Important things to know

Auto-managed sprints have the following specifics:

• A sprint that doesn’t have any issues can still start automatically.
• If a sprint has closed parent issues whose child issues aren’t closed, the sprint won’t complete automatically. For example, when some closed tasks have open sub-tasks, you’ll need to close these sub-tasks first. After that, the sprint will auto-complete.
• When a sprint auto-completes, all the remaining open issues will be moved to the destination you select in the sprint configuration:
  • the backlog
  • a new sprint that Jira creates automatically
  • any existing future sprint
• If something has changed about the selected destination for the remaining open issues, Jira will show you a notification about this in the board view and the backlog view. You’ll also find a relevant warning in the sprint settings.
  • Until the current sprint auto-completes, you can change the destination for the open issues in the sprint settings. Otherwise, the issues will move to the backlog by default.
• If you configured an auto-managed sprint, when it auto-starts or auto-completes, you’ll get an email notification that Anonymous has made some changes to this sprint.

Enabling the Parallel sprints option

To be able to schedule an auto-start or auto-complete for a new sprint while another sprint is still in progress, you will need to enable parallel sprints.

You must be a Jira admin to enable the Parallel sprints option. If you aren’t, contact your Jira admin about this.

To enable parallel sprints:

1. In the upper-right corner, select Administration > Applications.
2. In the left-side panel, select Jira Software configuration.
3. Select Parallel sprints.

Configuring a sprint auto-start and auto-complete

You can schedule an auto-start and auto-complete for a sprint when:

• creating a future sprint
• creating a new sprint that you want to start now
• editing an existing sprint

To schedule an auto-start and auto-complete for a sprint:

1. Start creating or editing a sprint.
2. Select the dates when you want to start and end the sprint.

3. Select Start and complete automatically.

   Make sure your Jira profile timezone matches your local timezone. If they differ, Jira will use the profile timezone to schedule auto-managed sprints. Learn how to change your profile timezone

4. In the drop-down list, select the destination where the remaining open issues will move after the current sprint auto-completes. You have the following options:
   1. Backlog – the open issues will move to the backlog after the sprint auto-completes. The backlog is also a default destination for the cases where Jira can’t move open issues to a future sprint because it has been completed or deleted.

   2. New sprint – the open issues will move to a new sprint that Jira will create automatically. This sprint will have only a name. You can edit the sprint settings as needed.
      

      How Jira gives names to auto-created sprints

      The name of an auto-created sprint will be the same as the name of the first sprint at the top of your backlog. For example, if the first sprint in the backlog is “April-May Sprint“, the new auto-created sprint will have the same name – “April-May Sprint“.

      If the name of the first sprint at the top of the backlog has a number, Jira will add 1 to this number and set the new number in the auto-created sprint name. For example, if the first sprint in the backlog is “Sprint 10“, the new auto-created sprint will be “Sprint 11“.

   3. Any existing future sprint – the open issues will move to an existing future sprint.
      

      What you should know when selecting an existing future sprint

      This sprint can be completed, deleted, or started before your current sprint auto-completes. Jira will notify you about any changes with warning messages in the board view and in the backlog view.

      You’ll be able to change the destination in the sprint settings before the sprint auto-completes. If you don’t change the destination, the issues will move to the backlog by default.

5. Select Save.

The sprint will start and complete automatically on the dates you set. On the board, you’ll see the number of days left until the sprint auto-complete. The sprint will also be marked with the AUTO-MANAGED label in the backlog view.

What can happen to a selected existing sprint and what you should do

In the sprint and backlog views, you’ll see warnings when something changes about an existing future sprint you selected as the destination for moving open issues from the current auto-managed sprint.

In the following table, learn what can happen to the selected existing sprint and what you should do in each case.

How it works

Here are a few under-the-hood details explaining how the sprint auto-management works.

• Automation is written as a cron job that is scheduled as a Jira service. You can find the complete information on it in Scheduler administration. Search for com.atlassian.greenhopper.service.sprint.services.SprintAutoStartStopJob.
• The job is scheduled with an interval of 1 minute. The first run is scheduled right after Jira startup. You can change intervals by setting the following property: sprint.auto.start.stop.run.interval.in.minutes. Learn how to set the property
• The job runs once per cluster and may run on any node. This means you’ll need to search logs on all nodes if there’s a problem.

• You can find more details about errors, warnings, and the overall behavior of the feature in the file atlassian-greenhopper.log with the prefix [SPRINT-AUTO-START-STOP]. Learn more about log files in Jira

Disabling the feature

You can disable auto-managed sprints in two ways:

• Disable parallel sprints
• Manage the feature flags

Disabling parallel sprints

To disable the Parallel sprints option:

1. In the upper-right corner, select Administration > Applications.
2. In the left-side panel, select Jira Software configuration.
3. Uncheck Parallel sprints.

Managing the feature flags

To disable auto-managed sprints with the feature flags:

1. Disable the following dark feature flag: com.atlassian.jira.agile.darkfeature.sprint.auto.management.enabled. Make sure that no input with the wildcard *sprint.auto.management.enabled is present.
2. Add the following dark feature flag: com.atlassian.jira.agile.darkfeature.sprint.auto.management.disabled.