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What is On-call?

A rotation where team members are responsible for responding to production incidents outside business hours.

Why It Matters

On-call ensures someone is always available to fix critical issues that affect users.

Real-World Example

The on-call developer receiving a 2am alert about the payment system being down and working to restore it.

“Understanding terms like On-call matters because it helps you have better conversations with developers and make smarter decisions about your software. You do not need to be technical. You just need to know enough to ask the right questions.”

Callum Holt, Founder, 13Labs

From definition to deployment

Knowing the term is step one. Using it in something real is the rest.