What Exactly Does DevOps Do?
In 2025, software development and IT operations has become very fast. Now the question arises what exactly does DevOps do? Has commonly become a main practice to understand modern IT Operations. In 2025, DevOps is being adopted increasingly by software houses in the replacement of old IT Operations. DevOps is not just a skill, It’s a mindset , a mindset of collaboration between the development and operations teams. DevOps is focused on the rapid and continuous delivery, automation and collaboration to speed and improve up the production of great quality softwares.This blog will cover DevOps roles and responsibilities, explains the DevOps lifecycle, explores key DevOps tools and technologies, compares DevOps vs traditional IT operations, and shows the benefits of DevOps in business.
What Exactly Does DevOps Do?
DevOps is a set of practices that unites software development and IT operations, aiming to shorten system development life cycles while delivering features, fixes, and updates frequently in close alignment with business objectives. DevOps engineers automate deployment pipelines, monitor system health, manage infrastructure as code, and foster communication among stakeholders to ensure seamless software delivery.
DevOps is a mindset, a set of practices that is a bridge between the development and operations departments that fastens the IT operations, this aims to shorten system development lifecycles and also being inline in delivering features, fixes, and updates regularly aligned with business strategy and objectives. DevOps engineers bridge the gap between development and operations team, they automate CI/CD pipelines, they continuously track the performance of system health, manage IaC using tools like Terraform or AWS Cloud Formation, and also communicate and collaborate with stakeholders to ensure a smooth software delivery.
Key DevOps activities include:
Designing and managing Continuous Integration/Continuous Deployment (CI/CD) pipelines, DevOps engineers design and manage pipelines so that the software or application can be continuously integrated and deployed so that the users can enjoy new features quickly.
Automating repetitive development and deployment tasks, they automate the development and deployment tasks by using tools like terraform to create infrastructure as code and tools like ansible to automate repetitive tasks.
Monitoring application and infrastructure performance,they also monitor applications and infrastructure performance to see if everything is right or not, so they can fix issues quickly so that the users don't suffer.
Managing infrastructure using code (IaC) with tools like Terraform and Ansible,DevOps engineers use tools like terraform, ansible or aws cloud formation to make an infrastructure template so that there is no requirement to create infrastructure again and again.
Ensuring security with continuous vulnerability assessment,DevOps Engineers, Usually DevSecOps Engineers ensure security measures are taken with continuously assessing the vulnerabilities to look for issues and fix it then.
Collaborating across teams for faster incident response, they also collaborate across different teams like development, operations, marketing, sales and AI teams so that every department knows what is happening with their apps and infrastructure because it’s customer facing.
DevOps Roles and Responsibilities
Businesses heavily rely on consistent and continuous integration and continuous delivery pipelines to remain valuable in the tech market. DevOps fills the gap between development and operations, enabling:
Quick and more reliable software and product releases: When there is collaboration between developers and operations, the software development, testing, and delivery process becomes fast and reliable, due to which business enhances, and profit increases.
Automated testing and deployment processes: In DevOps, when software is developed, it must be tested before making it available to users. DevOps automates manual work in this process, which fastens the testing. When testing is fastened, so is deployment. This whole process increases the software development and delivery speed.
Scalable cloud infrastructure management: When we create software, once traffic increases on the software or website, the cloud infrastructure should scale according to the traffic requirements. There are open-source tools such as Kubernetes that don’t let your software or website go down. DevOps helps in scalable cloud infrastructure management.
Improved team collaboration: DevOps enables better collaboration. DevOps means a combination and collaboration of development and operations. In 2007 or 2008, a conference in Canada suggested there must be collaboration between development and operations teams, due to which software development and deployment processes fasten, increasing profit eventually and benefiting all.
Proactive system monitoring and incident response: In DevOps, we can pre-monitor systems before any incident happens. This helps us prepare for future incidents beforehand so that if an incident happens, we can quickly resolve and fix it.
DevOps Lifecycle Explained
The DevOps Lifecycle Explained refers to each of the different phases in DevOps processes, which includes:
Planning: Defining requirements and KPIs collaboratively, requirements and KPI’s are collectively set between the development and operations teams to ensure they all stay on the same page and collaboratively fuel the process of software development and delivery.
Development: Writing and integrating code with version control , when code is written for new features inside existing apps, they must be continuously integrated using version control systems like git.
Build: Automating the creation of build artifacts, generation of artifacts can be automated using generative ai tools by defining clear requirements and desired output to it. AI tools let us focus on the development and deployment process whereas it handles the instructions document of how, when and what would be done.
