Releases and release candidates use the same core creation process. The difference is where you create them and what happens when they are promoted:
Create a release in the final environment for validation and deployment to Production.
Create a release candidate in the nominated penultimate environment to test the combined package before promoting it. Once promoted, it appears as a release in the final environment.
Create a release or release candidate
Open the appropriate pipeline environment:
For a release, open the final environment.
For a release candidate, open the nominated penultimate environment.
To create a release in either environments, select at least one open feature from the Open pull requests tab and click Create release...:
In the pop-up window, enter a name for the release PR.
To configure release name formatting or schedule releases on a regular cadence, select the Settings cog, choose Edit pipeline settings, and open the Releases tab.
From there, you can set the default release PR naming format and configure your release schedule.
What Gearset creates
Gearset creates a new branch from the base branch configured for the pipeline, usually main or master (even for the penultimate environment - release candidates). It then:
Merges the selected feature pull requests into the new branch.
Closes the feature pull requests that were successfully included.
Opens a pull request from the new branch to the relevant environment branch.
Uses the name entered during creation for the release pull request.
Gearset creates the package as long as at least one feature can be added successfully. If a feature can’t be added because of a merge conflict, you’ll need to resolve the conflict before adding it to the package. (LINK FOR MERGE CONFLICT)
Note: You can configure validations to run automatically only on PRs which are merged into releases and not on an environment's individual feature PRs by configuring the Run validations on final environment setting when creating or editing a pipeline.
Review and validate the package
The Releases or Release candidates tab shows the changes included in the package, along with associated information such as tickets and deployment steps.
Gearset validates the features together as a single package against the target org. When more features are added, the combined package is validated again.
A release can be deployed to that environment by selecting it and clicking Deploy Release.
The pull request for the release branch can also be found in your VCS with all included features referenced.
Note - Once changes have been merged into a release, no additional changes to the base feature branches themselves will be automatically synced into the release branch. For more details please read --- add link What happens if I add extra commits to the original feature branches that make up the release?