1.4Defect Lifecycle

A well-defined defect lifecycle ensures bugs are tracked from discovery to resolution.

New → Open → In Progress → Fixed → In Verification → Closed
                ↓                      ↓
             Deferred              Reopened → In Progress
                ↓
             Won't Fix / Duplicate

Statuses Explained

Status	Who Owns It	What Happens
New	QA (creator)	Bug is reported with all required information
Open	Team lead / Triage	Bug is reviewed, prioritized, and assigned
In Progress	Developer	Developer is actively working on the fix
Fixed	Developer → QA	Fix is committed, PR merged. Moves to QA for verification
In Verification	QA	QA verifies the fix in the target environment
Closed	QA	Fix verified successfully
Reopened	QA → Developer	Fix did not resolve the issue or introduced a new problem
Deferred	Team lead	Won't be fixed this release; moved to future sprint
Won't Fix	Team lead + PO	Accepted as-is; not worth the effort to fix
Duplicate	QA / Team lead	Same bug already reported; link to the original