Configure custom hierarchy levels in your plan
This page refers to the advanced planning features that are only available as part of Jira Cloud Premium and Enterprise.
The processes described in this section are only possible with Jira administrator permissions.
By default, Jira comes with Epic as a level 1 work type, and Story as a level 0 (subtasks are considered -1 or below Story). As part of your Jira Premium and Enterprise subscriptions, you can add levels above 1 and use these extra levels to track your organization’s larger initiatives in your plans and unify cross-project work. Some common work types are Legend, Odyssey, or Anthology. Or maybe you wanna go crazy and name your higher hierarchy levels things like Monolith, Deity, or Omnipotence. It’s truly up to you.
Before you can plan with levels above epic, an administrator needs to first associate the hierarchy level in your plan with a Jira work type. This is because your plan uses its own hierarchy structure which correlates to, but is independent from, the order of Jira work types defined in your work type scheme.
Adding a new custom hierarchy level is a three step process. If the work type already exists and is part of your project’s work type scheme, skip to step 3:
Changes to the hierarchy settings will apply to all existing plans using this work item scheme.
1. Create work type
Select > Work items.
In the left column, go to Work types > Add work type.
Enter a name and description for your new work type.
Choose between a standard or sub-task work type.
Standard work types are placed above the epic level (commonly Initiative and Legend) whereas Sub-task work types are underneath the Story level alongside subtasks.
Select Add.
2. Add work type to scheme
Select > Work items.
From the left column, select Work type schemes.
Find the relevant work type scheme and click Edit.
Edit the name, description, default work type, and selected work types.
To add a work type to the scheme, drag it from Available Work Types to Work Types for Current Scheme. The order in which they’re listed in this box represents the hierarchical structure within Jira. For example, if you add the work type bug below story, Jira will consider story to be its parent work type.
When you’re done, select Save.
3. Associate the work type to your hierarchy
Now that you’ve created the work type and added it to your work type scheme, select Work type hierarchy from the menu on the left.
The menu on this screen lets you arrange Jira work types by hierarchy levels. The left column, labeled Level name, is the hierarchy structure in your plan and the right column, labeled Jira work types, are the configured work types in your scheme.
To add a new level, select + Create level at the bottom of the menu. Give your new level a name, then use the dropdown in the Jira work types column to associate it with a work type.
To reorganize your hierarchy structure, drag and drop the levels into the order you’d like. The order of this list is how your hierarchy levels will show in your plan, and won’t change the structure of your Jira work types as previously configured.
Once you’ve configured your level, select Save changes.
On your timeline view, open the Filters menu and adjust your hierarchy filters to show this new level on your timeline.
In order to see custom hierarchy level relationships in Jira work items, you must add the Parent field to your work items.
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