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Acceptance criteria

Acceptance criteria are the conditions that must be true for a feature to be considered done.

Acceptance criteria give teams a shared definition of done. Without them, "done" becomes a moving target and QA becomes a guessing game.

Why it matters

Clear criteria reduce back-and-forth and make trade-offs explicit. They also protect the team from late scope additions during QA.

What to include

Cover the user action, the expected outcome, and any edge cases that are non-negotiable for the release.

  • User action and expected result
  • Failure cases that must be handled
  • Analytics or logging requirements

Common mistakes

Writing criteria that are too vague or too broad. If two people can interpret it differently, it needs another pass.

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// Clarity prevents chaos. We turn scope definitions into working software without the drama.

// From definition to deployment in weeks.

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