Jira Software Reviews

“Excellent booking experience”

Pros

I find it very effective for assigning tasks to team members with clear requirements and expectations. It also makes it easy to monitor project progress and track the status of ongoing work.

Cons

Locating older tasks assigned to other team members can sometimes be time-consuming and requires extra effort.

“Team-friendly issue management”

Pros

Keeping multiple teams aligned on reported system issues and ongoing projects is much simpler with this tool. People can log the steps they've completed, attach test plans, assign the item to the right person and handle a lot more within the same place.

Cons

Setting up a new item feels pretty tedious because several fields have to be filled out before it can be submitted. Cutting down the number of required fields would make the process more efficient.

“Tracking and reporting excellence”

Pros

Right from the start, the interface feels very practical and works well across different screen resolutions. It helps agile teams stay productive and the tracking and reporting features are especially strong. Bamboo also lets you keep an eye on your build stages directly within the platform. On top of that, it offers a wide range of API options so integrating it with other systems is very manageable.

Cons

The on-premise installation is a real challenge. Getting it set up on-premise can take several days which is frustrating. If you later decide to move to the online version, the integration between the on-premise setup and the cloud service is also difficult. Another downside is that it doesn't support importing data from other issue tracking tools.

“Excellent for scrum teams”

Pros

The interface is very user-friendly and it comes with all the tools needed to track bugs effectively. It also offers a variety of project management graphs and charts that show time spent, work completed and other useful metrics. Integration with Confluence works really well and overall it feels like an excellent fit for SCRUM-based project management.

Cons

Most things work really well but there are times when closing tasks or moving unfinished work from one sprint to the next can be a bit difficult.

“Flexible suite”

Pros

It has been a really strong fit for agile teams. It's flexible enough to be customized around the specific needs of different agile projects and overall it's a very powerful platform. It works well for everything from ticket tracking to full project management which makes it a versatile tool to have in place.

Cons

Setting up more complex workflows can take some product training since that part of the system isn't especially simple at first.

“Versatile reporting features”

Pros

There's a lot to appreciate in the feature set. Whether you're working with Scrum or Kanban, it covers those needs well. It's also highly customizable and the reporting capabilities are great.

Cons

The biggest downside is the usability. Navigating the platform can be pretty confusing and some functions are hard to find. I'm also not a fan of the SaaS pricing model.

“Keeps work organized”

Pros

Our team uses this system to manage employee IT ticket records, including the updates that need attention, their priority level and the deadline for each one. It makes it much easier to sort what matters most and keeps everything organized instead of relying on email. Having all the information stored in one place is also really useful whenever we need to look back at past details.

Cons

Honestly, there's not much I can point to as a downside with this system.

“Project docs done right”

Pros

Jumping into an active project would be a real struggle without the documentation and shared knowledge kept here. As someone in software, the part I value most is how the information is clearly tied to the right people and presented in a way that makes ownership and context obvious.

Cons

There really isn't much that comes to mind when I think about downsides with this software.

“Workflow names frustrate”

Pros

I like that it supports almost any Agile management system I use, integrates with Git through plugins, offers powerful advanced search capabilities and provides a great user experience for Agile boards.

Cons

There's definitely a lot of power packed into it but figuring out what many of the fields actually do is harder than it should be and at times it feels like there's more clutter than real value. Updates also seem a bit buggy now and then. The biggest headache though this might partly come down to how our admin team set things up, is that you can't customize the name of each workflow step. For example, you might have a step called "In Testing," but if you need something like "waiting to be tested," it still has to be labeled "In Testing," and the real testing stage turns into "In Testing 1." That gets annoying fast. I end up keeping a cheat sheet nearby just to remember what each step is actually supposed to mean. I'm also really not a fan of the WYSIWYG editors. They're pretty bad and the tables are especially awful to work with and look at.

“Helpful guides and setup”

Pros

It's fairly easy to use and there are plenty of how-to articles available which makes things a lot more helpful.

Cons

One frustrating part is how often the software goes down during upgrades and then the system crashes and they end up having to roll the updates back.

