How to Use Conditions and Expressions in Azure Pipelines

By Daniel Zoghalchali·Latchkey

The condition key gates a stage, job, or step on an expression built from functions like succeeded(), eq(), and and().

Attach condition: with an expression. Expressions combine status functions (succeeded(), failed()) with comparisons over variables and branch refs.

Run a step only on main after success

Combine the implicit success check with a branch comparison explicitly, since a custom condition replaces the default.

steps:
  - script: ./deploy.sh
    condition: and(succeeded(), eq(variables['Build.SourceBranch'], 'refs/heads/main'))
  - script: ./notify-failure.sh
    condition: failed()

Gotchas

• Setting a custom condition removes the implicit succeeded() - add it back or the step runs even after failures.
• Runtime conditions use variables['Name']; compile-time template logic uses ${{ if }} instead.
• Use always() for cleanup steps and succeededOrFailed() to run despite earlier failures.

Verify it actually works

• Trigger the real event rather than a manual run. Manual dispatch populates a different context, so behaviour depending on the event will differ.
• Assert on the outcome, not on the step exiting zero. Many steps report success while producing nothing.
• Check it on a fresh runner with a cold cache once, so you are not testing warm state that will not exist on the next contributor machine.

Frequently asked questions

Related guides

References

• GitHub Actions documentation