Mitigation usually comes first when a full fix cannot be deployed quickly, and remediation follows as the permanent resolution. When a safe patch is available and can be deployed right away, teams skip mitigation and remediate directly.
The order depends on two questions. How urgent is the risk, and how safe is the fix to deploy today? A critical vulnerability on an internet-facing system with a patch that needs two weeks of regression testing is a classic case for mitigating first. Blocking the exploit path or applying a compensating control closes the exposure within hours, while the patch goes through testing.
A more useful question than “patch now or wait” is “what is the fastest, safe way to remove exploitability?” Seemplicity’s Response Options answer that by ranking Fix, Mitigate, and Neutralize choices by how much risk each removes and how much disruption each causes.