Jira for bug tracking and project management

I highly recommend Jira for a bug tracking tool and especially for Agile software teams. For us it has really made a difference in terms of: team collaboration, Agile methodology adoption, decreased time to market of new projects/new features and on the overall teams' spirit. We have seen a wide adoption for the other departments as well, non software development.

Pros

We used several bug tracking tools in the past but Jira is by far the best one. What I like most: - user friendly interface, provides a nice user experience - Agile SCRUM/Kanban support out of the box - extremely configurable on almost everything - extendable through custom scripting, either built-in or via addons - very collaborative - there are thousands of addons in the marketplace; you can even write your own

Cons

Being so flexible to be configured, the learning curve for admins is a little steep. The price is based on the number of users and if you experience wide user adoption in a big company, you end up in paying more for upgrading to the next tier, than if you would pay for that tier first time.

Excellent tool to organize and control for work processes

It is great! we use JIRA to manage projects (internal and external), customer services desk process, reporting, measure work efficiency, monitoring and work hour control.

Pros

It is an outstanding platform easy to use, with a great UI design, and wide range of customization and con configuration. It has standard templates to manage projects according to current approach and new trends (Agile/scrum/PMI). It service desk offer everything you may need to control all of the process internal and external. It has a large number of app to aggregate, as well as REST full API, Webhooks, and the likes to extract data or make interfaces with company's systems.

Cons

About the cloud service, is a litther pricy, and most of the time you need to contract (monthly fee) some apps to do basic things. On the other hand, support service has its opportunities. Response time is quite slow, and in some occasions -simply- not attended.

More then you will ever need / Tool to handle thousands of problems one by one

Pros

*Functionality The best feature of Jira is a huge number of integrations, massive amount of possibilities, statistics and tricks that you can you inside the platform. There is an integrated tracking, kanbans, lists, sorting direct contact with chat (stride) and feature to work with git right from every task or issue. * New UI Recently Jira got an update, a new chat (Stride, instead of Hipchat) and a new UI for the tasks. I can see that company goes in the right direction to adopt all of it's powers. *Customization Jira, being confusing at first hides a lot of it's features inside most of which you can change and adjust to your business needs. It is a great solution for a big corporation with dozens of departments, hundreds of employees and thousands of issues and tasks daily. However, in all other cases Jira can be a nightmare at this point.

Cons

*Slow Out off all CRM platforms and tools to handle tasks and issues Jira is the slowest by far. Is it initial problem or has it appeared after adopting so many technologies under one roof - I can't be sure. But one thing is clear - Jira is awfully slow. *To many features Yes, it is a disadvantage when it comes to Jira. When a new customer comes to Jira I believe, he is most definitely confused. Especially, if he/she tried ANYTHING else before. Of course, I see that company does a lot to make it easier and more comfortable, but as it is now, Jira is a terrible solution for fast adoption, scary for a small or middle sized team and most definitely not a great choice for personal use. Jira is Huge. If you are huge - great features, customizing, different apps and plugins will help you solve a lot with Jira. If you are just starting or don't have that many tasks and issues and people in your company - you should probable check other options.

JIRA is essential for good software development but you NEED to invest in configuration

I love JIRA because I am an organizer and I spend the time getting it right. But you need that kind of commitment for the best experience.

Pros

The powerhouse controls that allow you to configure exactly the solution you need. JIRA is unmatched in customization. For controlling workflows, getting status updates and clearly understanding what's on your plate, JIRA is amazing.

Cons

The use of JIRA without properly configuring it. Without that commitment, JIRA can be offputting and seem like a heavy mess of a system. You need to remove what you don't use, need to set everything up for individuals and you need to educate your team about how they can use the system. It's so open that it can overwhelm people without management.

JIRA the ultimate project management tool for SaaS

Overall we switched to JIRA from ProdPad which opened up a whole new way of managing feature requests and gaining visibility into what is being worked on and bugs.

Pros

The Kanban board, export features and workflows are all features which stand out to me from my experience with JIRA.

Cons

There can be some confusion on finding settings within the admin section. So a bit of a learning curve to the software in my opinion.

Enterprise Issue Management for Teams

Generally I love Jira - with the plugins and immense flexibility, it is the best issue management for software development teams that I have ever used.

Pros

Jira is highly configurable, allowing you to set it up exactly as your team works rather than having to change how you work for the software. It provides a huge amount of flexibility that is difficult to match in the crowded issue management category. This is the industry standard when it comes to software development and agile process management.

Cons

Only use Jira if you are ready to get stuck into the administration and management of the software - it takes a significant amount of setting up to get it right. You are rewarded with strong features and it is highly configurable but it can also have a managament time impact.

It's a well crafted tool for Project management and bug tracking

The integration with some other applications make us happy. It delivers almost everything for a software company required.

Pros

Jira is a decent project management tool from my opinion. It's easy to configure as an Administrator. Our team able to release product quickly with Jira tool.

Cons

For technical guys it's very easy to use. But for business guys feel difficult to use in the first time. Because the UI looks confusing.

