Set up Jira Software Cloud
Learn how to set up Jira Software Cloud and integrate it with other products and applications.
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The following information only applies to team-managed projects.
To check which type project you need help with, look at the bottom of your project’s left-hand sidebar:
If you see an icon stating You’re in a team-managed project with Give feedback and Learn more menu items, you're in a team-managed project.
If you don't, you're in a company-managed project. Check out our company-managed project documentation.
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Your project's Roadmap is the central home for all epics in your project. This is where you create, manage, and gain insights from your epics. Epics will only display on the roadmap, and won't display on your project's board or backlog.
To create an epic:
Select + Create Epic in the first column of the roadmap.
Give your epic a name, and click enter.
Your new epic will be added to the bottom of the list.
It’s also possible to create a new epic by hovering your mouse between two existing epics. The new epic will land in the middle of the list.
As soon as an epic’s created it appears in the Epic list on your roadmap. Epics are unscheduled by default, and won’t automatically appear on the timeline. This gives you control over when your epics appear on your timeline and encourages more accuracy during the planning stage.
To visualize the epic as a bar on the timeline, you will need to set a start and end date:
Navigate to your roadmap from your project’s sidebar.
Select (+) Create epic. Give your epic a name, and press enter.
Hover your cursor over the timeline next to your newly created epic. A preview of the epic bar will display.
Release your click to create the bar. Or, click, then drag your cursor to suit the specific start and end dates of your work.
The epic bar has a default duration according to how you view your timeline. The default durations are:
Weeks – 7 days
Months – 14 days
Quarters – 30 days
Adjust your epic’s start and end date
While you’re creating the epic bar on your timeline, you can drag your cursor forward in time (to the right side of your screen) or back in time (to the left side of your screen).
To quickly clear these dates, right-click the epic bar. Choose to clear the Start date, Due date, or Both dates. Clearing both dates will remove the epic bar from your timeline.
Color coding epics make it easy to distinguish different streams of work.
You can adjust the color of an epic directly on the roadmap. Simply right-click the epic and choose a fresh color.
The default color for all epic bars on the timeline is purple.
There are two ways to add issues to your epics:
To add an issue, hover over an epic and click Create child issue.
Click on an epic to see more details:
Epic color: Change the color of an epic.
Add a child issue: Use the quick-add button to add the first child issue to your epic.
Add more issues: Once you have one child issue, you can use the + above the list to add more.
Child issues list: View and open all of the child issues for this epic.
Adjust the order of your epics and issues, or assign an issue to a new epic.
Click and hold the issue or epic cell from the far left column on the timeline, then drag and drop the work wherever you like.
You can also add or remove issues from epics from the issue view, board, or backlog. Check out Manage epics in team-managed projects to learn how.
As work is completed on an epic, you can use the progress bar to quickly see the epic's progress on the roadmap.
To hide or show epic progress, select View > Progress.
The small bar underneath the epic's name if there are issue in the epic. This bar indicates the overall progress of your epic’s issues. It shows the status of any standard issues in your epics, excluding subtasks.
The epic’s progress bar is divided into three segments:
The green segment represents issues in a Done status category
The blue segment represent issues in an In progress status category
The grey segment represents issues in a To do status category
Hover over any segment of an epic's progress bar to see specifically how many issues are in each status category, either in a to-do status, an in-progress status, or a done status.
Your team might have one epic that is blocking the progress of another, or two epics that impact one another. The roadmap enables you to visualize dependencies between epics.
Can't create a dependency?
Issue linking is activated by default. But if your issue linking is currently “OFF”, you'll need activate it to create links between issues. Your Jira admin can enable it.
To capture dependencies, the roadmap relies on a specific issue link type called Blocks. The link type is required, however, it can be renamed to suit your team. If the link type is deleted, the roadmap will create another in its place.
There are two ways to visualize dependencies on your roadmap.
To create dependencies between epics directly on your roadmap:
Hover over an epic to reveal dots on either side of an epic.
Drag one of the dots to the epic you want to link it to.
To create dependencies between epics from the epic issue detail view:
Select an epic on the roadmap.
Select Link issue.
Select either blocks or is blocked by, then select the epic to link.
Dive into the details of linked epics inside of dependency cards by selecting the dependency line, or the link icon on an epic.
The dependency line will turn red if one of your epics is scheduled to start before a dependent epic will be completed, which signals the potential for delay or risk.
To remove a dependency between two epics, select Unlink issue or delete the issue link in the issue detail view.
Your project's Roadmap is the central home for all epics in your project. This is where you create, manage, and gain insights from your epics. Epics will only display on the roadmap, and won't display on your project's board or backlog.
To create an epic:
Select + Create Epic in the first column of the roadmap.
Give your epic a name, and click enter.
Your new epic will be added to the bottom of the list.
It’s also possible to create a new epic by hovering your mouse between two existing epics. The new epic will land in the middle of the list.
Color coding epics makes it easy to distinguish different streams of work.
You can adjust the color of an epic directly on the roadmap. Simply right-click the epic and choose a fresh color.
There are two ways to add issues to your epics:
To add an issue, hover over an epic and click Create child issue.
Click on an epic to see more details:
Epic color: Change the color of an epic.
Add a child issue: Use the quick-add button to add the first child issue to your epic.
Add more issues: Once you have one child issue, you can use the + above the list to add more.
Child issues list: View and open all of the child issues for this epic.
Adjust the order of your epics and issues, or assign an issue to a new epic.
Click and hold the issue or epic cell from the far left column on the timeline, then drag and drop the work wherever you like.
You can also add or remove issues from epics from the issue view, board, or backlog. Check out Manage epics in team-managed projects to learn how.
As work is completed on an epic, you can use the progress bar to quickly see the epic's progress on the roadmap.
To hide or show epic progress, select View > Progress.
The small bar underneath the epic's name if there are issue in the epic. This bar indicates the overall progress of your epic’s issues. It shows the status of any standard issues in your epics, excluding subtasks.
The epic’s progress bar is divided into three segments:
The green segment represents issues in a Done status category
The blue segment represent issues in an In progress status category
The grey segment represents issues in a To do status category
Hover over any segment of an epic's progress bar to see specifically how many issues are in each status category, either in a to-do status, an in-progress status, or a done status.
Your team might have one epic that is blocking the progress of another, or two epics that impact one another. The roadmap enables you to visualize dependencies between epics.
Can't create a dependency?
Issue linking is activated by default. But if your issue linking is currently “OFF”, you'll need activate it to create links between issues. Your Jira admin can enable it.
To capture dependencies, the roadmap relies on a specific issue link type called Blocks. The link type is required, however, it can be renamed to suit your team. If the link type is deleted, the roadmap will create another in its place.
There are two ways to visualize dependencies on your roadmap.
To create dependencies between epics directly on your roadmap:
Hover over an epic to reveal dots on either side of an epic.
Drag one of the dots to the epic you want to link it to.
To create dependencies between epics from the epic issue detail view:
Select an epic on the roadmap.
Select Link issue.
Select either blocks or is blocked by, then select the epic to link.
Dive into the details of linked epics inside of dependency cards by selecting the dependency line, or the link icon on an epic.
The dependency line will turn red if one of your epics is scheduled to start before a dependent epic will be completed, which signals the potential for delay or risk.
To remove a dependency between two epics, select Unlink issue or delete the issue link in the issue detail view.
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