---
title: Promotion Variables
description: Use promotion variables to account for environment-specific differences, such as third-party integrations or URLs. You can specify configuration resource property values for either the source or target environment. The source environment property values will be substituted for the target environment property values by the promotion.
component: pingone-api-ea
page_id: pingone-api-ea:platform:early-access/configuration-management/promotion-variables
canonical_url: https://developer.pingidentity.com/pingone-api-ea/platform/early-access/configuration-management/promotion-variables.html
---

# Promotion Variables

Use promotion variables to account for environment-specific differences, such as third-party integrations or URLs. You can specify configuration resource property values for either the source or target environment. The source environment property values will be substituted for the target environment property values by the promotion.

A promotion changes only the corresponding target environment property values with the promotion variables you set for the source environment. If you do not set any promotion variables, the configuration resource or resources that you specify for the source or target environment will be used as is, and cannot be changed during the promotion operation.

|   |                                                                                                                                                                                                                                    |
| - | ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
|   | Not all properties for configuration resources can be used as promotion variables. Refer to [Variable Resources](promotion-variables/variable-resources.html) for the listing of supported configuration resources and properties. |

To use promotion variables, you need to:

1. Specify the configuration resource to be promoted in a snapshot.

2. Define the variable or variables to be used for a source or target environment configuration resource property. Refer to [Variable Definitions](promotion-variables/variable-definitions.html).

3. Declare the variables to be used by the promotion operation. Refer to [Variable Declarations](promotion-variables/variable-declarations.html).

A few things to be aware of:

* The variables are scoped only to the specified configuration resources, and are not applied to any dependent resources.

* Variables are not versioned with a snapshot, so for each promotion operation, you need to ensure the variable settings for a configuration resource are correct.

* Any configuration resources that you change directly without updating the variables will be overwritten by a subsequent promotion operation. This is because the promotion operation will use the existing variable set.