Jira Software Reviews

“IT team hub”

Pros

After moving over to it for our IT ServiceDesk and project management, it became clear how valuable it was to keep everything in one place for the IT team. Not long after that, we started noticing just how many other tools it could replace for us which made it even simpler to stay on top of what needed to get done and when.

Cons

There is definitely a learning curve with the software. The onboarding process wasn't bad but getting comfortable with it at the beginning was not very simple for us. That said, after around three weeks, we felt completely confident using it.

“Collaboration tools”

Pros

This platform works really well with the other collaboration tools we already use which makes staying connected across products much more convenient.

Cons

At times, keeping everything on schedule can be challenging especially when working on larger projects.

“Team alignment”

Pros

It makes assigning work to sprints easy and helps the team collaborate well.

Cons

It can feel a bit awkward to use and customizing it for different business groups is somewhat difficult.

“Cross-team visibility”

Pros

Having one place where I can see the full picture of my own work and what my team is working on has been really valuable.

Cons

At times, tracking items feels a little too detailed although that may be more about how we have everything set up.

“Project flexibility”

Pros

One thing that really stands out is how customizable the whole platform is so projects can be set up to match exactly what you need.

Cons

Product works well overall but I do wish it had built-in support for querying parent/child relationships.

“Task tracking”

Pros

This software has been really powerful for us and has helped a lot especially with its important features for tracking team tasks and monitoring progress.

Cons

At the beginning, it can be a bit difficult to understand all of the features but it doesn't take too long to learn how everything works and see what you can do with it.

“Daily planning boards”

Pros

Getting started with the product is easy and the boards are simple to configure making it very effective for managing day-to-day projects.

Cons

Resource management and effort estimation are weaker areas since they depend heavily on user-provided information and can be changed too easily to fit adjustments.

“Ticket updates”

Pros

One feature I appreciate most in this software is the way it keeps the full ticket thread available so I can follow updates on the request as they come in.

Cons

The part I like least is that it often takes several days to receive an update or any response to a request.

“JQL and reports”

Pros

One thing that really clicks with this product is the way JQL, its SQL-like query language, is set up. The type-ahead feature is especially powerful because it lets you build statements quickly and find the exact data you need without a lot of effort. When you combine that with the Scrum board, Kanban board and dashboards, it feels like your projects are always right at your fingertips.

Cons

My frustration with the product comes up when exporting filter queries to Excel because there are two clear shortcomings. The first is that the export is still created in .XLS format instead of .XLSX which feels outdated since .XLS goes back to 1987 while .XLSX has been around since 2004. The second issue is with time estimate fields during export. Those values do not keep their actual time format so if a project is estimated at one hour, the exported value shows up as 3600 which is the time in seconds.

“Roadmap planning”

Pros

Between the product roadmap, project tracking, team collaboration and Gantt chart, this software covers a lot of what our team needs and does it really well.

Cons

One limitation with the product roadmap is that it only lets you go back one year. For a long-running product that has already been in development for a while, getting everything set up properly is challenging.

“Team reporting”

Pros

Collaboration is where this tool really delivers and it handles that part very well. From Scrum and Kanban boards to custom workflows, roadmaps and report creation, it covers a lot of ground. The reports are quick to generate, detailed and give you valuable insight into how a project is progressing. It has evolved far beyond the bug-tracking tool it originally was.

Cons

At the time of this review, there's still no built-in timeline for tracking project progress and direct team communication is missing unless you rely on notifications or bring Confluence into the setup. That gap is especially noticeable when working in a remote environment.

“Great tool”

Pros

Suite feels quite comprehensive especially with Confluence included and it offers a wide range of useful features.

Cons

On the downside, there are a lot of blocking bugs that stay unresolved for months or even years despite being reported. For example, images regularly fail to load, showing a "Fail to load" message in comments or tickets. It also happens that changes made in tickets cannot always be saved which sometimes means losing the information that was just entered.

“Task management”

Pros

The task management, subtask organization and reporting charts are really powerful and those features have been especially useful for me. Logging time also makes running our business much more manageable.

Cons

One issue I run into sometimes is when I try to share a file inside my task, the system freezes. If I haven't saved the article first, I end up losing it which is really frustrating.

“Collaboration win”

Pros

Keeping track of tickets is much better with this tool and tagging users so they get email notifications is really useful. Assigning people to tickets and following progress is pretty easy and being able to link related tickets makes issue tracking much clearer. It also supports creating separate projects that can connect with each other which helps a lot. Instead of chasing updates through email, the comment section lets teams attach documents, tag users and keep everyone notified in one place. Creating tasks and issues is another nice plus especially since they can be linked to an Epic and given criticality levels and labels. On top of that, integrating it with other tools through APIs is quite convenient.

Cons

I think one area that still needs improvement is the dashboard and reporting setup because it is not very user-friendly. Overall, the tool would benefit from being made more simple to use.

“Custom reports”

Pros

Built to handle a wide range of environments, industries, teams and skill levels, this software is highly powerful and flexible. The interactive reporting has made tasks that used to require dedicated time much quicker to complete. It also offers a variety of integrations and importing or exporting data is easy.

Cons

One downside is that the UI changes frequently and often feels a bit like a prototype. While that fits an agile development approach, it can sometimes seem like the team has to keep re-learning how to use the tool.

“Project visibility”

Pros

There are plenty of really useful features here. The time tracking and planning tools help a lot and the Kanban boards are especially handy for getting a quick view of where a project stands.

Cons

The interface can feel a bit confusing at times and now and then even simple tasks take more effort than they should. Once you get familiar with it though, it becomes manageable.

“Best fit for us”

Pros

After trying out other tools, this was the one that matched our needs better than anything else. It turned out to be the best choice for us.

Cons

At first, we struggled a bit because it offers a lot of tools while our day-to-day use is fairly simple. Once we got past the learning curve though, we adapted really well.

“Easy epic setup”

Pros

Setting up and working with epics is really easy and convenient.

Cons

Sometimes it can be a little too persistent with reminders about overdue activities and tasks.

“Sharing and integrations”

Pros

Connecting it with development tools like GitHub, VS Code and CodeCollaborator has been really useful. It also makes sharing and creating queries on the dashboard very convenient.

Cons

One thing missing is a proper text editor when writing comments or descriptions. The code palette could also present text formatting better and it would help to have more formatting options for highlighting words or quoting specific sentences.

“Secure storage”

Pros

The platform works well for file sharing, security and keeping documents organized in a central repository.

Cons

One frustrating part was constantly needing to request permission to access files which really slowed productivity down. This may be more of a company-specific setup issue but it was still frustrating having to keep asking product managers for access to documents I needed.