DevOps Metrics and KPIs: A Multivocal Literature Review

Context: Information Technology (IT) organizations are aiming to implement DevOps capabilities in order to fulfill market, customers and internal needs. While many are successful with DevOps implementation, others still have difficulty to measure DevOps success in their organization. As a result, the effectiveness of assessing DevOps remains erratic. This emphasizes the need to withstand management in measuring the implementation process with suitable DevOps Metrics. But what are these metrics?

Objective: This research seeks to provide relevant DevOps Metrics in order to facilitate the efficiency of DevOps adoption and better analyze DevOps performance in enterprises.

Method: A Multivocal Literature Review (MLR) is conducted, with 139 documents gathered and thoroughly examined from throughout the community, including books, scientific articles, white papers, and conferences, among others.

Results: This article conducts an extensive and rigorous MLR, contributing with a definition of DevOps Metrics, 22 main metrics, their definitions, importance and categorization in sets of KPIs, as well as exposing clear indicators on how to improve them. It is also discussed how metrics could be put into practice and what constitutes a change in the context of DevOps Metrics. The study’s outcomes will assist researchers and practitioners understand DevOps Metrics and how to better implement them.