developed product has meet all the designed and planned criteria, whereas beta testing is done to make ensure that product has meet all the final criteria and are released to end users.