Amazing! Can't even imagine our product development without Jira.

It's one of the must-have tools in our startup. It helps tremendously in collaboration and planning. I love the UX.

Pros

Intuitive and Easy to use Makes the collaboration with the team so easy Dashboard is awesome Detailed in terms of features Best Support

Cons

Nothing as such which I don't like. It has everything. But, just a suggestion if periodic webinars are conducted it'll be helpful to understand new features and best usage.

JIRA is one of the better project management tools there are

Overall Jira has been a very nice and easy change to make and it is very efficient when clubbed with Confluence and if given proper training to the different users

Pros

JIRA allows the user to create and manage the tasks and sub-tasks very efficiently and also allows us to create different kinds of workflows which in turn is very usable when it comes to privilege/permission management between the different user groups who are working on a particular task

Cons

Percentage-based tracking is something that is not very easy to use in jira and this is bound to the amount of hours spent for a particular job which the developers are not that comfortable in posting out instead it should be more of a direct percentage addition that they can make so that the progress is clearly visible

Fine tool for project delivery but could use some other features.

Good tool especially for agile delivery.

Pros

Easy GUI. Linking issues together is easy. Kansan functionality is superb

Cons

Integration with other PM tools are limited. Good for agile delivery but not waterfall or hybrid. Good integration with confluence but not other collab applications.

If you are doing Agile/SCRUM software development, JIRA is a must

JIRA was a bit tough at first to pick up, but soon you understand how it works and its features, your workflow becomes very smooth. However, I would like if JIRA had fewer technical terminologies or quick help features in case you get lost inside. They gave a tour when they introduced the 'new issue view' and you can still find it useful in the "Actions" tab on the right top of the screen. JIRA is a must if you are in the IT industry.

Pros

My organisation uses Agile software development to do product development, it would be appropriate for me to say every one of us uses this software right from the developers, to QAs to designers to Product Managers to even the senior management. Everyone has their own work areas inside JIRA. It is difficult to say in few words what JIRA is, it is a complete suite for a software development company and I'd suggest you try out JIRA no matter the size of your team. My main work areas and familiarity are the backlog, story management and issue reporting. JIRA acts as the single source of truth with its easy to use Epic and Story feature which makes the life of a product owner very comfortable. The development teams are then able to do their story estimations and sprint planning all in the same place. I would highly recommend you to try JIRA even if you are a startup or a big software house.

Cons

JIRA has a learning curve (at least for me, coming from a non-technical or project management background) but with a bit of training (can be done by yourself) it is not that hard to get up and running. Initially, I struggled to find my way around the software and also didn't know how to use some features and tools. But when you get accustomed to the UI, you will realise the power of JIRA.

Jira integrator is helpful to leverage task data across critical apps

The consistency that Jira lends across teams during adoption is extremely useful. We are able to leverage project details and be flexible on how the project workflows are defined. Again, the ability to use the SmartSheet integrator without making too many changes to our overall process was the biggest sell.

Pros

Jira is being adopted by more Development Teams within our organization and now we are able to use the SmartSheet integrator to report project metrics. This tool allows us to sync our task status to one or more sheets to manage separate deliverables as well as projects. It limits the need for Teams to report data in multiple applications.

Cons

While the integrator is useful, we cannot edit or view the details for workflows created by others. The integrator(s) have not worked well with Confluence, but that may be a training issue. I would also like to use the API if possible.

Best way to track time and tasks

I have used Jira in a few projects and every time it proved to be a reliable and productive solution. Mostly we use Jira to keep track of our developer's time in the Kanban board. It is a great tool that allows the developers to actually show us how hard they work and what tasks they tackled. Jira has increased productivity in all projects I used it in.

Pros

Tracking tasks is a time consuming effort, and one that is easy to forget. Luckily, there is Jira. Jira lets you track your tasks and time spent on them without encroaching on your day. It is easy to set up (once you know what you are doing), easy to use, and a delight to look at. It provides the time tracking and issue tracking tools that any serious project requires.

Cons

It is hard to set up the first time. You need to know which functions you need and which you should remove. But once you set it up and know how it works, it is a treat to work with it.

Jira - you might not want to use it, but it has all the features you will ever need!

Jira is all about customization and making it work for your own workflow.

Pros

Jira can be customized to fit almost any workflow imaginable, whether it be a very simple Kanban board or very restricted and complicated workflows with approvals and automations. If you learn it well you can make it work in almost any organization - which is a skill you can use between jobs!

Cons

Jira isn't very intuitive to use and setup when you first start using it. They are making a conscious effort to simplify it with the new next-gen projects, which does help, but the UI is often slow and requires waiting between screens loading too often, which can be annoying at times.

All in one

I have some larger projects for which Jira is a perfect fit. Once you are set up everything works smoothly. I would recommend this tool for any long-term product development but only if you are willing to put effort into it. It is not a one-click set-and-forget solution but can work wonders for larger projects in the long run. For an average team, I would consider 2 months the break-even point for time spent and time saved.

