Jira issue template apps compared, November 2026: prices, data handling, fields and hierarchies for twelve apps

Choosing an issue-template app for Jira Cloud means reading eleven listings that all say "templates". We read them, their documentation and their reviews, pulled the prices from the Marketplace API, and put it all in two tables. We make one of the twelve, so the method is written down, our own gaps are in the same table, and the corrections address is at the bottom.

By Rolf Eriksen Published 3 November 2026 16 min read

Listings, documentation and prices read on 21 October 2026; our own column at version 2.14.0, 3 November 2026 · We make one of these apps (disclosure)

• If every new work item of a type should start with the same text, you may not need an app: a team-managed space can give a work type a default description. The guide to Jira's own options covers that, block templates, Automation and Clone.
• If you need a structure, an epic with its tasks and sub-tasks made the same way every time, Jira's Clone and Automation get part of the way and an app gets the rest. Eleven of the twelve apps here create hierarchies; they differ in depth, in what they fill, and in what happens when a child cannot be created.
• Decide four things before you read the tables: whether the app may write into the Create dialog on its own, who creates the work items and with whose permissions, where the template data lives, and what it costs at your seat count. Those four separate the twelve more than any feature list.
• Every app here has a 30-day evaluation, and most are free on a site with up to ten users, so the cheapest way to decide is a small test space and the checks at the end of this page.

The twelve are the issue-template apps for Jira Cloud with the most installs on 21 October 2026, found through the Marketplace's own search for "issue templates", "templates", "subtask templates", "epic templates" and "default values", plus Templify and the category's most-installed app, which that search does not return. Clone apps and checklist apps are not here; they solve adjacent problems.

Prices, ratings and review counts come from the Marketplace APIs (/rest/2/addons, /pricing/cloud/live, /reviews). Features come from each vendor's documentation and listing, read on that day. Where the documentation did not say, the cell says not stated; we did not guess, and we did not install the other eleven apps to find out. Our own column is from our documentation and code at version 2.14.0. Vendors change their apps every month, so treat every cell as "true on the date given" and check the listing before you buy. If a cell about your app is wrong, the address at the bottom reaches a person.

1. May the app write into the Create dialog by itself?

Seven of the twelve fill Jira's Create dialog automatically once a work type is chosen, through Atlassian's UI modifications. It is the most-praised feature in the category's reviews ("loaded for everyone"), and the source of its sharpest complaints, because Jira can re-run an app's code on a form that already holds text, for example when a minimised dialog is restored or the work type is changed. One vendor documents the protections it added against overwriting typed text; a 2024 review of another says the app "blows away your issue summary and description". The other five, ours included, do not write into the form: a person picks the template and Jira's dialog opens filled in, or the dialog names the default and the person opens it. Decide which you want before anything else, because it is a design choice no setting changes.

2. Who creates the work items, and what happens when one fails?

A template with children creates several work items in a row. Ask whether they are created by Jira as the person (so Jira's permissions, required fields and workflow apply, and the person is the reporter) or by the app as itself, and what happens when the third of eight fails because a work type was renamed or a field became required. The reviews that cost apps their stars in 2026 are about exactly this: children "created out of order", "orphaned child tickets", and setups lost. The honest answers are "it stops and tells you", "it resumes without duplicates" or "it is not transactional"; one vendor's documentation says the last of these.

3. Where does the template data live, and what leaves Atlassian?

The Runs on Atlassian badge means the app's compute and storage are on Atlassian's platform and nothing is sent outside it; nine of the twelve show it. One app keeps template definitions on a server in Frankfurt, one processes templates on the vendor's own servers, and one sends usage analytics to a third-party service unless it is switched off. Data residency, which pins app data to your Jira site's region, is supported by some and stated as unsupported by one. The install screen lists every permission scope the app asks for; across the twelve the count runs from six to twenty.

4. What does it cost at your seat count?

Prices are per Jira user, and every app has the same shape: free up to ten users, then a monthly rate for 11 to 100, then falling rates. At 50 users the twelve cost between nothing and USD 540 a year; at 500, between USD 1,085 and 2,690. Two vendors sell a Standard and an Advanced edition, and some features in the tables below belong to the Advanced one.

Reading across: the five leaders all set assignee, components, custom fields and due dates and fill the Create dialog automatically; four have a trust programme behind them; their documentation says little about version history. Ours matches them on fields since 2.9.0 and custom fields since 2.10.0, does not fill the dialog by itself, keeps fifty versions of each template, and has no trust programme and no reviews yet.

Reading across: this is where the differences in data handling are. One app has no Runs on Atlassian badge and keeps template definitions outside Atlassian; one is free and fills defaults only; two are built around a manual picker rather than automatic fill. Several have documentation gaps large enough that a trial is the only way to know.

