Jira Software guardrails
The content of this page applies to Jira 9.12. If you're looking for information about a different version, select it from the menu in the top-right corner.
Background
We’re committed to supporting the needs of our largest customers, and this includes continually improving the performance and scalability of our products. The amount of data in your instance can be a factor in performance and stability problems. As your instance grows, so does your risk of performance degradation over time. Often this is a gradual degradation and can go unnoticed until you reach a point where it has a significant impact on your team.
In the table below, we’ve described the performance and stability impacts that we’ve observed and suggested some actions you can take to reduce your risk. The guardrails are based on real-world experiences with some of our largest customers, but won’t necessarily be representative of every organization’s experience.
Ways you can reduce the risk of experiencing serious performance and stability problems may include:
application changes, such as upgrading to a newer application version to get the benefit of performance improvements, or changing the way users are managed.
infrastructure changes, such as increasing memory, CPU, or running a cluster or mirrors.
data cleanup activities to reduce your footprint, such as archiving or breaking up monolith sites.
It’s important to note that these aren’t hard limits, and some of your product instances may already exceed these thresholds. There are a number of factors, including the interplay between different data types, and site load, which will influence whether you experience the potential impacts listed below, and to what degree. As with any type of risk, it’s essential to identify the risk and make a plan, so you can prioritize those actions that will help you reduce the probability of future performance problems.
Definition
Product Guardrails are data type recommendations designed to help you identify potential risks and aid you making decisions about next steps in your instance optimization journey.
Jira Software guardrails
The following guardrails are provided to help you identify and mitigate scale risks, and make decisions about cleaning up your instance.
Projects
Content type | Number of active projects |
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Guardrail | 7000 projects (not archived) |
How to find this number | |
Risks | We've observed these problems when operating above this guardrail:
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Mitigation options |
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Comments
Content type | Number of comments per issue |
---|---|
Guardrail | 1000 comments per issue |
How to find this number | |
Risks | We've observed these problems when operating above this guardrail:
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Mitigation options |
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Attachments
Content type | Number of attachments per issue |
---|---|
Guardrail | 3000 attachments per issue 10MB per single attachment |
How to find this number | How to find issues with the most attachments in the database |
Risks | We've observed these problems when operating above this guardrail:
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Mitigation options |
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Issue links
Content type | Number of issue links or sub-issues |
---|---|
Guardrail | 1000 issue links |
How to find this number | How to find issues with the most issue links in the database |
Risks | We've observed these problems when operating above this guardrail:
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Mitigation options |
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Text
Content type | Amount of text in a field. |
---|---|
Guardrail | 255 characters in single-line fields 100k characters in description and multi-line fields |
How to find this number | |
Risks | We've observed these problems when operating above this guardrail:
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Mitigation options |
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Custom fields
Content type | Total number of custom fields |
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Guardrail | 1,200 custom fields |
How to find this number | |
Risks | We've observed these problems when operating above this guardrail:
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Mitigation options |
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Epics
Content type | Number of epics |
---|---|
Guardrail | 120,000 epics |
How to find this number | You can use JQL to identify the number of epics, |
Risks | We've observed these problems when operating above this guardrail:
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Mitigation options |
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Sprints
Content type | Total number of sprints |
---|---|
Guardrail | 60,000 sprints |
How to find this number | |
Risks | We've observed these problems when operating above this guardrail:
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Mitigation options |
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Workflow scheme bulk actions
Action | Associating a new issue type to an existing workflow scheme |
---|---|
Guardrail | 1000 issues per bulk action |
How to find this number | |
Risks | We've observed these problems when operating above this guardrail:
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Mitigation options |
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Change history
Content type | Number of changeitems or changegroups associated with an issue |
---|---|
Guardrail | 20,000 changeitems or changegroups |
How to find this number | |
Risks | We've observed these problems when operating above this guardrail:
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Mitigation options |
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Users
Content type | Total number of users synchronized between LDAP and Jira |
---|---|
Guardrail | 100,000 users |
How to find this number | |
Risks | We've observed these problems when operating above this guardrail:
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Mitigation options |
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Inactive users
Content type | Number of inactive users with content assigned to them synchronized between LDAP and Jira |
---|---|
Guardrail | 100,000 users |
How to find this number | How to get the number of inactive users with content assigned to them |
Risks | We've observed these problems when operating above this guardrail:
Additionally, there is a known issue in Jira Server and Data Center 8.20.6 and older that results in increased directory synchronization and user authentication times if you have more than 10,000 inactive users with content assigned to them in your system. |
Mitigation options |
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Groups
Content type | Total number of groups synchronized between LDAP and Jira |
---|---|
Guardrail | 25,000 groups |
How to find this number | How to get the total number of groups |
Risks | We've observed these problems when operating above this guardrail:
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Mitigation options |
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Depth of nested groups
Content type | Number of levels of hierarchy when groups are nested |
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Guardrail | 4 levels deep We also recommend groups do not contain a mix of users and other groups, as this can have a negative impact on performance. |
How to find this number | How to check the depth of group nesting |
Risks | We've observed these problems when operating above this guardrail:
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Mitigation options | Try rebuilding your group structure to prevent deep nesting. For example, you can split your group structure into two categories:
Nested groups come with their own set of limitations and potential side effects. Make sure that you understand this mechanism before rebuilding your group structure. For more information, see Managing nested groups. |