The DORA research programme has identified four metrics that reliably predict software delivery and operational performance. Here is what they mean, how to measure them honestly, and how to improve them.
The Four DORA Metrics
- Deployment Frequency: how often you deploy to production. Elite performers deploy multiple times per day.
- Lead Time for Changes: from code commit to production. Elite: less than 1 hour.
- Change Failure Rate: what percentage of deployments cause production incidents. Elite: 0–15%.
- Mean Time to Recovery: how long to restore service after an incident. Elite: less than 1 hour.
Why DORA Metrics Matter
The DORA research, covering 30,000+ technology professionals over 7 years, consistently shows that elite software delivery performance is correlated with organisational performance: 2× more revenue growth, 50% higher market cap growth compared to low performers.
Measuring Your Baselines Honestly
Many organisations measure DORA metrics in ways that flatter their performance. Deployment frequency must count only production deployments, not staging. Lead time must include code review time, not just pipeline time. Use your incident management system, not self-reported data, for change failure rate and MTTR.
A 90-Day Improvement Plan
We start every DevOps engagement with a DORA baseline assessment, then target the metric with the highest improvement potential. Typically: deployment frequency and lead time respond to CI/CD automation; change failure rate responds to automated testing; MTTR responds to observability improvements.