Jira vs Jira Align comparison

Jira and Jira Align are both solutions in the Application Lifecycle Management (ALM) Suites category. Jira is ranked #1 with an average rating of 8.4, while Jira Align is ranked #9 with an average rating of 7.8. Jira holds a 21.9% mindshare in ALM, compared to Jira Align’s 1.4% mindshare. Additionally, 91% of Jira users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 92% of Jira Align users who would recommend it.

Jira

Read 274 Jira reviews

15,002 Views
10,262 Comparison Views

91% willing to recommend

Jira Align

Read 41 Jira Align reviews

1,134 Views
704 Comparison Views

92% willing to recommend

Jira

Jira Align

Comparison Buyer's Guide

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Executive SummaryUpdated on Dec 15, 2024

Jira and Jira Align compete in the agile project management category. While both products cater to different scales, Jira is generally preferred for its feature set and pricing flexibility, whereas Jira Align is seen as superior for large-scale agile projects.

Features: Jira supports agile methodologies with powerful tools like Scrum and Kanban boards, integrating well with other Atlassian products. It offers extensive workflow customization and strong visualization tools. Jira Align provides advanced agile scaling features with a focus on roadmap and portfolio management, strategic planning, and aligning projects with organizational goals.

Room for Improvement: Jira users face challenges with stability and search functionality. Its integration with Confluence can be problematic. Jira Align is criticized for high costs and a non-intuitive user interface. Both products could benefit from improved integration and enhanced customization.

Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: Jira offers both on-premises and cloud-based deployments with extensive documentation. Customer support varies, with many users relying on community forums. Jira Align is cloud-based, simplifying deployment in cloud infrastructures, but its setup can be complex, and its documentation needs improvement. Both rely on Atlassian support, sometimes supplemented by third parties.

Pricing and ROI: Jira's competitive pricing and flexible licensing models appeal to small and medium businesses, though costs can rise with plugins and more users. It provides a strong ROI from its feature set and integrations. Jira Align is more expensive, targeting enterprises needing high-level agile scaling. Despite higher costs, it offers good ROI through strategic alignment and enterprise transparency.

To learn more, read our detailed Jira vs. Jira Align Report (Updated: March 2025).

Buyer's Guide

Jira vs. Jira Align

March 2025

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Helped 845,040 peers since 2012

Review summaries and opinions

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:

Categories and Ranking

Jira

Ranking in Application Lifecycle Management (ALM) Suites

1st

Average Rating

8.2

Reviews Sentiment

6.9

Number of Reviews

274

Ranking in other categories

Application Requirements Management (2nd), Project Management Software (2nd)

Jira Align

Ranking in Application Lifecycle Management (ALM) Suites

9th

Average Rating

8.0

Reviews Sentiment

7.0

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

Enterprise Agile Planning Tools (3rd), Value Stream Management Software (1st)

Mindshare comparison

As of April 2025, in the Application Lifecycle Management (ALM) Suites category, the mindshare of Jira is 21.9%, down from 23.9% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Jira Align is 1.4%, down from 1.7% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

Application Lifecycle Management (ALM) Suites

Q&A Highlights

Miriam Tover

Service Delivery Manager at PeerSpot

Apr 02, 2019

What Is The Biggest Difference Between AgileCraft And JIRA?

Some of the fundamental difference between AgileCraft & Jira are 1) Jira was originally a bug tracking tool that has been modified to try and support Agile projects. AgileCraft was developed out of the box with Agile in mind. 2) Jira data structure is flat which means creating a hierarchy for rolled up reporting is problematic even with the 3rd party plugins. 3) AgileCraft was designed to support enterprise level Agile/SAFe while Jira was not and struggles in this area As JIRA has a low CapEx it is attractive to a lot of people and there is a large user community. The OpEx, when you consider all the plugins you may need to acquire to do what you want , can create a annual cost that is equivalent to other ALM solutions. Given this large user base other vendors (including AgileCraft) have created ways to stack their products on top of Jira to allow that user community to scale it. This is great for those that do not want to simply get rid of their Jira implementation. Jira is fine for small single team use but I am not a fan of it for larger enterprise wide programs that use SAFe or other enterprise Agile frameworks Given the recent announcement of Atlassian (Jira parent) acquisition of AgileCraft it will be interesting how they blend the two product together.

