SimplifyInstall apps

Priority Board for Jira – User Guide and Setup

How to use Priority Board for Jira: set priorities by drag and drop, rank inside a priority, bulk-move with undo, swimlanes, shared views, sprints and gadget.

Get started in 2 minutes

  1. Install Priority Board from the Atlassian Marketplace (a Jira admin; free for up to 10 users).
  2. Open it: a project’s sidebar → Priority Board.
  3. Drag a card to another priority column — the issue’s real Priority changes in Jira. Issues without a priority wait in the last column, No priority.
  4. Save changes keeps the board as your saved view; Filters → Projects or Groups widens it to the whole team.

Overview

Priority Board shows one Jira project’s issues in one column per priority of the project’s priority scheme — Highest, High, Medium, Low and Lowest on most sites. Dropping a card on another column sets the issue’s real Priority field. Inside a column the cards stand in Jira’s rank order, the same order your Jira boards and backlog show.

Every change is made as you, with your own Jira permissions: if you cannot edit an issue in Jira, the app cannot either — the card goes back and a message gives Jira’s reason. The app runs on Atlassian Forge and stores only your saved filters and views, in your Atlassian site.

Priority Board uses Jira’s own Priority field. Scoring models such as RICE or WSJF are not included.

Install and open the board

  1. Install Priority Board from the Atlassian Marketplace (a Jira admin approves the permissions).
  2. Open a project. Priority Board is in the project’s navigation, next to Summary, Backlog and Active sprints (under More when the row is full).

The board shows that project only. You need the “Browse projects” permission in it.

The priority board

Each column has the priority’s icon, name and number of issues. Issues without a priority are not shown. Done issues show no due marks.

  • Change the priority: drag a card to another column, or open its ⋯ menu and choose a priority under Move to.
  • Rank inside a priority (Jira Software sites): drag a card up or down in its column, or use Move up / Move down in its menu. The new place is stored as the issue’s rank in Jira, so the backlog and Jira’s boards show the same order.
  • If the Priority field is not on the issue’s edit screen, Jira refuses and the message says so — add Priority to the screen in Project settings → Issue types.

Reprioritize several issues at once

Ctrl+click (⌘+click or Shift+click) cards, or choose Select in a card’s menu. The bar “N selected” offers Move to… and Clear selection (also Escape).

Each issue is changed like a single move: one that Jira refuses goes back with the reason, the others move. The message “N issues moved to …” has Undo for all of them, and Ctrl+Z (⌘Z) does the same. Only the last move can be undone.

Edit from the card

Click the assignee avatar to choose another person who can be assigned in the project, or Unassigned. Edit summary renames the issue (Enter saves, Escape cancels). View the issue opens Jira’s issue dialog.

Issues without a priority

When the project has issues with no priority, a last column No priority appears and lists them. Drag a card out of it to give the issue that priority; no card can be dropped into it, and the column disappears once it is empty.

Triage with swimlanes and due marks

Board settings (the gear next to Refresh) splits the board into swimlanes — by Assignee, Parent (epic), Priority or Project. Here the board is split by epic:

Columns keep one order in every lane, a card moves within its lane, and a lane folds when you click its title. The other settings:

  • Column sums — issue count only, original or remaining estimate, Story Points or another number field (Σ in each column header).
  • Card fields — Parent, Status, Due date, Labels, Components, Fix versions or Remaining estimate on every card.
  • Auto-refresh — off, or every 1, 5, 15 or 30 minutes while the page is open.

Cards are marked Overdue (red), Due today, Due tomorrow or Due in N days (up to 3, amber) — hover a mark to see the date.

A column’s ⋯ menu moves it left or right and sets a WIP limit (1–999): the header shows “cards / limit” and turns red over it, without stopping a move.

Filters and quick find

Only my issues and Assignees are always visible; More filters opens Include statuses, Exclude statuses, Issue types and Created after / before. Clear filters empties them all.

