---
title: "What is Agile?"
canonical: https://wavect.io/glossary/agile/
language: en
description: "A family of software-development practices that prioritise short iterations, frequent customer feedback, and adjusting plans as the work reveals reality."
image: "https://wavect.io/img/general/bak/open_graph_preview.jpg"
---

METHODOLOGY

# Agile

A family of software-development practices that prioritise short iterations, frequent customer feedback, and adjusting plans as the work reveals reality.

Last reviewed: 2026-05-24 by [Kevin Riedl](/team/kevin-riedl/) [wiki ↗](https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q139796365)

Agile is older than most people realise (the manifesto is from 2001) and worse-implemented than most teams will admit. The original idea was simple: planning further out than you can predict is wasted work, so plan short, ship, learn, replan. Everything else (Scrum, Kanban, SAFe, [sprints](/glossary/sprint/), retros, story points) is implementation detail layered on top.

The most useful question for a team that says it is “doing agile” is: when was the last time the plan changed because of what shipped last week? If the answer is never, the team is doing waterfall in two-week chunks.

Worked example of the difference: two teams both run two-week sprints. Team A demos, sees that the feature nobody on the roadmap predicted is the one users actually click, and reorders next sprint around it. Team B demos, notes the feedback in a doc, and proceeds with the plan they wrote in January because the plan is the plan. Team A is agile. Team B has agile ceremonies and a waterfall brain. The ceremonies are identical; only the willingness to act on evidence differs, and that is the whole ballgame.

The honest trade-off and the founder mistake: agile is not a license to skip planning, and it is not free. It trades long-horizon predictability for fast learning, which is exactly wrong when scope, regulation, or an interface contract genuinely cannot change (certified medical devices, avionics, some hardware). Even there the original principles apply inside the team; the public-facing process just looks more like [waterfall](/glossary/sdlc/). Wavect is agile in the original sense: we work in short cycles, demo often, lean on [CI/CD](/glossary/ci-cd/) so shipping is cheap, and we are willing to throw out work that turned out to be wrong. We are skeptical of the certification-industry version of agile, where the meeting cadence becomes the goal and a [TDD](/glossary/tdd/) suite gets written for show rather than for confidence.

**When this matters in a software project.** When scope can still change because the market keeps teaching you something, which is most early products. Agile trades long-horizon predictability for fast learning, and that trade only pays when you are actually willing to act on what ships.

**What founders usually get wrong.** They buy the ceremonies and keep a waterfall brain: two-week sprints, story points, retros, and a plan that has not changed since January. Ceremonies without willingness to change course on evidence is waterfall in disguise.

**How Wavect handles it.** We are agile in the original sense, short cycles, frequent demos, cheap shipping via CI/CD, and we throw out work that turned out wrong. When scope genuinely cannot move, we say so and plan accordingly; the [fixed price vs time and materials guide](/software-development-guide/fixed-price-vs-time-and-materials/) covers that contract choice.

// FAQ

## FAQs

### How do I tell if a team is really agile or just doing waterfall in sprints?

Ask when the plan last changed because of what shipped last week. If the answer is ’never’ or ‘we replanned at the quarter’, they are doing waterfall in two-week chunks. Real agile changes plans on the evidence the work surfaces, not on the calendar.

### Is Scrum the same as agile?

No. Scrum is one implementation of agile principles. So is Kanban. So is XP. Teams that conflate Scrum with agile end up worshipping ceremonies (stand-ups, story points, retros) that no longer serve the underlying goal of fast learning and adjustment.

### When is agile the wrong fit?

When the scope, regulation, or interface contract genuinely cannot change (think medical devices, certified avionics, some hardware). Even there, the original principles apply at the team level; the public-facing process just looks more waterfall.

Related terms

- [Sprint](/glossary/sprint/)
- [TDD](/glossary/tdd/)
- [CI/CD](/glossary/ci-cd/)
- [SDLC](/glossary/sdlc/)

Related services

- [Custom Software Development](/services/software-development/)

Related case studies

- [Polity](/case-studies/polity/)

Related guides

- [The software development process, week by week](/software-development-guide/software-development-process/)

Talk to us

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