Lifecycle Services (LCS) explained
What LCS does for Dynamics 365 Finance and Supply Chain projects — workspaces, environments, deployable packages, BPM, and support.
Lifecycle Services (LCS) is the operational portal for Dynamics 365 Finance and Supply Chain Management implementations. If Microsoft 365 admin centre manages users, LCS manages the application lifecycle: environments, code, updates, and support. Anyone working on a Finance/SCM project will live in LCS daily.
Projects. Everything in LCS belongs to a project workspace — a logical container for a single implementation or operations engagement. A project has a type (Implementation, Migrate, etc.), an Azure subscription mapped to it for environment hosting (for sandboxes that need it), an LCS partner, and roles assigned to users (Project owner, Environment manager, Developer, etc.).
Environments. From the project, environments are requested, provisioned, started, stopped, deallocated, and decommissioned. Each environment has a lifecycle screen showing its state, the platform and application versions running, and a history of changes.
Deployable packages. Custom code and binary content move into environments as deployable packages built from a developer's Visual Studio. The developer uploads the package to the LCS asset library, then an authorised user applies it to an environment. There is no direct deploy from VS to production.
Updates. Microsoft's platform and application updates flow through LCS as packages. Customers can preview, schedule, and apply them per environment. LCS shows which environments are on which version.
Business Process Modeller (BPM). A library of standard business processes (procure-to-pay, order-to-cash) maintained as flow diagrams in LCS. Customers walk through the standard process, mark fit vs gap, and link to BPM tasks recorded with the Task Recorder — which captures user actions in the application as reusable scripts for training and testing.
Issue search. A searchable knowledge base of known issues, hotfixes, and platform releases, with the ability to file support tickets that route to Microsoft.
Asset library. Beyond deployable packages, the asset library stores GER configurations, data packages, BPM exports, and other artefacts shared across the project team.
The future. Microsoft is gradually migrating LCS functions into the Power Platform admin centre, aligning F&O with the rest of the Dynamics 365 estate. The migration is incremental; most lifecycle tasks still happen in LCS today, with more moving each release wave.
Related guides
- Master Data Services vs Dual-Write for Dynamics 365How Master Data Services and Dual-Write differ as integration patterns between F&O and Dataverse — strengths, weaknesses, and the architectural choices.
- Data entities and the Data Management FrameworkHow bulk data import, export, and integration work in Dynamics 365 Finance and SCM — entities, projects, and the recurring integration pattern.
- Dual-write integration between F&O and DataverseHow Microsoft's Dual-write framework synchronises Finance/SCM data with Dataverse — table maps, initial sync, and operational realities.
- Finance and Operations and the Power PlatformHow Dynamics 365 Finance and Supply Chain extend through the Power Platform — virtual entities, Power Automate, Power Apps, and AI Builder.
- One Version and updates in Finance and SCMHow Microsoft's One Version policy works for Dynamics 365 Finance and Supply Chain — Service Updates, pause windows, and the upgrade obligation.