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Featured Reviews

Saroj Ekka

Technical Delivery Lead at Applied Materials

Offers good repository integration, sprint board and easy to set up

There are some features and reports we need that are not there. For example, if I have to find out the capacity of the current sprint by user and compare it with the previous sprint, that visibility isn't there. We can know the capacity and what happened with the whole sprint, but not for an individual person to see where it's falling and how it's tracking. Report and analytics capabilities are important for a product manager. That visibility is important, so we use Jira. Some of the features are there, and I use my own Excels or other data things to compensate for that.

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Tonia Spight-Sokoya

Program Support for Third Party External SPM Lead Business Execution Consultant/PMP PM at Wells Fargo

User-friendly with good documentation and the ability to integrate with other third arty vendors

I am really focused on identity access management and getting access to the vendors. Right now, I'm setting up vendor access through Azure. You can do that or with the IAM. Sometimes we have to create several different types of access because we have vaulted databases. We have the Unix databases, I have MySQL, and we have Mongo, where I get access to those user classes or to the databases in the host group. Those are all different access scenario forms that I submit after I do the configuration in the form with the security team. I need clarity on the IAM. I'm not clear on PAM eighter. Is there a form that they have to submit to get access to the internal cyber-risk teams to get their access for people to be able to use the tool on the Confluence side? Do they have to send some kind of form to the operation's security or enterprise security? To be able to get the access for privileged access, do they need to be working on projects that have vaulted databases? I still need to figure out how that works. Other companies that are competitors of Jira and Confluence, are able to create their active directories for the vendors that don't come in internally. They only do access through the cloud and through third-party, two-factor identification. That's something I was wondering if that was already implemented in the packages, the package for Confluence. It would be nice to have that right in the solution.

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Quotes from Members

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:

Pros

"The most valuable feature of Jira is that it's a well-known tool that many people are familiar with."

"The design of the interface is clean and not too busy visually."

"It's an open-sourced product that is easy to customize."

"Jira is very useful for project management for internal projects."

"The solution helps a lot with scrums."

"Powerful features including a good reporting capability."

"It improved communication, as it was a popular tool, and most people enjoyed using it."

"I like that all of the team members on an agile team can use it. No one is in a separate application."

More Jira pros

"Some of the most valuable features are the configurations and dashboards."

"The technical support services are excellent."

"Jira is one of the most widely used tools in the market, and it has a vast amount of data already stored in it. Jira Align is crucial in orchestrating this data and providing valuable views and insights. However, it's essential for tools like Jira Align to offer configurable features. While complete customization might not always be feasible for enterprise-level tools, configurable features allow organizations to drive transformation accordingly."

"I like the way the UI functions."

"The most valuable features are the ability to customize the entries and to update them quickly. Since the new version they released, we started utilizing the customization features to create specific codes and symbols for our teams that were not available before. For example, in team A each person had their own symbols and we had our own demarcation. When our project or task was completed, we had a code that we could enter online that let the main project managers know that it was time to remove it."

"The tool enabled everyone to see the status of each environment."

"In our workflow, we utilize a dashboard. Our product development backbone relies on two-week sprints. At the beginning of each sprint, we conduct a planning meeting to discuss and challenge the backlogs. Throughout the sprint, we conduct daily sessions to review code, ensure alignment with coding standards, and address any issues. Once all tasks are completed, we proceed with the deployment process."

"The technical support team responds quickly and resolves issues effectively."

More Jira Align pros

Cons

"It should have Behavior Driven Development (BDD). There should be an option to add macros to help with that. A lot of people are using it now, and it would be nice if there was a way in there to be able to generate the BDD of commands whenever you're creating a story."

"I want the tool to integrate connectors."

"They are not supporting in-house servers anymore and I think I've got until January to port this to something else."

"I'd like some more features around software testing. I'd like to see some more stuff done around data testing. That's what I'm most interested in."

"The solution heavily focuses on the Agile framework, which might only suit some business use cases. This particular area needs enhancement."

"The reporting needs to be better."

"When we use the plugin in Jira so, there are two different systems which we are working on, Jira and the X-ray plugin. The X-ray plugin should be incorporated into Jira because we have to fetch two reports. One report is faxed through Jira, and one can be faxed through X-ray. So there needs to be clarity about which the Jira team should reflect."

"If Jira would be interested in offering a SharePoint version, it would be beneficial."

More Jira cons

"I don't know if Jira provides training for people who want to be certified with the solution, so that is one of the problems."