Test: Running automated test suites for quality assurance, In DevOps, when software is developed, it must be tested before making it available to users. DevOps automates manual work in this process, which fastens the testing. When testing is fastened, so is deployment. This whole process increases the software development and delivery speed.
Deploy: DevOps enables us to automate the building of applications. When applications are built, then comes the testing phase to identify issues and resolve them. After automating and testing, the deployment phase follows. In this phase, we automate the deployment of that application.
Monitor: Collecting feedback to improve upcoming iterations, In DevOps, we can pre-monitor systems before any incident happens. This helps us prepare for future incidents beforehand so that if an incident happens, we can quickly resolve and fix it. When software is deployed after testing and made available to users, we must also monitor our applications and check the logs frequently to know what is happening in our application, what types of errors are present, and what the logs convey about our application.
DevOps Tools and Technologies
Version control using Git and GitHub: DevOps has version control systems like Git and GitHub are extremely important in software engineering or related roles. It’s a tool for collaboration between developers and engineers for a fast software development and delivery process.
CI/CD tools like Jenkins, GitLab CI, or CircleCI: Jenkins, GitLab CI, or CircleCI kind of tools are used for practicing continuous integration and continuous development. These tools ease the updating of software.
Containerization with Docker: There is an extremely important tool known as Docker that helps in containerizing and packaging applications, which eases the process of software development. Docker is a tool everyone in DevOps must learn.
Orchestration via Kubernetes: In DevOps, container orchestration is extremely important, so tools like Kubernetes help in this. Kubernetes helps in automated scaling of applications, easing the process of high traffic management, so it’s an essential tool to work with.
Infrastructure as Code using Terraform or Ansible: IaC is necessary in DevOps. In a lab environment, tools like Terraform, Ansible, or sometimes AWS CloudFormation are extremely useful for easing and fast-tracking the process of managing and creating infrastructure.
Monitoring with Prometheus and Grafana: There is an important phase that comes after deploying the application, and that phase is monitoring. For monitoring, we use tools like Prometheus and Grafana. These tools ease the process of understanding logs and activities going on in our applications.
Benefits of DevOps in Business
The Role of DevOps in Empowering Modern Businesses
Businesses today depend on robust, consistent continuous integration (CI) and continuous delivery (CD) pipelines to stay competitive in the technology sector. DevOps bridges the gap between development and operations to deliver transformative results:
Faster, More Reliable Software and Product Releases
When developers and operations teams collaborate closely, the entire software development, testing, and delivery pipeline accelerates. This unified approach leads to faster, more dependable releases—helping organizations enhance business performance and boost profits through quicker time-to-market and higher quality products.
Automated Testing and Deployment
Within a DevOps environment, automation plays a vital role. As software is developed, automated testing ensures it is thoroughly vetted before reaching users. This reduces manual effort, speeds up the QA process, and allows deployment to happen more rapidly and reliably. With these efficiencies, organizations can increase the pace and consistency of their software delivery cycles.
Scalable Cloud Infrastructure Management
As user demand increases, maintaining system availability and performance becomes essential. DevOps integrates scalable infrastructure management—relying on modern tools (like Kubernetes) that adjust resources in real time, ensuring applications and websites remain available regardless of traffic spikes. DevOps practices enable teams to keep systems running smoothly and efficiently without manual intervention.
Enhanced Team Collaboration
DevOps is built upon fostering strong collaboration between engineers and operations professionals. By breaking down traditional silos, teams improve communication and work more efficiently. This cultural shift leads to faster development, streamlined deployment processes, and increased organizational success.
Proactive System Monitoring and Incident Response
Through proactive system monitoring, DevOps teams can identify and address potential issues before they impact users. Early detection and quick response capabilities mean incidents can be quickly resolved, reducing downtime and safeguarding business continuity.
DevOps vs Traditional IT Operations
Below is a comparison between DevOps and old approach to IT Operations:
DevOps makes sure no delays are there, increases transparency, and betters the software development and delivery process when compared with traditional IT Operations
Final Thoughts
If you understand what exactly DevOps do, it will help you know the comprehensive culture and practice set that totally changes the landscape of software development and IT operations. A well structured DevOps team makes use of advanced DevOps tools and technologies, follows the DevOps lifecycle, and takes on multiple DevOps roles and responsibilities to accelerate and enhance software development and delivery. Businesses that adopts DevOps benefits from improved agility, quality and collaboration between teams to stay competitive against old practices.
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