Jira Software Reviews

“Customization and GitHub fit”

Pros

Between the customization options and the GitHub integration, this tool has been incredibly useful for our team. It works just as well for basic project tracking as it does for more advanced workflows around reviewing and releasing software features which makes it very flexible.

Cons

Getting comfortable with it takes a while and the learning curve is definitely steep. If you're building your own projects, the tutorials are absolutely worth going through. It takes a real investment of time to understand how everything works and to plan your setup properly but once you get past that, the payoff is worth it.

“Boards for team visibility”

Pros

It does a great job of keeping work organized and assigning tasks to team members is easy. That makes it really useful for managing team activity in one place.

Cons

There are a lot of customization options which is helpful but it can take some trial and error before you get the board set up the way you want.

“Reliable testing and reporting”

Pros

After actively using it for around four years, I can say it offers excellent support for software and testing workflows. It makes opening, tracking and reporting business records very convenient. The interface is simple and clear and the batch processing feature helps me complete multiple identical tasks within a minute.

Cons

The biggest downside is the price which feels too high. For such a large global product, the pricing could definitely be more attractive. In some cases, you also have to purchase an extra add-on to make certain tasks more convenient.

“Fantastic agile tracking”

Pros

This has been an excellent tool for issue tracking and project management. It's very user-friendly which made it especially helpful for team members who aren't as technical. Our agile team used it to create and follow stories along with issues and the visual progress tracking made it much easier to stay aligned and keep everything on schedule.

Cons

Honestly, I don't have any real complaints about it. The only thing is that we didn't use sub-tasks within stories very often although I can see how that feature could be useful for other teams.

“Scales across teams”

Pros

Whether the team is under 10 people or well over 2,000, this software holds up really well. I've used it in both small companies and much larger organizations and it scales without much trouble. Once you learn how it works, everything starts to click and it becomes much more manageable and that's when you really begin to see how much it can do.

Cons

With bigger organizations though, the platform can feel a bit overwhelming at times. I've been frustrated more than once while trying to find something inside a board or project, only to end up somewhere completely unrelated. At this point, search is still one area I don't feel I've fully figured out.

“Dynamic scrum delivery”

Pros

Across Agile projects, this has been a very dynamic tool for managing delivery. It comes with a wide range of features that really support Scrum teams, including maintaining the product backlog, creating epics, features and stories and then breaking those stories down into tasks while tracking them properly. It also lets us create multiple spaces based on project needs and store different artifacts in one place. The interlinking between artifacts is very helpful for navigation and for viewing related items quickly. Access management is great as well.

Cons

One limitation is that the product is not open source so cost can be a factor. That said, if the project has the budget, it is definitely a tool worth using for Agile delivery. It also does not include built-in modeling tools so Confluence is needed alongside it for that part.

“Boards for every project”

Pros

It's pretty easy to work with while still giving enough flexibility to add attributes, customize boards and swimlanes and choose from several board layouts. It's been genuinely useful across the roughly 10 projects I've used it on, ranging from small proof-of-concepts to large enterprise-wide software initiatives.

Cons

Moving between screens from the board can be a bit confusing because the behavior isn't consistent sometimes it opens a popup, other times a sidebar and in some cases it sends you to a completely different page.

“Clean interface and tracking”

Pros

Right away, the platform feels very easy to use. The interface is simple and uncluttered which makes everything easier to navigate. Creating new tickets, stories, tasks and similar items is quick and finding them again through search is just as simple.

Cons

Honestly, there is not much I dislike about it. If I had to point out something, it would be that I occasionally get mixed up about which project or board I'm currently viewing. That may partly be on me but a more visible indicator could help. Maybe not giant 72-point text, of course but something a little clearer would be nice.

“Project coordination made easy”

Pros

After trying several project and task tracking tools, it becomes pretty clear that this is a tough problem to get right. This platform does a great job of tying everything together and making the different pieces work well as one system.