"I would like to see Jira Align merge and integrate better with Jira as a whole. A lot of the time, the data from Jira won't map very well into Jira Align."

"The solution needs to improve its pricing. It also needs to provide an integrated view of how other tasks are to be tracked. It would be also useful to see the integration of Confluence, Teams, and Slack into the product. I want to be able to communicate directly with others while using the product. I am also not sure if the integration of third-party alternate workflow tools like SAP would be possible."

"There are fewer customization options in Jira Align due to how it was designed."

"I've encountered limitations in using Jira Align for certain aspects, particularly in implementing OKRs. Jira Align's highest hierarchy is Epic, which may not always align perfectly for specific initiatives. Additionally, while Jira Align offers functionality for tracking OKRs and generating dashboards, I've found that it lacks in some areas. As a result, we've explored alternative solutions that better meet our needs in these areas. Its Kanban feature is also limited."

"Maybe some of the terms and the connectivity could be improved."

"The vendor should implement automation features"

"One area where Jira Align could improve is in its licensing model. There was a significant change in the licensing module about six months ago, which resulted in increased costs for customers like us. This change wasn't communicated clearly, and it made it challenging for companies to adopt Jira Align without facing higher expenses. In terms of features, I would like to see improved workflows in the next release, as that would greatly benefit our organization."

More Jira Align cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The tool's pricing is reasonable."

"The tool is expensive."

"If I compare Jira's licensing model with that of other products, I think that the other products have a much better licensing model."

"The ballpark figure is about $100 a month."

"For very small companies, if you have less than 10 individuals, it is $10 a year for each of the products. When we were a part of the enterprise and had more than 10 people using it, or before they came up with this solution for small companies, it was $2,500 a year for the license for Jira and Confluence, and I believe something like $600 a year to perpetuate the license. I can't remember if it was $600 or $2,500 annually. It was for up to 25 people at the time, and this was in the early 2000s and mid 2000s."

"The basic price of Jira is reasonable, but for each plugin, we have to keep paying more. When you add it all up, it can be expensive. The main problem we face is we are forced to purchases plugin licenses for users who are not going to use them. For example, we have Jira licenses for approximately 450 people but if we only want a purchase a plugin for few people it is mandatory to buy the license for the 450 people who have Jira licensees. This is a problem because sometimes we need plugins for the product manager or for people in charge of the report, not everyone. For us, it can be very expensive in the end, they should alter this policy to allow plugins for only a set number of licenses."

"It depends on the type of license. In terms of subscription, it is cheap, and it works pretty well."

"The price of the solution could be lower."

More Jira pricing and cost advice

"The software is very good, but the price is expensive. Our licensing costs are on a monthly basis, but there are no additional costs to the standard license fees."

"The license for Jira Align is priced fairly."

"The pricing and licensing costs are rated lower, around six mainly due to significant increases in licensing costs that were not well-received by users."

"On a scale of one to ten, where one is cheap, and ten is expensive, I rate Jira Align a seven out of ten."

"Jira Align is quite expensive for small-to-medium companies, but it's quite reasonable for larger ones."

"Jira Align was reasonably priced then, especially for a bundle license that accommodated around 50 monthly users."

"Jira Align is an expensive solution."

"The tool is moderately expensive."

More Jira Align pricing and cost advice

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Answers from the Community

Miriam Tover

Service Delivery Manager at PeerSpot

Apr 2, 2019

What Is The Biggest Difference Between AgileCraft And JIRA?