Next to them, Find by key or summary, Mine and Unassigned narrow the cards already on screen at once; they are not saved.

A board loads up to 1,000 issues; if more match, “Not every issue is shown” asks you to narrow the filters.

Profiles

The Profile select keeps named sets of filters, per project. The board opens with default.

  • Save stores the filters, the column order, WIP limits and board settings in the selected profile (“Unsaved changes” shows until you do).
  • To create a profile, type a new name into the select and choose Create profile ”…”.
  • ⋯ → Delete profile… removes one, after you confirm.

Profiles are yours; nobody else sees them.

More boards as view tabs

The first tab, By priority, is the board above. + (Add a view) adds other boards to this project page: By due date, By status, By assignee, Workload, Sprints and By field… (Labels, Components, Fix versions or a single-select field).

Plan sprints from priorities

The Sprints view (Jira Software) shows a Scrum board’s Backlog, the active sprint and the future sprints. Drop a prioritized issue on a sprint to move it there, or on Backlog to take it out of its sprint — in Jira, as you.

Boards by component, label or any select field

By field… asks which field to group by. Each value becomes a column, plus None. Dropping a card on another column replaces the value it was shown under; dropping it on None removes that value.

With an added tab selected, the ⋯ menu next to Save renames, moves or removes it, and Share with the project shares it as it is now. Everyone who can open the project page finds it under + → Shared views. The person who shared it and project admins can save changes for everyone; anyone else can Save as my view. The page address follows the selected tab, so you can send a link to a view.

Export to CSV

⋯ → Export to CSV saves the cards on screen (quick filters apply) as a spreadsheet with key, summary, column, status, priority, assignee and due date. The file is made in your browser.

Dashboard gadget

Add Priority Board to a Jira dashboard (Edit → Add gadget). In its Configure, choose the board, the Project, the column sums and how often it refreshes. The gadget lists issues per priority with a bar for each column’s share:

It searches Jira as the person looking at the dashboard, so everyone sees only the issues they may see.

Keyboard

The cards are one Tab stop: ↑ / ↓ within a column, ← / → to the next column with issues, Home / End and Ctrl+Home / Ctrl+End to the first and last issue; Enter or Space opens the card’s menu. Columns also have Move left / Move right in their menu.

Saved views, Mine and View settings

Since the November 2026 redesign every board has the same frame:

  • The saved view next to the app’s name (”· default ▾”): switch views, Save as new view…, Rename, Delete view… and share a view with the project or everyone. While the board differs from what is saved, Save changes and Discard appear.
  • Quick filters next to Filters: Find issues, Mine and Unassigned.
  • View settings — a panel beside the board: Group by (swimlanes), Column sums, Card fields with a live preview, WIP limits of every column in one list, and Auto-refresh. Every change shows at once and is kept with Save changes.

Permissions and data

  • Issues stay in Jira. The app changes them through Jira’s REST API as you; every change is in the issue history.
  • Stored by the app: your profiles, view tabs and shared views, in the app’s Forge storage inside your Atlassian site. Nothing is sent outside Atlassian.
  • Permissions: read and write Jira work, read users and groups, app storage, Jira configuration (to list group members), and — for ranking and the Sprints view — Jira Software’s board, sprint and rank permissions. Without Jira Software, everything except ranking and Sprints works.
  • On uninstall the saved profiles and views are removed; your priority changes stay in Jira.

See the privacy policy.

Troubleshooting

  • An issue is missing — it has no priority, a filter hides it (Clear filters), or more than 1,000 issues match.
  • A priority change fails — the Priority field is not on that issue type’s edit screen.
  • The order inside a column does not stick — ranking needs Jira Software, and your permission to rank in the project.
  • “Issues could not be loaded: …” — press Retry. “Profiles could not be loaded” — press Try again; nothing is lost.
  • Dark mode — the board follows Jira’s theme.

Still stuck? Contact support.