Jira review

The default issue tracker for software teams, free for up to 10 users.

Facts checked July 2026

Free plan: Yes
Free plan score: 69/100Usable
Starting price: $7.91/month
Based in: Australia
Company: Atlassian
Founded: 2002

Our take

Jira's free tier for 10 users is genuinely usable, so the case for alternatives rests on Jira's complexity and admin burden rather than its price.

The software team default since 2002

Jira is Atlassian's tracker for software teams: scrum and kanban boards, backlogs, customizable workflows, agile reports, and a marketplace of thousands of add-ons. It scales from a 3-person startup to organizations running tens of thousands of tickets, which is both its strength and its reputation problem.

Who should still choose Jira

Software teams that need enforceable workflows, permissions, and audit trails
Organizations already on Confluence, Bitbucket, or other Atlassian products
Teams of 10 or fewer who want a serious tracker for free

Free for 10 users, and the price only starts after

Jira is freemium, and to be fair, the free plan is real. As of July 2026 it covers up to 10 users with scrum and kanban boards, backlogs, reports, 2GB storage, 100 automation rule runs a month, and community support. Atlassian notes it may deactivate inactive free sites. Standard runs about $8/user/month with 250GB storage and audit logs; Premium adds advanced planning and 24/7 support.

Where alternatives beat the 10-user limit, and where they do not

Plane offers a similar structure (sprints, modules, multiple views) with far less configuration, plus a self-hosted option Jira Cloud lacks at this price. Linear wins on speed and feel for teams who never wanted a workflow admin role. OpenProject and Taiga self-host for free with no 10-user ceiling. If your team is under 10 people and happy with Jira, though, the honest advice is that switching saves you complexity, not money.

Should you leave? Not if the free plan fits

Jira's free tier is one of the few incumbent free plans we would call real: 10 users, scrum and kanban boards, backlogs, reports, and 2GB of storage. If that describes your team and nobody is fighting the workflow configuration, stay put, because a move buys you simplicity rather than savings. The two things worth watching are the admin time that grows with your workflows and Atlassian's note that it may deactivate inactive free sites. If either one is biting, our free Jira alternatives page starts with Plane for structure and Linear for speed.

What Jira offers

Kanban boards
Gantt & timeline
Agile & sprints
Automations
App integrations
Mobile apps

Not included

Time tracking
Self-hosting
No user cap on free plan
Docs & wiki

Jira plans and pricing

Free for up to 10 users with scrum and kanban boards, backlogs, reports, and 2GB storage

Atlassian prices per exact user count through a calculator, so the per-user rate shifts with team size.

Free

Scrum and kanban boards, backlogs, and reports with community support

10 users, 2GB storage; inactive free sites may be deactivated

Standard

$7.91/mo

250GB storage, audit logs, and user roles and permissions

Per-user price drops at higher user tiers; about $8.15 billed monthly

Premium

$14.54/mo

Adds advanced planning, unlimited storage, and 24/7 support

Price is per user

As of July 2026. Check current pricing on the Jira pricing page.

Jira's free plan score

How good Jira's free plan really is, judged on four things and weighted into one number.

69/100

Usable

Ten users, 2GB of storage and a serious agile tracker, at no cost.

Free plan generosity: 72/100
Feature depth for the category: 82/100
Freedom and honesty: 62/100
What free users report: 52/100

Read the full free plan breakdown

Scored July 2026. How we calculate the free plan score.

Frequently asked questions about Jira

If Jira is free for 10 users, why do teams leave it?

Complexity and admin overhead, not price. Jira asks for configuration work that ClickUp, Linear and Plane do not, and on a small team that work lands on somebody who did not ask for it. If nobody on your team is fighting the workflow setup, switching away buys you simplicity rather than savings.

How many automation rule runs does Jira's free plan get?

100 a month (as of July 2026), which covers a handful of simple rules and not much more. For comparison, Trello, also an Atlassian product, gives free workspaces 250 Butler runs a month. Automation is the free limit most likely to bite before the 10-user cap does.

How much storage does Jira's free plan include?

2GB, which is comfortable for issue tracking with the occasional attachment and over thirty times ClickUp's 60MB free workspace (as of July 2026). Standard raises it to 250GB and Premium removes the cap entirely.

What does Jira cost once you pass 10 users?

Standard is about $8 per user per month billed annually, and Premium about $14.54 with advanced planning, unlimited storage and 24/7 support (as of July 2026). Atlassian prices per exact user count through a calculator, so the per-user rate shifts with team size. Budget from a quote rather than from a headline figure.

Can you self-host Jira on the free plan?

No. Our figures cover Jira Cloud, which is what the free tier and Standard are, and it has no self-hosted equivalent at that price (as of July 2026). If the data has to live on your own server, OpenProject and Plane are the open source trackers we cover in this category.

Latest Jira news

Changes that affect what you get for free: pricing, free plan limits, ownership, and whether the project is still maintained. Not every release.

We checked Jira's own blog, changelog and release notes in July 2026 and found nothing that changes the picture above.

Reader reviews

What people who actually use Jira think of it.

No reviews of Jira yet. If you have used it, yours would be the first.

The useful part is the specifics: what you used it for, and where it got in your way.