Zuora Revenue testing environments
Testing environments represent private tenant access to the Zuora Revenue application, APIs, and supported integration. This article describes the different types of Zuora Revenue testing environments and is targeted to help you determine the appropriate environment for your needs.
Zuora offers the following testing environments for the Zuora Revenue application.
- Production copy environment (Sandbox)
Intended for release preview, system testing, and data modeling. It comes with a copy of your production data. Data and the application are refreshed on demand. By default, the customer gets 1 or 2 tenants as per contract. Zuora customers can purchase any number of additional tenants in this environment for a recurring annual fee. - Migration environment
Intended for heavy performance testing, load testing, and data conversion or migration. It comes with a copy of your production data if applicable. Zuora customers can purchase high-performance migration tenants on a monthly basis.
Production copy environment (Sandbox)
The production copy environment is an isolated customer sandbox, containing a snapshot of customer data from the production environment, which is running completely on AWS on a reduced capacity/footprint. Zuora customers can purchase any number of additional production copy environments paying for each on an annual basis.
The Zuora Revenue sandbox (production copy environment) has the following characteristics:
- The sandbox environments are run on a best-effort basis and do not have a guaranteed uptime or performance.
- The software updates, which typically involve code changes only, are applied to the sandbox environment as follows.
- For quarterly releases, one of the sandboxes will be updated a minimum of four weeks before the production update.
- Additional sandboxes will be updated along with the production update or based on on-demand requests.
This type of update does not refresh existing customer data.
- Provisioning or refreshing to a sandbox environment typically takes from 1 to 5 business days depending on the data volume profile (See Refresh policy).
- The following features are supported by the Zuora Revenue sandbox:
- SSO
- REST/SFTP/BOOMI integrations
BOOMI will be provisioned on one sandbox environment only.
The sandbox environments can be used for the following use cases:
- Regression testing
- System testing
- Data modeling for new scenarios
The following use cases are out of scope for sandbox environments:
- Performance testing
- Load testing
- Historical data conversions
- Tieing sandbox activity for regular production close
Migration environment
The migration environment is intended for heavy performance testing, load testing, and data conversion or migration. It comes with a copy of your production data if available. Zuora customers can purchase high-performance migration tenants on a quarterly or monthly basis.
To subscribe to the migration environment, reach out to your Zuora representative. If you do not have a Zuora representative, submit a request at Zuora Global Support.
Refresh policy
The following table explains the refresh policy that is applicable for different types of refresh requests.
| Request type | Refresh policy guidelines |
|---|---|
| Copy the snapshot of the production copy environment |
|
| Update the software for new releases |
|
Refresh timelines
Refresh request timelines are based on customer data volume and operational time that is required to act on the request.
| Size | Estimated time |
|---|---|
| Low to Moderate volume | Up to 48 hours |
| Large volume | Up to 72 hours (3 days) |
| Above Large volume | Up to 96 hours (4 days) |
To triage high-priority production issues, best-effort will be made to make the system available as soon as possible.
All request refreshes are entertained during business days only.