Ionic AppFlow builds in development instead of production mode

Question

I'm using the Ionic AppFlow Live Update deployment feature without problems but the build is made using the development environment instead of production. I have a similar app using Live Update that builds correctly in production environment and I can't find any differences in the configuration of both apps.

I have two environment files:

environment.prod.ts
environment.ts

and the app is using the environment.ts configuration, which is for development.

I can install correctly the app in production mode in a device through USB using:

$ ionic cap copy --configuration=production
$ ionic cap open android

How can I force AppFlow to use the production environment for the build?

package.json:

{
  "name": "app-name",
  "version": "0.3.2",
  "author": "John Doe",
  "scripts": {
    "ng": "ng",
    "start": "ng serve",
    "build": "ng build",
    "test": "ng test",
    "lint": "ng lint",
    "e2e": "ng e2e"
  },
...
}

ionic.config.json

{
  "name": "app-name",
  "integrations": {
    "capacitor": {}
  },
  "type": "angular"
}

angular.json

{
  "$schema": "./node_modules/@angular/cli/lib/config/schema.json",
  "version": 1,
  "newProjectRoot": "projects",
  "projects": {
    "app": {
      "root": "",
      "sourceRoot": "src",
      "projectType": "application",
      "prefix": "app",
      "schematics": {},
      "architect": {
        "build": {
          "builder": "@angular-devkit/build-angular:browser",
          "options": {
            "outputPath": "www",
            "index": "src/index.html",
            "main": "src/main.ts",
            "polyfills": "src/polyfills.ts",
            "tsConfig": "tsconfig.app.json",
            "baseHref": "/",
            "assets": [
              {
                "glob": "**/*",
                "input": "src/assets",
                "output": "assets"
              },
              {
                "glob": "**/*.svg",
                "input": "node_modules/ionicons/dist/ionicons/svg",
                "output": "./svg"
              },
              "src/manifest.webmanifest",
              "src/manifest.webmanifest",
              "src/manifest.webmanifest"
            ],
            "styles": ["src/theme/variables.scss", "src/global.scss"],
            "scripts": [],
            "aot": false,
            "vendorChunk": true,
            "extractLicenses": false,
            "buildOptimizer": false,
            "sourceMap": true,
            "optimization": false,
            "namedChunks": true,
            "serviceWorker": true,
            "ngswConfigPath": "ngsw-config.json"
          },
          "configurations": {
            "production": {
              "fileReplacements": [
                {
                  "replace": "src/environments/environment.ts",
                  "with": "src/environments/environment.prod.ts"
                }
              ],
              "optimization": true,
              "outputHashing": "all",
              "sourceMap": false,
              "namedChunks": false,
              "aot": true,
              "extractLicenses": true,
              "vendorChunk": false,
              "buildOptimizer": true,
              "budgets": [
                {
                  "type": "initial",
                  "maximumWarning": "2mb",
                  "maximumError": "5mb"
                }
              ]
            },
            "ci": {
              "progress": false
            }
          }
        },
        "serve": {
          "builder": "@angular-devkit/build-angular:dev-server",
          "options": {
            "browserTarget": "app:build"
          },
          "configurations": {
            "production": {
              "browserTarget": "app:build:production"
            },
            "ci": {
              "progress": false
            }
          }
        },
        "extract-i18n": {
          "builder": "@angular-devkit/build-angular:extract-i18n",
          "options": {
            "browserTarget": "app:build"
          }
        },
        "test": {
          "builder": "@angular-devkit/build-angular:karma",
          "options": {
            "main": "src/test.ts",
            "polyfills": "src/polyfills.ts",
            "tsConfig": "tsconfig.spec.json",
            "karmaConfig": "karma.conf.js",
            "styles": [],
            "scripts": [],
            "assets": [
              {
                "glob": "favicon.ico",
                "input": "src/",
                "output": "/"
              },
              {
                "glob": "**/*",
                "input": "src/assets",
                "output": "/assets"
              },
              "src/manifest.webmanifest",
              "src/manifest.webmanifest",
              "src/manifest.webmanifest"
            ]
          },
          "configurations": {
            "ci": {
              "progress": false,
              "watch": false
            }
          }
        },
        "lint": {
          "builder": "@angular-eslint/builder:lint",
          "options": {
            "lintFilePatterns": [
              "src/**/*.ts",
              "src/**/*.html"
            ]
          }
        },
        "e2e": {
          "builder": "@angular-devkit/build-angular:protractor",
          "options": {
            "protractorConfig": "e2e/protractor.conf.js",
            "devServerTarget": "app:serve"
          },
          "configurations": {
            "production": {
              "devServerTarget": "app:serve:production"
            },
            "ci": {
              "devServerTarget": "app:serve:ci"
            }
          }
        }
      }
    }
  },
  "cli": {
    "schematicCollections": [
      "@ionic/angular-toolkit"
    ]
  },
  "schematics": {
    "@ionic/angular-toolkit:component": {
      "styleext": "scss"
    },
    "@ionic/angular-toolkit:page": {
      "styleext": "scss"
    }
  }
}

Answer 1

I realized that because I'm using the free AppFlow version there is no Environments option. So I changed the build script to:

"build": "ng build --configuration=production",

and it worked.

In the Basic Plan and above, you can create environments and environments variables, as described in the official documentation.