Implementing Feature Flags Checklist

16 items · Technical · Medium difficulty · 1 hour

Practical steps to select, name, rollout, test, and clean up feature flags.

• Evaluate and choose a flag service

  Compare LaunchDarkly, PostHog, and custom solutions on SDK support, pricing, and compliance.

• Define flag ownership and lifecycle policy

  Assign owners, define TTL, and set deletion responsibilities.

• Add metadata to each flag (owner, created date, expiry)

  Store owner, start date, and automatic expiry date in flag metadata.

• Establish a clear naming convention for flags

  Use concise, hierarchical names like service.feature.action.environment.

• Create code and doc templates for flag usage

  Provide example SDK calls, unit tests, and PR notes for new flags.

• Default new feature flags to off

  Ship code with flags disabled to avoid unintended exposure.

• Implement user targeting and rule-based checks

  Define clear attribute-based rules for beta users, tenants, or roles.

• Plan percentage rollout strategies

  Decide incremental steps, burn-in periods, and rollback thresholds.

• Add a production kill switch and emergency rollback process

  Ensure one-click disable and a runbook for rapid rollback.

• Test kill switch behavior in staging and production

  Simulate incidents to confirm immediate disable and safe rollback.

• Enable logging for flag evaluations and user exposures

  Capture which users saw which flag variations for debugging.

• Build monitoring and alerts for flag-driven anomalies

  Alert on traffic shifts, error spikes, or metric regressions after rollouts.

• Create an automated stale-flag detection and cleanup policy

  Mark flags unused for X days and queue for removal or review.

• Schedule periodic audits to remove or document flags

  Run quarterly reviews to delete or confirm active flags.

• Integrate flag checks into CI/CD and code reviews

  Block merges that add flags without owner/expiry or tests.

• Train the team and publish a flag runbook

  Share tutorials, policies, and emergency procedures with stakeholders.

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