“Fantastic agile tracking”

Pros

This has been an excellent tool for managing agile projects. It really helps with tracking work and assigning tasks properly. The template feature is especially useful for anyone who is not very confident using the platform at first. Another big advantage is how well it connects with other apps needed during a project. I also appreciate being able to monitor project progress through screen sharing which makes collaboration much better.

Cons

One frustrating part is creating tickets since you have to log every small action you want to take. The pricing is also on the expensive side.

“Works across departments”

Pros

Once a company starts using it, it quickly becomes essential. It fits well in almost any environment, whether it's for developers, logistics, supply or just about any other department.

Cons

One thing we really don't like is the pricing for plugins and add-on tools. In most cases, the cost is tied to the total number of IT users rather than a specific group so you end up needing licenses for all IT users.

“simple project oversight”

Pros

Across our project management work, this was a dependable and simple tool to use. We relied on it for a wide range of projects involving different people, shifting timelines and multiple moving parts. It gave our managers a clear way to monitor progress and helped keep visibility and transparency strong across the organization.

Cons

Even though our organization is fairly small, the screen could still feel cluttered and overwhelming when several tasks were displayed at once. If it already felt a bit confusing with only a handful of projects, I can only imagine it would be harder to navigate with a larger team.

“Better request management”

Pros

Before I started using this tool, I handled all my work requests through email and keeping track of everything was really difficult.

Cons

I think the program's manual could be written in a way that's easier to understand.

“Task and issue tracking”

Pros

Managing tasks and tracking issues has become much more convenient with this software.

Cons

Entering all the required details takes quite a while and the demo on how to use it could be better.

“Flexible tracking tools”

Pros

One of the best parts of this software is how well it tracks tasks within a project when several people are involved. It's also really useful that you can set different stages for each task, see who added specific information and update the task content over time as the work progresses.

Cons

The numbering system was the part I struggled with most. It made it hard to connect related tasks when they needed to be grouped together across different projects. On top of that, in my work project we also had to reference those item numbers in other documents. If the system had a better way to link documents, files and related items to each other, it would be much more effective for overall project tracking.

“Project management features”

Pros

Project management is definitely the strongest part of this software. It lets you set up a project, break it down into sections and tasks and assign each task to different users. You can follow the progress of every task, leave comments and attach files when needed. There's also the option to build boards, monitor backlog stages, see what is currently in progress and review what has already been completed across the project. On top of that, filtering tasks by user, generating charts, reports, forecasting and other tools make it very useful overall.

Cons

One thing that has been frustrating is the lack of phone notifications. Even after uninstalling and reinstalling the app and checking all the settings, notifications still do not come through. Because of that, I end up relying on a flood of emails just to stay updated whenever there is any change to a task.

“Team planning solution”

Pros

This has been a highly effective tool for keeping track of the team's completed work and organizing upcoming tasks.

Cons

The pricing is fairly steep and the new UI/UX introduced around mid-October 2017 is not very user-friendly.

“Real-time reporting success”

Pros

Our team now gets access to more than a dozen ready-made reports and the agile reporting provides real-time data which has been a really valuable feature.

Cons

At this point, I really don't have any complaints about the software since it's easy to use and pretty self-explanatory.

“Clear planning visibility”

Pros

Switching over from Asana has helped us work much more closely with our product, tech and development teams and it's given us a far better view of where projects and tasks stand at any given time. It's definitely not as visually fun as Asana but the boards and swimlanes make it much easier to see both my own priorities and what other teams are focused on. The roadmap view has also been incredibly useful for planning across quarters and fiscal timelines and it keeps us on track while I'm managing a team along with several important strategic initiatives.

Cons

There's definitely a learning curve with the software and even setting up a basic task can feel a little more tedious than it should. Asana is faster and more simple in that respect but the tradeoff is that you miss out on some of the broader planning and high-level visibility this platform offers. It also feels much more built for dev and tech teams than for marketing, content or creative work but having everyone operating in the same space does improve end-to-end tracking and communication so that compromise has been worth it even if I do miss some of Asana's lighter, more playful feel.