Capacity and velocity in Advanced Roadmaps
Capacity and velocity planning was introduced in Advanced Roadmaps version 3.28. If you’re using an earlier version of Advanced Roadmaps, this process may be different or not available in your instance.
The number of story points or hours your team can complete in one iteration is referred to as its capacity. For example, an iteration with a capacity of 30 story points (which is the default setting) can contain six issues that are estimated at five story points each. You can use capacity to plan out different timeline possibilities, referred to as Scenarios in Advanced Roadmaps. Advanced Roadmaps handles capacity differently depending on a number of settings including how your teams estimate work, whether they’re a Scrum or Kanban team, and more.
Velocity, which is used strictly for planning purposes, is your team’s average capacity per iteration over time based on past performance. For example, a team with a velocity of 30 story points will require two sprints to complete an epic estimated at 35 story points, assuming no other work was already assigned to those sprints.
Enable capacity management in your timeline
To view capacity on your timeline:
- In the View settings menu, select Team or Sprint from the Group by menu. This will organize your issues into swimlanes.
- Select the checkbox next to Show capacity on timeline to finish.
To manage a team’s capacity from your timeline, you must use a board with sprints or iterations as the issue source for your plan. For scrum teams, the teams in your plan must also be associated with that board.
Calculate capacity for Scrum teams
When scheduling work for Scrum teams, capacity is calculated differently depending on which units you use to estimate work:
If you’re using time-based estimates, the sprint capacity is determined by taking the weekly capacity and multiplying by the number of weeks per iteration. For example, if you set the capacity at 40 hours, the sprint’s capacity will be 80 hours, assuming a two-week sprint.
If you estimate in story points, no conversion is necessary since story points are defined per iteration. The capacity applies to the whole sprint. By default, this is set to 30 story points, though you can adjust this to meet your team’s needs.
Calculate capacity for Kanban teams
Kanban teams can only use time-based estimates.
For Kanban teams, work is broken down into iterations which each last one week. You can set the weekly capacity of a Kanban team in either days or hours, but the length of the iteration cannot be changed.