2 out of 6 answers

Mark Sternberger

Vice President at NTT Data India Enterprise Application Services Pri

Apr 1, 2019

From: Nick Regan from IT Central Station Sent: Monday, April 1, 2019 11:09 AM To: Sternberger, Mark Subject: Seeking expertise in AgileCraft Hi Mark, Can you help out a colleague with the following question about AgileCraft: ----- What Is The Biggest Difference Between AgileCraft And JIRA? One of the most popular comparisons on IT Central Station is AgileCraft vs JIRA. People like you are trying to decide which one is best for their company. Can you help them out? What is the biggest difference between AgileCraft and JIRA? Which of these two solutions would you recommend to a colleague evaluating application lifecycle management suites and why? Thanks for helping your peers make the best decision! ----- Please reply to this email with your response or post your answer here. You've been a member of IT Central Station since March 2019. In a market full of vendor hype, we provide free connections between real users of AgileCraft to share advice and make better buying decisions. Thanks for being part of the community. Nick Regan Community Director, IT Central Station IT Central Station 244 Fifth Avenue New York, NY 10001 (646) 328-1944 um-nqn 342024 To change notifications, please visit your subscription page or unsubscribe completely. gitbdelWHFUOFUyYk1sbkN2bzRLUUQyV1pibk1IeHJQRnRwUEFVSm5DYmFvVG0rNTdnQmE0YjY5T1NBS2tlQlNGa3A5SS0tdzNKeGVNUUsxK1JWdVRjblo0b1RQQT09--acfde43e76e9c3b13be36f6090940095bb440d60gitbdel Disclaimer: This email and any attachments are sent in strictest confidence for the sole use of the addressee and may contain legally privileged, confidential, and proprietary data. If you are not the intended recipient, please advise the sender by replying promptly to this email and then delete and destroy this email and any attachments without any further use, copying or forwarding.

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Kathy Fournier

Senior Director, Deal to Delivery Program Manager at a financial services firm with 10,001+ employees

Apr 1, 2019

Hi Nick. Considering the two are now the same company, I would defer any answer to the team at Atlassian. https://investors.atlassian.com/financials-and-filings/news/news-details/2019/Atlassian-to-Acquire-AgileCraft-to-Help-Executives-Align-Strategy-to-Execution/default.aspx

Read full answer

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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Educational Organization

53%

Manufacturing Company

Financial Services Firm

Computer Software Company

Financial Services Firm

25%

Computer Software Company

14%

Manufacturing Company

11%

Insurance Company

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

Questions from the Community

Is Jira better or would you go with Micro Focus ALM Octane?

Hi Netanya, Basically , it all depends on the use cases for your environment and the business needs. Hope the below data may be relevant to you for identifying your needs and deciding on the approp...

See all answers

Which is better - Jira or Microsoft Azure DevOps?

Jira is a great centralized tool for just about everything, from local team management to keeping track of products and work logs. It is easy to implement and navigate, and it is stable and scalabl...

See all answers

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Jira?

We operate under a nonlimited license with Jira, allowing a number of users to access it with a single enterprise license.

See all answers

What do you like most about Jira Align?

I joined the company because they had a large project, and as a startup company, they needed to scale up efficiently. My task was to review the current baseline, assess the team's capabilities, and...

See all answers

What needs improvement with Jira Align?

The platform's communication features could be more robust for better team integration.

See all answers

What is your primary use case for Jira Align?

We use Jira Align for business strategies, collaboration, and reporting. The solution allows us to manage the various products and features delivered on that platform.

See all answers

Comparisons

Microsoft Azure DevOps vs Jira

Compared 16% of the time

IBM DOORS vs Jira

Compared 11% of the time

OpenText ALM Octane vs Jira

Compared 9% of the time

Polarion ALM vs Jira

Compared 7% of the time

Rally Software vs Jira

Compared 6% of the time

More Jira Competitors

OpenText ValueEdge vs Jira Align

Compared 44% of the time

ServiceNow Strategic Portfolio Management vs Jira Align

Compared 22% of the time

Rally Software vs Jira Align

Compared 5% of the time

Microsoft Azure DevOps vs Jira Align

Compared 5% of the time

JIRA Portfolio vs Jira Align

Compared 3% of the time

More Jira Align Competitors

Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

Jira

March 2025

Download Jira product report

Buyer's Guide

Jira Align

March 2025

Download Jira Align product report

Also Known As

Jira Software

AgileCraft

Overview

Jira is a powerful cloud- and subscription-based application lifecycle and issue management solution. It is designed to aid users both in project management and in resolving any issues that arise at any point in the software development process. It is especially concerned with easing the ability of developers to collaborate.

Jira Benefits

Some of the ways that organizations can benefit by choosing to deploy Jira include:

DevOps lifecycle visibility and planning. Jira provides application developers with tools that enable them to track and visualize where they are in the development process. This means that a DevOps team can measure their progress at all times. Jira’s roadmapping feature also enables a DevOps team to work more efficiently by setting goals for their projects, keeping them on track. Additionally, they are able to track whether they are meeting the goals that they set for their projects.

Regular product updates. Atlassian is constantly updating Jira so that it is continuously evolving into an ever more powerful and user-friendly solution. Users can be sure that the product that they are using is always being tweaked so as to provide them with the best possible project management solution.

