Are you sick of Jira test management solutions? You’re not alone. I speak to dozens of businesses monthly across all different sectors. Many have been forced to use Jira for test management. The more positive people I talk to say it is okay at best.
Most actively dislike it and I am yet to meet a tester who thinks Jira is great for their needs.
Yet, an uncomfortable number of testers have been pushed into using Jira because the developers chose it. Their opposition often falls on deaf ears. If they are heard, the common counterargument is something along the lines of…
“It has bug-tracking capabilities. What more do testers need?”
True, test professionals aren’t needy people; we’re used to doing more with less, but come on. The bare minimum we need is a fit-for-purpose test management tool, and Jira, even with the available plugins, is not it.
Is The Tide Turning?
Thankfully, it appears that times are changing. I’ve noticed a groundswell of anti-Jira sentiment among my customers and the broader market.
I hear growing frustrations from devs, PMs and budget stakeholders around Jira’s pricing, licensing model, and capability. Plus, in recent years, there have been several high-profile software issues:
- Repeated outages
- A log4j security vulnerability that took 11 months to resolve
- Cybersecurity concerns
Jira-Based Test Management: Hidden Costs and Frustrations
But back to Jira’s test management capabilities, and just a little digging quickly uncovers some fundamental issues and challenges.
1. You Pay for Add-ons You Don’t Use
Jira was built to track development work, not to manage complex test processes.
Many teams add plugins like Zephyr or Xray to fill the gaps. But here’s the catch: licensing for these add-ons is typically tied to the total number of Jira users, not just your testers.
For example, if you have a team of 50 developers and 10 testers, you must buy 60 licences.
That means you’re paying for test management features for everyone, even if only a small fraction of your team is doing testing.
2. Limited Capabilities and Clunky Workflows
While plugins like Zephyr and Xray add some test management features, they’re far from comprehensive:
- Limited test case organisation: Jira lacks the hierarchical structure and grouping options testers need, making it hard to maintain a clear, reusable library of test cases.
- Poor support for different testing styles: Exploratory, BDD, and data-driven testing are awkward to implement and often require custom workarounds.
- Manual, error-prone execution: Testers frequently have to update statuses by hand, with little real-time visibility into overall progress.
- Poor automation support: Integrating automated tests is cumbersome, and results are often siloed from manual testing efforts.
- Weak reporting and traceability: Jira doesn’t provide built-in reports for test coverage or requirement traceability, making audits and compliance a headache.
3. Miserly Execution Limits and Performance Risks
Zephyr, for example, enforces strict execution limits, starting at 100 test executions and 600 automated test runs per month with Zephyr Scale Automate, even for teams running modern CI/CD pipelines.
This execution cap is shockingly low for any organisation practising continuous integration.
Then, as your test data grows, Jira’s performance can degrade for everyone, not just testers. At scale, test management add-ons can cause Jira to slow down or even crash, disrupting your entire software delivery pipeline.
4. User Experience and Support Shortfalls
Zephyr and Xray have been criticised for their unintuitive interfaces, slow performance with large datasets, and slow support response times—all of which sap productivity and frustrate teams.
5. People Are The Real Cost
It’s tempting to focus on the sticker price of new tools (notwithstanding point 1 above!), but the real cost is your team’s time.
Every hour spent wrestling with Jira plugins, manually updating statuses, or waiting for reports is money lost.
Plus, when people cost more than tools, why would you use something that costs your team time, rather than a tool that boosts their productivity?
Professional Test Tools: Better, Faster, Smarter
This growing dissatisfaction with Jira is the perfect time to explore affordable, best-in-class, professional test management solutions.
Specifically, modern test management platforms like:
- OpenText Software Delivery Management (Octane/Value Edge Quality)
- OpenText Application Quality Management (ALM/Quality Center)..
These dedicated, proven tools were built explicitly for testing test management and deliver:
- Centralised, real-time dashboards for quality and risk across all projects—no more cobbling together spreadsheets or hunting through Jira issues.
- Advanced reporting and traceability out of the box, making audits and compliance straightforward.
- Seamless integration with Jira: If your developers want to keep Jira, that’s fine—the OpenText tools synchronise requirements, defects, and user stories with Jira. In real time.
- Scalability and performance: Purpose-built storage and architecture allow you to scale your testing without affecting your entire project management system.
- AI-powered productivity: The latest OpenText Test Management Tools bring generative AI, helping you generate test cases, analyse results, and identify risks faster. AI-driven features can automate repetitive tasks and spot anomalies. They even suggest and build tests to improve coverage.
The Bottom Line
Jira may be a solid choice for issue tracking and Agile development, but it is not a test management tool, even with plugins.
As testing becomes more complex and business-critical, just okay isn’t good enough. Modern, AI-powered test management platforms offer better visibility, efficiency, and integration without the hidden costs and headaches.
Here’s the thing, though—If your developers insist on keeping Jira, that’s okay.
OpenText Software Delivery Management and Application Quality Management integrate seamlessly with Jira, allowing each team to use the best tool for its job.
It’s time to demand more than just okay. It’s time to invest in tools that will allow your testers—and your business—to thrive.