Pros

If you are looking for a management system that is good enough to cover all your needs then Jira and the Atlassian portfolio is exactly what you are looking for. Every aspect of your workflow is infinitely customizable and perfectly integrated with their entire suite of software development tools. Once your setup is complete everything is easy and automatic for your team. The potential for boosted productivity is huge.

Cons

All the updates can be overwhelming. Great updates can provide users with additional features without affecting present ones but some updates are breaking and requiring you to find the relocated setting in order to configure what you want. That is adding to the already high cost of setting up a new project. If you have someone dedicated to administration then the rest of the team will have a great experience. This is a very powerful tool and that means it will take time to learn and properly manage it.

Versatile tool for help desk and task management

We use Jira for IT help desk support, miscellaneous administrative and clerical support, staying focused on engineering and resource planning. We've gained several benefits. We can transparently tell all the efforts we are working on, which effort is taking more time, what are the blockers, who's putting how much effort into what work and whether there is value in the work we are doing. Jira has allowed us to stay focused and cut down on non-essential or wasteful work while giving the company a clear idea of what we are working on.

Pros

I love Jira's ease of use. Jira allows our staff and business partners to request from us using Jira Service Desk. Engineers track their effort using Jira Software. We use the default settings for the most part and that works great for us. There is no need to train anyone on how to use it because everything is self-explanatory. That cuts down on confusion and allows us to get/enter accurate information.

Cons

It is slow. It is very slow at times. Jira's makers - Atlassian - have not paid much attention over the years about its slowness. If you are into full-fledged project management, portfolio planning and more, you will have to buy add-ons to get additional functionality within Jira. Did I say that Jira is slow? While the ease of use saves time in accurately recording information in Jira, all that saved time is wasted away waiting for pages to load.

Bram's Jira review

Overall, the product is great to use. If your company invests in it then as a user, you should can count yourself lucky. When you are responsible of running and purchasing the product and are dealing with organizational constraints, Atlassian Jira might not be so user friendly anymore. That's a petty, as it's in contrast with the user friendly image Atlassian Jira has with the many users.

Pros

The ease of use is such a timesaver. Also the many integrations with other attlassian products is great, it really saves a lot of time and it's a great as documentation. Jira is the reference for software development team, and with good reason1

Cons

It can be costly and there are nasty sides on the licensing. For example, you can't use plugins for a limited number of users, and only pay for that the number of users. Although in some cases I can understand, in some other cases it makes no sense and it's really a barrier. An other nasty side we experienced is the lost of investment when upgrading during a license term. We bought a license for 2 years, without any discount wrt the 1 year license deal. Within the year, we already needed to extend the number of licensed users so we had to upgrade the license. We then had no way to recover a part of the investment of the remaining time of the initial license ... never buy more than 1 year! One last BIG negative is the recent forced move to cloud. We have always ran Jira and Atlassian products on prem. A recent decision by Atlassian is forcing the user away from the current on prem solution. This is simply not what we want or can. I'm sure this will be an issues with several European organizations where the move to cloud wrt GDRP is not that easy or not a company priority.

The Ultimate Business Productivity Suite

JIRA has been an excellent tool overall - provides the perfect mix of task, project and issue tracking features that every company needs. I have worked with JIRA in two independent fast-growing companies and both times it has been the main driver of productivity.

Pros

The fully integrated task and project management boards with extensive levels of detail to run Kanban maintenance boards, complex sprints and even visualise recruitment pipelines. In collaboration with Confluence and BitBucket, the Atlassian product suite make the management of a growing software team seem easy.

Cons

JIRA has quite a steep learning curve for less software native users and can appear too complex for the average operational or commercial person. As such, it can be difficult to convince new people to use JIRA without extensive training and hand-holding. This could be improved by guided tours and a simpler interface for "new starts".

Best and most true to tradition agile project/product management tool around

I have a (probably unhealthy) love for Jira and would need a lot of convincing to switch. It's interface is genuinely enjoyable to use and it aligns perfectly with agile product management methodologies, natively and in conjunction with its plethora of add-ons.

Pros

Jira is an immensely powerful issue management tool. It's JQL language provides ultimate flexibility to satisfy the needs of all roles on a product/project team. It's easy to use (if agile concepts are familiar to you and semi-intuitive if they're not), easy to deploy (especially if you're using Jira Cloud) and easy to integrate with.

Cons

The pricing model for add-ons. You could have a 100 users registered to your Jira instance, have an add-on that is used by a small handful of power users, and still be paying a license fee for all 100 users. Very annoying!

Works great for Software Project Management, I wish the configurations were easier to set up.

We are overall very satisfied with the product as the user side of the things are very solid. The administration is quite complex and if you are doing it on your own, it will take a long time and a lot of hours reading their forums to get things right.

Pros

The task tracking and overall reporting are pretty solid. If configured properly, you will not miss on any updates and can proactively resolve blockers.

Cons

The configuration. They are very complicated and you cannot expect a new user to get it right and that's why there are dedicate people who set up this. We did it on our own and it took us a couple of months to get things right.