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Environment configuration

Manage environment variables and secrets for each stage of your application.

Environments

Every project in qtrl has four environments: development, test, staging, and production. Each environment has its own set of variables and secrets. When you create a task or start a test run, you pick which environment to run against, and the AI agent uses that environment's configuration.

You can set a default environment in your project settings. This pre-selects the environment when creating tasks, though you can always override it per task.

Environment variables

Variables are key-value pairs that the AI agent can read during test execution. The most common use is setting a BASE_URL for each environment so tests automatically target the right URL.

To manage variables, open your project's Settings tab and switch between environments using the tab selector. Each environment has its own independent set of variables.

Variable keys must be uppercase. If you type a lowercase key, it gets converted automatically. You can add, view, and delete variables at any time. To change a variable's value, delete the existing one and create a new one with the updated value.

Secrets

Secrets work like variables but are designed for sensitive data: test account passwords, API tokens, and anything you don't want visible in the UI after creation.

The key difference: once you create a secret, its value is encrypted and can never be viewed again. The settings page shows the secret's key with a masked value (********). If you need to update a secret, delete the old one and create a new one.

During test execution, the AI agent can access both variables and secrets. From the agent's perspective, they work the same way. The distinction is purely about visibility in the UI and storage security.

Common setup

A typical project might look like this across environments:

Variables (visible, non-sensitive):

  • BASE_URL set to http://localhost:3000 in development, https://staging.example.com in staging, and https://example.com in production.
  • API_VERSION if your app has versioned endpoints.

Secrets (encrypted, write-once):

  • TEST_USER_PASSWORD for a dedicated test account.
  • API_TOKEN if your app requires authentication tokens.

Who can manage environments

Environment configuration is available to organization owners, admins, and project admins. Regular project members and viewers can't see or change environment settings. For more on roles, see Organizations and teams.