What is Architecture Drift?
Drift is unavoidable: code evolves, services are added, responsibilities shift. If documentation is not continuously reconciled with the codebase, it becomes a lie — or worse, an authoritative-looking lie. Drift detection tools compare what the docs say against what the code shows and produce a conformance score you can track over time.
Related terms
- Conformance Rule — A machine-checkable constraint that validates the codebase against architectural intent.
- Living Documentation — Documentation that is generated or validated from the running system, so it stays accurate as the system evolves.