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Documentation
1. What it does
Jira keeps each project's work on its own board. Multi-Project Boards brings it back together: you define the columns you care about once, and issues from every project you can see fall into those columns — even when each project names its stages differently.
A column can gather issues by status, by issue type (for example, one column for every Epic across the whole site), by project, or any combination of the three. You can keep several boards, each with its own columns and its own shareable link.
2. Installation & where to find it
Install Multi-Project Boards from its Atlassian Marketplace listing on your Jira Cloud site. Only Jira administrators can install apps.
Once installed, open it from the top Apps menu of your Jira instance ("Multi-Project Boards"). No configuration is required to open it — you build your first board from inside the app. The app runs as a full-screen page; there is no per-issue panel.
3. Boards
Everything lives on a board. You can keep many boards — one per team, per client, per initiative — and switch between them instantly.
The board switcher
At the top-left, click the board name to open the switcher. From there you can:
- Jump to any other board.
- Tick “Open this board by default” to make the current board the one shown whenever you enter the app without a specific board link. The default board is marked in the list.
- Create a new board.
Its own link
Each board has its own URL. Switching boards updates the page address, so you can bookmark a board or paste its link to a teammate and they'll land straight on it. Opening the app without a board link falls back to your default board, then to the first one.
Settings, rename, delete
The gear icon next to the switcher opens the current board's settings, where you configure its columns (below), rename the board, or delete it. Everything you change in settings saves automatically a moment after you stop editing — a status line at the top shows “Saving…” / “All changes saved”, and warns you if a column is still incomplete (so nothing is saved half-finished). Use Back to board to return.
4. Building columns
In board settings, each column collects issues by any combination of three criteria. A column needs at least one of them:
- Statuses — matched by name across projects. This is the core idea: if your projects spell the same stage differently — “In Progress”, “In Development”, “Doing” — pick them together and they all land in one column. Because matching is by name, a column also automatically picks up the same-named status in any project you can see, not only the one you selected it from.
- Issue types — e.g. a single “Epics” column that gathers every Epic across the whole site, or one column per type.
- Projects — narrow a column to specific projects.
When you pick statuses, they're grouped by project (plus a “Shared across projects” group), and a status already used by another column is hidden — so you can't accidentally place the same status in two columns.
One issue, one column
If an issue could match several columns, it still appears in exactly one. Columns claim issues in priority order — a status column wins over a type column, which wins over a project-only column — so a task stays with the stage it's actually in rather than showing up twice.
Order, remove, and board scope
- Reorder columns by dragging them by the handle; the board shows them left-to-right in that order.
- Remove a single column, or Remove all to start over.
- Set a board-wide project scope (the “Projects” field at the top of settings) so the entire board only ever considers the projects you choose — leave it empty to include every project you can access.
5. Quick setup (auto-generate)
The settings screen can generate columns for you, so you don't have to build them by hand:
From a project's workflow
Pick a template project. Its statuses become the columns (ordered To Do → In Progress → Done), and same-named statuses from your other projects are pulled into them automatically. Any status in the other projects that has no same-named column is listed afterwards, so you can place it by hand — nothing is silently dropped.
One column per issue type
Choose the issue types you want (Epics, Stories, Bugs…), or “Select all”, and get a column for each — collecting that type across every project.
Both generators add to your existing columns rather than replacing them, so you can combine a status-based layout with a couple of type columns. Adding the same thing twice is safe: duplicates are detected by what a column matches and skipped, and the result tells you how many were added and how many were already there.
6. The board view & paging
Each column is a scrollable list of cards. A card shows the issue's summary, its real status (as a coloured lozenge, so the grouping never hides what's actually going on), its key, project, type, priority, assignee initials, and any labels.
For performance on large instances, a column loads up to 50 issues at a time. The column header shows an honest count like “50 of 320”, and a Show more button loads the next page. Issues are ordered by most recently updated first, then by your own manual order (see the next section) — so anything you've deliberately arranged stays put, and the rest surfaces the freshest work.
7. Moving & reordering cards
Drag a card and drop it where you want it. Two things can happen:
Moving to another column changes the issue in Jira
- Dropping into a status column transitions the issue's status. The app only performs a transition the issue's own workflow actually allows; when a matching transition doesn't exist, the card returns to its place and a notice explains what the issue can move to versus what the column expected.
