What is velocity in agile and how is it used?

What is velocity in agile and how is it used?

• A. The total hours worked by all team members in a sprint
• B. The amount of work completed in a sprint; used to forecast future sprint capacity and project completion
• C. The number of user stories in the backlog
• D. The rate of code commits per day

Answer: (B)

Velocity is the amount of work the team actually completes in a sprint, usually measured in units like story points. It’s determined by summing the story points of all user stories that are done by the end of the sprint (not those started or in progress). This empirical measure lets you forecast how much work the team can commit to in future sprints, guiding capacity planning and helping estimate when the backlog might be finished or when a release might ship. It’s not the total hours worked, not the number of stories in the backlog, and not the rate of code commits per day—those don’t directly reflect finished, delivered value. Velocity can vary due to team changes, complexity, or downtime, so it’s most useful when tracked over multiple sprints to inform realistic planning.

Velocity is the amount of work the team actually completes in a sprint, usually measured in units like story points. It’s determined by summing the story points of all user stories that are done by the end of the sprint (not those started or in progress). This empirical measure lets you forecast how much work the team can commit to in future sprints, guiding capacity planning and helping estimate when the backlog might be finished or when a release might ship. It’s not the total hours worked, not the number of stories in the backlog, and not the rate of code commits per day—those don’t directly reflect finished, delivered value. Velocity can vary due to team changes, complexity, or downtime, so it’s most useful when tracked over multiple sprints to inform realistic planning.