Week 7 of 8
Running the release window
When the window opens, the What’s New in Workday report tells you what changed. Its Setup Effort column is the triage key. Automatically Available features take effect when delivered, and Workday tells you to assess them and create a test plan. Setup Required features change nothing until you configure them.
Two gaps catch teams. Retirements are not in the What’s New report; they are in the Release Center. And opt-in features become automatic in a later release, whether you opted in or not.
This week: triage the release and run Sandbox and Sandbox Preview side by side
- On day 1, run What’s New in Workday in Sandbox Preview. Every Automatically Available item gets a test case or a written reason why not.
- Add retirements from the Release Center and the rows on Maintain Feature Opt-Ins to the same list.
- Test integrations first, then critical business processes, payroll, security and your most-used custom reports.
- Run each test in Sandbox and Sandbox Preview with the same data. A fail only in Preview is a release regression; a fail in both is an existing issue.
- Raise release regressions with Workday Support before the production date, with tenant, steps and evidence.
Number of the week
1 week
before Preview is when most feature release notes for a major release are published, so triage can start before the window opens.
Source: Workday Administrator Guide, FAQ: Release Notes (2026)Use this week
- Workday Feature Release (R1/R2) Impact & Regression Plan →
Flags every Automatically Available item and retirement without a test, and separates release regressions from existing issues.
- Guide: testing Workday’s twice-yearly releases in the Sandbox Preview window →
The week-by-week plan behind this issue, with sources.
- Concept: What’s New in Workday Report (Workday docs) →
What each column means, including Setup Effort and Tenant.
Next week, the last of the playbook: how to keep up with two windows a year without burning out the team.
Get the playbook in your inbox, one week at a time
Subscribe free and every template in the library is yours.