What is Definition of Done?
The Definition of Done (DoD) is a team-wide agreement on what "done" actually means for any piece of work. It is a shared quality checklist applied to every story — distinct from per-story acceptance criteria, which define functional behavior for that specific item.
A typical DoD includes things like: code reviewed and merged, automated tests written and passing, documentation updated, no known critical bugs, and deployed to staging. By making "done" explicit, teams avoid the trap of work being "done" in name but not actually shippable.
For PMs, a strong DoD protects quality and predictability. It prevents hidden work (testing, docs, cleanup) from leaking into future sprints and ensures that "completed" velocity reflects genuinely releasable increments.
Examples
- A team's DoD requires unit tests and an updated changelog before any story is marked done.
- A story passes its acceptance criteria but fails the DoD because documentation wasn't updated.
Where PMs use this
Related terms
Acceptance Criteria
The specific, testable conditions a user story must satisfy to be considered complete.
Scrum
A popular Agile framework that organizes work into fixed-length sprints with defined roles, events, and artifacts.
Sprint
A fixed, short period (typically 1–2 weeks) during which a Scrum team completes a set of committed work.