- Dropping into an issue-type column changes the issue's type (subject to your project's rules; if Jira rejects it — for example a required field on the new type — the card returns and the reason is shown).
The card moves the moment you drop it — you don't wait on Jira's search index — and the board quietly reconciles with the server a moment later.
Reordering within a column sticks
Drag a card up or down inside its column and drop it exactly where you want — between two cards, at the top, or on the empty space to send it to the end. This manual order is the app's own (stored per board in Forge Storage, independent of Jira's ranking), so it survives refreshes, is applied every time the board loads, and never affects any other board. Reordering within a column does not change anything in Jira.
8. Epics, stories & subtasks
Any card that has child issues shows a progress counter — for example “3 of 8 done”, turning green when everything under it is complete — and a disclosure triangle.
Click the triangle to expand it in place: an Epic opens into its Stories, a Story into its Subtasks — a full Epic → Story → Subtask tree, drawn with the same cards and working across projects. Children load on demand, only when you open a node, so a board full of epics stays fast. This works on any parent, not just epics — a status column of stories will expand into their subtasks too.
9. Filters & search
The filter bar sits above the board and applies to all columns at once. Every control collapses its selection to a count, so the bar wraps neatly instead of growing tall. Available filters:
- Search — matches an issue's summary, or its exact key (type “KAN-12” to jump to it).
- Project, Issue type, Priority, Labels — each a multi-select; pick any combination.
- Assignee — search for people by name and pick one or several.
- My issues — a quick toggle to show only issues assigned to you.
Filters are evaluated by Jira, so they work correctly even across the parts of a column that haven't loaded yet. Press Clear to reset everything at once.
10. The issue dialog
Click any card to open a detail dialog without leaving the board. It shows the issue's summary, status, project, type, priority, assignee, reporter, labels, and its full description (rendered exactly as Jira renders it). Open in Jira takes you to the complete issue when you need to edit or comment.
11. Permissions
| What the app needs | Why |
|---|---|
| Read Jira work & users | To display issues, statuses, types, priorities, assignees and projects on the board. |
| Write Jira work | To transition an issue's status, or change its type, when you drag its card to another column. |
| Storage | To save your boards, columns, default board, and manual card order. |
All Jira access is performed as the signed-in user, so everyone sees only the issues, projects and statuses they already have permission to see — the app never widens anyone's access.
12. Data, privacy & security
Multi-Project Boards runs entirely on Atlassian Forge. It operates no external servers or databases and fetches nothing off-Atlassian — user avatars are shown as initials and issue metadata as text, so no data ever leaves Atlassian's infrastructure. That's why the app is eligible for the Runs on Atlassian program.
The only thing stored is your board configuration (boards, columns, default board, manual card order), kept in Forge Storage. Your issues are never copied out of Jira. For the full legal detail, see our Privacy Policy and Data Processing Addendum.
13. Limits
- Up to 25 boards.
- Up to 10 columns per board.
- Up to 50 statuses mapped to a single column.
- Up to 50 issues loaded per column at a time, with Show more for the rest.
14. Frequently asked questions
Why does a status column show issues from projects I didn't pick?
Columns match statuses by name across every project you can see. If two projects use the same status name, both projects' issues appear in that column. Use a column's project criterion, or the board-wide project scope, to narrow it.
Why won't a card move to a column?
A move only happens if the issue's workflow allows a transition to a status in that column (or, for type columns, if the type change is permitted). When it isn't, the card returns to its place and a notice explains what it can move to and what the column expected.
Does dragging change anything in Jira?
Moving a card between columns changes the issue's status or type in Jira itself. Reordering within a column does not — that order is stored only by the app.
Can I have the same issue in two columns?
No. Each issue appears in exactly one column; when it matches several, the status-defined column wins.
Does it support sprints or swimlanes?
Not currently. Columns group by status, issue type and project; grouping by sprint is not part of this version. Let us know if you need it.
Does it work with Jira Service Management?
It's built and tested for Jira Software. It reads whatever projects, statuses and types your account can see.
What happens to my data if I uninstall the app?
Your Jira issues are untouched — they're native Jira data. App-specific data (boards, columns, saved order) stored in Forge Storage is removed according to Atlassian's Forge data deletion policy.
15. Support
Email [email protected] with any questions, bug reports, or feature requests. Support hours: Monday–Friday, 9:00–18:00 CET, with responses typically within one business day.