# Creating & editing flags

> The batched, explicit-save editing model.

This page covers creating flags and the dashboard's editing model.

## Creating a flag

In a project's **Flags** tab, create a flag with:

- A **key** in `lowercase_snake_case` (e.g. `new_checkout`). Permanent and used in
  code — choose carefully.
- A **type** — `boolean`, `string`, or `number`. See
  [Flags & flag types](/docs/concepts/flags).

The flag is created across all of the project's environments at once; you then
target it per environment.

## The editing model: explicit Save, not auto-save

Switchbox **batches your edits and saves on an explicit click** — it never
auto-saves on toggle. This is deliberate: a single Save commits a complete,
intentional state and publishes the config exactly once, so you never ship a
half-finished change or trigger a burst of publishes mid-edit.

As you change a flag — toggling it, editing rules, setting a rollout — an
**unsaved-changes bar** appears with **Save** and **Discard**. Nothing reaches
your apps until you click **Save**. Each Save publishes one new config for each
environment you changed.

![The flags list with per-environment toggles and an unsaved-changes bar showing Save and Discard](/docs-img/flags-save.png "Toggling a flag stages an edit — the unsaved-changes bar collects them until you Save.")

> A reload or tab-close while you have unsaved changes warns you first, so edits
> aren't lost by accident.

You can edit flags from two places, both using this batched model:

- The **flags list** — quick toggles across many flags, then one Save.
- The **flag detail page** — full targeting, rollouts, and values for one flag.

## Values for string, number, and json flags

Non-boolean flags carry a value pair, edited on the flag detail page (a `json`
flag's values are edited as JSON in a validated text field):

- **Default value** — what users get when the flag is off or unmatched.
- **Enabled value** — what matched / in-rollout users get.

These are authored once at the **flag level** and apply to every environment.
Need a different value in one environment? Open that environment's value control
and set an **override** — it applies only there, and clears back to the flag-level
value when you remove it. Boolean flags have no value pair (on is implicitly
`true`).

## Audit log

Every save is recorded — who changed what, and when. See a flag's history on its
detail page, and the team-wide feed on the **Activity** page.

## Next

- [Rules & rollouts in the UI](/docs/dashboard/rules) — targeting and percentages.
- [Connection & usage](/docs/dashboard/monitoring) — confirm apps are reading it.