Limits
Every ceiling in one place, Jira’s own rules included, and what happens at each.
Limits
A few numbers are Issue Order for Jira’s own. The rest are Jira’s rules: the app works within them, and checks them before a change is staged, so a refusal doesn’t first appear when you save.
| Limit | Value | What happens |
|---|---|---|
| Issues shown per list | 1,000, in Rank order | The list ends with a note, and its count reads 1,000+. You can still reorder what’s shown; Sort, Put in lanes and placing issues at its end are off. More below. |
| Sort levels | 3 | + Then by adds a level until there are three. Rank stands alone, with nothing after it. |
| The space’s own fields in Sort | Found from up to 8 issues | One issue’s edit screen per space and issue type in the lists being sorted. Number, date, choice, version, component and label fields are offered; people and free text aren’t. |
| Move to… search results | 50 | Most recently updated first. Type a key, or the start of a word in the summary, to narrow them. |
| Priority lane dividers | Lists of 5 or more issues | Only on a list that mixes priorities and is already in priority order. A shorter list shows priority icons but no dividers. |
| Parents | Exactly one level up | Jira’s rule. Every case below. |
| Across spaces | Between company-managed spaces | Jira’s rule. Team-managed spaces keep parents and children inside the space, and sub-tasks never change space. More below. |
| What one view shows | One site, one space | The Apps page shows one space; the pop-up shows one issue, with a way out to its space. |
| Undo in a draft | 100 steps | No undo after a save, as in Jira itself. |
| Kept unsaved changes | 14 days | After that, the copy in your browser is ignored and removed. |
| Spaces on the Apps page | Up to 20,000 read | The software and business spaces you can browse are listed. |
| Retries when Jira is busy | 4 per call | Each wait is up to 10 seconds. See When Jira is busy. |
1,000 issues per list
Each list (a space’s epics, an epic’s child issues, an issue’s sub-tasks, Without an epic) shows its first 1,000 issues in Rank order. A list with more:
- Says so. It ends with Only the first 1,000 issues by Rank are shown here., and a banner above the outline reads Some lists have more than 1,000 issues. The first 1,000 are shown, and Sort is off for those lists.
- Can still be reordered among the issues shown, by dragging or from a row’s ••• menu.
- Can’t be sorted. The Sort bar says This list has more than 1,000 issues, so Sort is off for it. When a sort covers several lists, the others are sorted and the status says Lists with more than 1,000 issues were left as they are.
- Can’t take issues at its end, because its end isn’t on screen: This list has more than 1,000 issues and only the first 1,000 are shown, so its end isn’t here. Drop them next to one you can see instead. At the top still works.
- Can’t be put in lanes: Lists with more than 1,000 issues can’t be put in lanes here.
Hide done helps. With Hide done on, a list past 1,000 is read again without its done issues, so years of finished work don’t crowd out what’s open. Its last row then reads Only the first 1,000 open issues by Rank are shown here. Switching Hide done reloads those lists, but not while you have unsaved changes: Lists with more than 1,000 issues will switch once your changes are saved or discarded.
Under epics in other spaces counts only issues whose epic is in another space toward its 1,000. In a space with more than 2,000 epics, the app finds them among the space’s first 20,000 child issues, in Rank order.
Move to… shows up to 50 results
A search in Move to… lists up to 50 matches, most recently updated first. A whole key such as SHOP-1 finds that issue; other words match the start of words in a summary. With the search empty and Other spaces off, a child issue’s choices are its space’s epics in the order the outline shows them, then Without an epic. In the pop-up, where the space’s epics aren’t loaded, they come from Jira instead: up to 50, most recently updated first.
With Hide done on, done epics and other done parents aren’t offered, and when that leaves nothing to offer the note says why, for example No open epics here. Done ones are hidden while Hide done is on.
One site and one space at a time
Issue Order works on the Jira site it’s installed on. The Apps page shows one space at a time, and switching to another with unsaved changes asks first. The pop-up shows the issue it was opened on, and zooms out to that issue’s space. Unsaved changes belong to the site, person and starting point they were made on, so drafts in two spaces never mix. Cross-space links still show: another space’s issue under one of this space’s epics is listed with that epic’s child issues, and this space’s issues under another space’s epic are in Under epics in other spaces.
Batch sizes that don’t limit you
These numbers shape how the app talks to Jira. None of them caps what you see or change:
- Searches ask for issue ids only, up to 5,000 a page, Jira’s most. One search covers up to 50 parents; if their children come to more than 5,000, each parent is read on its own.
- Issues are read 100 to a call, Jira’s most, up to 8 calls at once.
- A rank call moves up to 50 issues, Jira’s most, so a big sort is several calls.
- New parents and new priorities are written four at a time.
Jira’s own rules
These come from Jira and apply to every way of changing an issue, not just this app, so the app can’t lift them. It checks them as you drag or choose in Move to…: a choice Jira would refuse is greyed out with the reason, and a drop is refused with it.
Parent rules
A parent is exactly one level up, in every kind of space.
| Moving | Can go | Otherwise the app says |
|---|---|---|
| A child issue (story, task, bug…) | Under an epic, or to Without an epic in its own space | Child issues go under an epic. or Issues without an epic stay in their own space. |
| A sub-task | Under a story, task or bug in its own space | Sub-tasks go under a story, task or bug, not an epic., Jira keeps sub-tasks in their own space. or Sub-tasks always need a parent issue. |
| An epic | Under the level above epics, such as an initiative, on sites that have one. Not from the space’s list of epics: open the initiative’s Reorder child issues and move it from there. | Epics go under the level above them, like an initiative. From the space’s list of epics: Epics can only be reordered here. On a site with initiatives, the message adds how to move one from its initiative. On a site without that level, epics can only be reordered. |
| Anything into Under epics in other spaces | Nothing moves in. This list is the app’s own: it only gathers issues whose epic is in another space. | This list shows issues whose epic is in another space. To put an issue under such an epic, use Move to… with Other spaces. |
| An issue under itself | Never | An issue can’t go under itself. |
Across spaces
Company-managed spaces share epics. A child issue can go under an epic in another company-managed space, with Other spaces ticked in Move to…. In its own space it then shows under Under epics in other spaces, where it can be reordered, or moved out to one of the space’s own epics. Its current epic, if offered again, shows Already here.
Team-managed spaces keep parents and children inside the space, in both directions. Move to… doesn’t offer Other spaces for their issues, and a move into or out of one is refused: Team-managed spaces keep parents and children in the same space.
Sub-tasks never change space, in either kind.