Cons

There always seem to be a few small things I'd prefer to handle differently than the default workflow settings. The catch is that if you move too far away from the built-in process, you start giving up some of the nice out-of-the-box benefits.

“Sprint board workflow”

Pros

I find it easy to use and appreciate its powerful feature set. It benefits from the wide range of high-quality free plugins and values its strong support and integration with other products.

Cons

Sometimes even a small update, like adding a new column to the sprint board, takes more effort than it should. I wish I didn't have to go through so many different settings just to make that kind of change.

“Fantastic sprint planning”

Pros

Breaking work into team-based sprints has been really useful for managing tasks week by week. It also sends relevant email updates whenever you're watching a task which helps keep everything on track. Assigning tasks to other people is easy as well and they get notified accordingly.

Cons

Getting used to the navigation at first felt a bit harder than Trello so there was a slight learning curve in the beginning.

“Tools for product success”

Pros

Right out of the box, it includes everything needed to help guide a product toward success, easy task tracking, strong process modeling and great reporting tools. On top of that, the plugin system makes it flexible enough to add just about any feature you might need.

Cons

Honestly, I don't have any negative points to mention.

“Powerful queries and usability”

Pros

Getting started with it feels very easy and the advanced query options let me pull almost anything I need.

Cons

The biggest downside is the pricing. The app feels too expensive and would be much better if it were priced lower.

“Workflow customization”

Pros

At its core, this really excels as activity management software. It goes beyond being just another tool because almost any type of activity can be mapped into its workflow which makes it useful for both technical and business management. Nearly every part of the platform can be tailored to fit a project's specific needs. The interface is clean and the workflows feel simple so getting new users onboarded doesn't take much effort. On top of that, the dashboards and custom query language make it simple to track just about any part of a project.

Cons

One downside is that support can be slow to respond which has led to feature requests staying open for a very long time sometimes even for years.

“Helpful file sharing”

Pros

It's really useful being able to upload files and keep a record of conversations involving multiple stakeholders which makes collaboration much easier.

Cons

Downside is that when someone new joins the discussion, getting up to speed on the full context can be tough since the threads tend to become long and hard to navigate.

“Accurate estimates and logs”

Pros

One thing this has really improved for me is time estimation. I used to struggle a lot with giving realistic timelines for tasks but now I can look back at my previous work and make much more accurate estimates. Another feature I really appreciate is the complete work log for each user which makes it much easier for seniors and teammates to see exactly where my time has gone. It also helps me track down the branch where I made changes for a specific issue the tool was created for. Honestly, it has been incredibly useful.

Cons

User interface still feels like it could be improved quite a bit.

“Custom dashboard clarity”

Pros

Having everything laid out in a well-organized way is a big plus and the custom Dashboard does a really good job of putting the whole picture into perspective.

Cons

Every now and then, glitches pop up and stop me from saving changes to a comment or to the status of a story or bug which is definitely something that needs improvement.

“Reliable task tracking”

Pros

Our development team uses this product to assign tasks and keep track of everything accurately and it really helps keep work organized.

Cons

Navigation isn't always the most user-friendly especially when you're going through the initial setup.

“Flexible workflows and dashboard”

Pros

One of the best things about this software is how flexible it is for different projects. There are plenty of customization options and setting them up to build tailored workflows is pretty easy. The dashboard feels well organized, looks polished and is very user friendly overall. It also does a really good job of helping track and report bugs. Another big plus is the full integration with other popular tools our team already uses.

Cons

There is a bit more of a learning curve compared with similar products I've used. That said, it's not a major problem because there's a lot of documentation available to help along the way.

“Feature-packed solution”

Pros

Packed with features and we used it to keep track of development tickets, issues and updates for a portion of our software.

Cons

At a company our size, with fewer than 40 employees, the pricing made it too expensive to add more users so the limited user count became a small but noticeable frustration. Also, for the way we were using it, the platform sometimes felt overly powerful. Since there were so many capabilities we never touched, the interface and everyday workflow could come across as a little overwhelming and cluttered, almost like using a supercomputer to do basic arithmetic.