diff --git a/.changeset/initial-release.md b/.changeset/initial-release.md
deleted file mode 100644
index 3cd7ea5..0000000
--- a/.changeset/initial-release.md
+++ /dev/null
@@ -1,13 +0,0 @@
----
-"@karnstack/kino": patch
----
-
-Initial release of kino, a premium themeable React video player with a pluggable-provider architecture.
-
-- Translucent glass / macOS-style player chrome: idle play overlay with speed pre-select, auto-hiding control bar, scrubber with buffered shading, drag-to-seek, and storyboard thumbnail previews.
-- Speed, quality, and captions menus that gate themselves on provider and platform capabilities.
-- Keyboard-first controls (play/pause, seek, volume, rate, mute, captions, fullscreen, and percent seek) that yield to focused text inputs.
-- Themeable via the `accentColor` prop and `--kino-*` CSS custom properties.
-- Mux provider built on the `@mux/mux-video` element, plus a `MuxPlayer` drop-in that accepts signed playback, thumbnail, and storyboard tokens (auth-agnostic; tokens are minted server-side).
-- Headless `Player` root, store, and control primitives exported for custom chrome.
-- React 19 peer dependency. Entry points: `@karnstack/kino`, `@karnstack/kino/mux`, and `@karnstack/kino/styles.css`.
diff --git a/.github/workflows/release.yml b/.github/workflows/release.yml
index 338823a..98f8756 100644
--- a/.github/workflows/release.yml
+++ b/.github/workflows/release.yml
@@ -1,8 +1,15 @@
 name: Release
 
+# Runs automatically only AFTER the CI workflow succeeds on main, so a red
+# main never publishes. The changesets flow then takes over:
+#   1. add a changeset in your PR, merge to main
+#   2. CI passes -> this opens/updates a "Version Packages" PR
+#   3. merging THAT PR re-runs CI -> this publishes to npm
 on:
-  push:
+  workflow_run:
+    workflows: [CI]
     branches: [main]
+    types: [completed]
 
 concurrency: ${{ github.workflow }}-${{ github.ref }}
 
@@ -13,9 +20,13 @@ permissions:
 
 jobs:
   release:
+    # Only release when CI on a push to main actually passed.
+    if: ${{ github.event.workflow_run.conclusion == 'success' && github.event.workflow_run.event == 'push' }}
     runs-on: ubuntu-latest
     steps:
       - uses: actions/checkout@v4
+        with:
+          fetch-depth: 0
 
       # Installs Node and pnpm at the exact versions pinned in mise.toml.
       - name: Setup toolchain (mise)