What is purple teaming? Definition & examples

Purple teaming is not a separate team so much as a way of working. Instead of the red team attacking secretly and handing over a report weeks later, red and blue operators sit together. The red team runs a technique, the blue team checks whether it was logged and alerted, and any gaps are fixed on the spot.

How does purple teaming work?

A typical cycle looks like this:

1. Pick a specific attacker technique, usually mapped to the MITRE ATT&CK framework.
2. The red team executes it in a controlled environment.
3. The blue team checks visibility: was it captured, alerted, or missed?
4. Detection rules and logging are tuned, then the technique is re-tested.

This tight feedback loop turns a one-time test into measurable, repeatable improvement in detection coverage.

Why purple teaming matters

• It directly improves detection and response, not just a findings list.
• It builds shared understanding between attackers and defenders.
• It produces evidence of which ATT&CK techniques you can actually detect.

Tools like the open-source Atomic Red Team and Caldera help teams run techniques consistently.

How to practice purple teaming hands-on

On Purple Edge the purple-team learning hub lets you play both attacker and defender in the same cloud range, running offensive techniques and immediately validating whether your detections catch them.