Summary

Labels can't be simply deleted from Jira via UI and/or database. This article shows how to workaround this behavior to completely remove labels from Jira applications.

Environment

Jira applications - Cloud/Data Center

Solution

1. To completely delete a label from a JIRA instance, the label must be first removed from all the issues in that instance.
   • You can use Bulk action, selecting Change Labels (step 3 of Bulk action) with Find and remove these  to only remove certain labels from the issues.
     • See Edit multiple issues in bulk on your timeline (Jira Cloud) | Editing multiple issues at the same time (Jira Data Center)
2. Once the label is removed from all issues, it will no longer be seen when browsing it.
   • However, the deleted label might still show up on the browser immediately after deleting the label from all issues. If that's the case, it might be caused by index/cache replication that eventually will become consistent or the browser cache would need to be flushed and reloaded.

Feature Request

Both Cloud and Data Center application users can watch the following feature requests for improved label management in Jira applications:

• Feature Request for Jira Data Center: JRASERVER-33672 - Getting issue details... STATUS
• Feature Request for Jira Cloud: JRACLOUD-33672 - Getting issue details... STATUS