Troubleshoot character display issues in Jira server
Platform Notice: Data Center Only - This article only applies to Atlassian products on the Data Center platform.
Note that this KB was created for the Data Center version of the product. Data Center KBs for non-Data-Center-specific features may also work for Server versions of the product, however they have not been tested. Support for Server* products ended on February 15th 2024. If you are running a Server product, you can visit the Atlassian Server end of support announcement to review your migration options.
*Except Fisheye and Crucible
Problem
Often users may have problems with certain characters in an instance. Symptoms may include:
Non-ASCII characters appearing as question marks (?)
Page links with non-ASCII characters not working
Single characters being displayed as two characters
Garbled text appearing
Resolution
Atlassian recommends UTF-8 or Unicode encoding, and case-insensitive collation. In most cases, problems are due to a misconfiguration in one of the components.
Ensure the same encoding is used across all components
The UTF-8 character encoding should be used across the database, application server and web application.
In the system information of the Jira application, ensure that the webwork.i18n.encoding is set to UTF-8. See Accented characters not displaying correctly in Jira server .
To change the character encoding used in the application server, please ensure you set the Application Server URL encoding, and view your application server's documentation on any other settings required to enable your encoding. You may need to consult Integrating Jira with Apache or Integrating Jira applications with IIS, if using those.
To change the character encoding used in the database, see the appropriate child page from Connecting JIRA applications to a database.
Start Jira with the parameters
-Dfile.encoding=utf-8 and -Dsun.jnu.encoding=UTF-8. See Setting properties and options on startup.ℹ️ For running Jira as a Service in Windows, add one parameter per line.
Requesting support
If there are still problems with character encoding after following the above steps, create a support request, and our support staff will aid in solving your problem.
Entering in the following details will help us to identify your problem:
Attach screenshots of the problem.
Generate a Support Zip and attach it to the ticket.
Copy the contents of the System Information page into the 'Description' field.
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