Jira's custom fields are a powerful feature for tracking various aspects of your project. They make it easier to tailor Jira to your business needs and improve process alignment. From tracking specific data points to aligning with unique process requirements, custom fields enhance Jira's versatility. But, as beneficial as Jira’s custom fields are, they have some limitations that present challenges — particularly for enterprise users, who require advanced data manipulation and sophisticated reporting.

The top challenges admins face when adding custom fields in Jira

Jira offers a variety of options for adding custom fields in Jira. The built-in custom fields can display data in multiple formats, like checkboxes, dates, and labels. However, admins often encounter a few key challenges with Jira’s built-in custom fields.

Limited field types: Jira offers several field types, but sometimes they don’t match exactly what you need. This can force teams to use workarounds that complicate processes and data handling.

Data consistency issues: When working with many custom fields, it becomes increasingly difficult to ensure data consistency, which can lead to inaccurate reports and insights.

No dynamic calculation capabilities: Jira’s built-in custom fields can’t display dynamic calculated custom fields, which causes teams to switch from Jira to external tools like Excel to perform manual calculations. This switch disrupts workflows and introduces a high risk of manual errors.

Limited access to field information. Detailed issue information metadata, like the dates and authors of a transition, is not accessible or reportable within Jira’s standard setup. This limitation is particularly problematic when you need sophisticated reporting. Because then you have to manually extract and process data, a process that’s both inefficient and prone to errors.

Ideally, you’d want a way to add custom fields in Jira that display hidden values on the fly and have calculated custom field values that get dynamically updated every time the issue is displayed or updated.

Transform custom field usage in Jira with JMCF

Enter Jira Misc Custom Fields (JMCF), an app that revolutionizes how teams use custom fields by enabling the creation of auto-calculated fields. These fields dynamically compute and display data, giving you real-time insights directly within Jira. Once a custom field is set up, you can seamlessly visualize these calculated custom fields anywhere in Jira — in the issue navigator, in JQL searches, Saved Filters, Agile Board queries, and Dashboards.

With JMCF you can enhance your Jira experience in two ways:

Expose hidden information: JMCF improves transparency by making hidden data, like the author of a transition and timing, visible in screens, reports, and dashboards within Jira. This capability ensures that every change can be tracked and attributed correctly, which is crucial for regulatory compliance and internal audits.

Create custom calculations: With JMCF, you can create calculated custom fields based on simple arithmetic operations or complex conditional scripting. This way, you can significantly reduce manual input errors and streamline data processing, making project management more efficient and responsive.

How to maximize your team’s efficiency with calculated custom fields

JMCF helps you tailor your Jira instance to accommodate the various project and departmental needs and improve the user experience. As such, it has a variety of use cases across various team functions.

Software developers find JMCF invaluable for tracking and forecasting project timelines. For example, you can auto-calculate remaining work hours and identify potential bottlenecks, such as unresolved bugs. This real-time data helps adjust workloads and timelines quickly.

Support teams enhance service delivery by calculating and displaying the total time spent on issues, thereby more effectively managing customer expectations and service level agreements (SLAs).

Project managers leverage JMCF custom fields to generate comprehensive reports and dashboards that provide insights into team performance, project timelines, and overall project health. This data is crucial for making informed decisions and optimizing project outcomes without the need for manual data entry.

Getting started with JMCF

With a comprehensive collection of 20+ custom field types, it’s easy to start adding JMCF custom fields in Jira — even for users without any coding experience.

If you need complete flexibility, you can use one of the scripted custom fields. JMCF offers a powerful built-in editor with syntax highlighting and on-the-fly syntax checking, an interactive inline help system, and an integrated script tester to get things done faster and more accurately.

Get started with a 30-day free trial.

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Jira admin’s guide to calculated custom fields and JMCF

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