Flexibility. Jira enables users to customize their workflows and dashboard so that the solution is operating in a way that best matches their needs. Jira can also integrate with more than 3,000 other applications and integrations. Organizations can use it to expand their project management and DevOps capabilities in many different ways.

Jira Features

Security capabilities. Jira is equipped with a number of useful security features. It gives administrators the ability to restrict access to certain tools so that only users who are authorized to complete certain tasks have access to the tools related to the completion of that task. Users can also set default permissions so that only particular users can work on new projects or particular projects.

Real-time notification feature. Users can set Jira so that it offers them notifications that contain critical information in real time. It can send users email notifications when pressing issues have been updated. They can also set it to notify them about tasks that may be due, or other similar events.
Activity log. Jira has the ability to track any and all changes that are taking place within the software framework. Users can keep a close eye on everything that is going on. This promotes a high level of visibility and can be leveraged to aid developers in their collaboration efforts.

Reviews from Real Users

Jira is a powerful solution that stands out when compared to many of its competitors. Two major advantages it offers are its workflow engine and its highly customizable dashboard.

Bharath R., the tool implementation and project management lead at a financial services firm, writes, “I feel the strongest feature of Jira is its workflow engine. It empowers us to automate our workflows within our organization. It's the one characteristic of Jira which I think can help any organization, be it in any domain.”

Uday J., a staff engineer at a computer company, says, “Another thing that I like a lot about Jira is that in the dashboard, you can plug the modules that you want. You can enable certain sections. For example, you can show trend history, open Jira tickets, etc. Some of the managers have created a dashboard for each engineer.”

Atlassian

Jira Align is a cloud-based agile planning tool designed to help enterprises visualize, manage, and carry out large-scale software and IT projects. Jira Align’s features are designed to align the activities of your company’s development team with the overall goals of the organization by helping you achieve the following results:

Connect and coordinate enterprise-level business teams.
Make your entire enterprise’s work visible to drive and improve business outcomes.
Improve product quality with a fully aligned organization.
Shorten delivery cycles by increasing operational efficiency.

With Jira Align’s integration with Jira Software, businesses can simplify governing large-scale software development efforts by translating their strategy and goals into the technical execution and delivery of work.

Jira Align uses the aggregated data from Jira Software to produce reports on every aspect of the development process. Product stakeholders are granted immediate visibility into the progress that has been made and can easily identify delays and their causes.

The solution also assists in budget planning by assigning expenses to various work items and giving management real-time insights into ongoing expenditures and performance against set budgets.

Jira Align Features

Some of the top features and benefits of using Jira Align include:

Strategy management: Jira Align provides a clear visualization of where your enterprise is holding via strategic snapshots. The snapshot helps guide teams throughout the product. With the snapshot in view, it becomes easier to see and track the goals your company wants to carry out.

Progress monitoring: View a progress bar that provides indication of the level of completeness of your projects. The interface is populated with live data, which assists with planning and execution reporting.

Reporting and metrics: Jira Align creates valuable insights using the aggregated data it collects, ensuring that changes are tracked across teams and results are made visible early on in the process. These metrics allow managers to quickly determine what actions need to be taken.

Scalability: Jira Align is designed to work within organizations with hundreds of technical staff members and it can scale to support tens of thousands of users.

Backlogs and workflows: Effectively manage your work utilizing backlogs and workflow boards.

Customizable dashboard: Lay out key data points to help management keep tabs on important items. Easily make decisions based on active live consolidated data along with forecasting, risk tracking reports, and more. To help lower risks, Jira Align provides you with a visualization of program cross dependencies. It also displays a comprehensive view of resource utilization across projects, and highlights inefficiencies so that they can be resolved quickly.

Reviews from Real Users

Jira Align stands out among its competitors for a number of reasons. Two major ones are its program-level planning options and its reporting capabilities.

A project manager at a consultancy notes, “I like how things can be sorted out, and it shows the different objectives one can do. You could also create a team view that would allow your team to see work outcomes. Jira Align also helps with the reporting, because we can export data to Excel or another format.”

Atlassian

Sample Customers

Square, Nasa, eBay, Cisco, SalesForce, Adobe, BNP Paribas, BMW and LinkedIn, Pfizer, Citi.

Anthem, nielsen, Homeland Security, NCR, dimension data

Buyer's Guide

Jira vs. Jira Align

March 2025

Free Report: Jira vs. Jira Align

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