What is the difference between continuous integration and continuous delivery/deployment in the software development process?

Continuous Integration (CI) is the practice of frequently merging code changes into a shared repository with automated builds and tests to quickly identify errors.

Continuous Delivery (CD) is the next step, where after successful build and testing, the application is automatically prepared for release, but deployment to production is done manually.

Continuous Deployment is the automation of the entire cycle, where after passing all checks, the new version is automatically deployed to production without manual intervention.

Example:

• CI: each commit triggers a build and tests.
• CD (delivery): after a successful build, the artifact is ready for deployment.
• CD (deployment): the artifact is automatically rolled out to the server.