Production Version (Stable Release)

The production version of a software release, also known as the stable release, is the last release candidate (RC) version that has passed all testing and is ready for manufacturing (RTM). The production version may still contain bugs and inefficiencies that must be addressed and modified before the final public release. The production version comes before the RTM, GA, and GM phases. It is also quite common for the production version to have two distinct versions.