Ours is the cheapest paid app up to 100 users and the second cheapest from 500, where a defaults-only app without hierarchies is cheaper. Price is the easiest column to read and the least useful on its own: an app that creates orphaned children costs more than the difference between any two rows here. Read it last.

We read the twenty most recent reviews of each app. The praise is consistent: fast support and calls with the vendor, project administrators managing their own templates without a Jira administrator, defaults "automatically loaded for everyone", and an app replacing a script someone had to maintain. The complaints repeat too, and they are the better guide to what to test:

• Children created out of order, or orphaned when a step failed part-way.
• Text typed into the Create dialog replaced by the template when the form was re-rendered.
• Templates that stopped working after a work type or field changed, found weeks later.
• An app asking for far more permissions than its job needs.
• No support for service projects, discovered after purchase.
• Only Jira administrators able to manage templates.
• A template holding only summary and description, so creation failed on required fields.

Every one of those is checkable in a trial. None of them is visible in a feature table, ours included.

1. Order and parents. On a throwaway space, make a template with an epic, three tasks and two sub-tasks each, use it twice, and check the keys arrive in template order under the right parents.
2. A failure half-way. Make a field required on the third task's work type, use the template again, and see what the app does: stops and says why, resumes without duplicates, or leaves a half-built tree.
3. Your own text. If the app fills the Create dialog by itself, type a summary, minimise the dialog, restore it, and change the work type. Your text should survive all three.
4. Drift. Rename a work type the template uses, or take a field off the create screen, and see whether the app tells you, and when.
5. The install screen. Count the permission scopes and read what each one is for; the listing's Privacy & Security tab has the vendor's answers on storage, residency and retention.
6. Who may manage. Sign in as a project administrator who is not a Jira administrator and try to make, change and delete a template.
7. Moving house. If you have a second site, export from one and import into the other.

We make Issue Templates & Create Defaults for Jira, released in September 2026 and at version 2.14.0 as this page is written. Against the eleven others, read from the same documentation, this is where it leads and where it trails. Both lists are facts about the apps, not opinions about them.

Where it leads

• It never writes into the Create dialog. A pick on the Templates page opens Jira's own dialog filled in; the dialog names the default template under Summary; what a person types is never touched. That is a design choice made after we measured the re-render problem ourselves, and it means no automatic fill.
• Children in order, with recovery. Every child's work type is checked before anything is created; items are created one at a time in template order; a refused item stops the run with Jira's reason, and the run resumes without duplicates or skips that item.
• Data handling. Runs on Atlassian, data residency supported, nothing sent outside Atlassian, no usage tracking, six permission scopes, two of them unused and declared so. The trust center has the questionnaire answers.
• A daily check. It tests every template against its spaces each day and lists what stopped working, with an optional alert work item. We found no equivalent in the other eleven's documentation.
• Version history with restore, fifty versions a template, and a 30-day bin for deleted templates.
• Price. The cheapest paid app up to 100 users; second from 500.

Where it trails

• No automatic fill. If you want the form filled the moment a work type is chosen, seven other apps do that and ours does not.
• No Jira Service Management portal. It works in a service project's agent view; customers on the portal do not see templates.
• No REST API, no attachments, no conditional logic, no initiative level. Two actions for Jira Automation exist; the rest do not.
• No audit log and no group permissions. It records nothing about who did what, by design, and permissions are Jira's own: Jira administrators and project administrators.
• Caps. 200 templates a site, 50 spaces a template, 100 work items a template. One competitor's reviewer describes 1,200 templates and 150-item structures.
• No trust programme and no reviews yet. It is the newest app in the table, and no customer has reviewed it.

Marketplace Documentation

Four native routes exist, and for many teams one of them is enough: a default description per work type in a team-managed space; a block template inserted into a description by hand; an Automation rule that writes or creates from a template; and Clone, which on an epic can now include its child work items. Each stops somewhere, and the guide to Jira's own options walks through all four with Atlassian's pages as sources.

Which Jira issue template app is the cheapest?

At 50 users the twelve apps compared here cost between nothing and USD 540 a year (prices read from the Marketplace pricing API on 21 October 2026). One app is free. Among the paid apps, Issue Templates & Create Defaults is the cheapest up to 100 users and the second cheapest at 500 and 1,000 users, where a defaults-only app is cheaper. Every app here is free for a site with up to ten users.

Do these apps see my Jira data?

It depends on the app. Apps with the Runs on Atlassian badge keep all compute and storage on Atlassian and send nothing outside it. Of the twelve, one keeps template definitions on a server outside Atlassian, one processes templates on the vendor's servers, and one sends usage analytics to a third party unless switched off. Each app's listing has a Privacy & Security tab with the vendor's own answers.

Can I try an issue template app before paying?

Yes. Cloud apps paid through Atlassian come with a 30-day evaluation, and sites with up to ten users pay nothing at all, so a small test site can keep an app for good.

Does Jira Cloud have issue templates without an app?

Not as such. A team-managed space can give each work type a default description, block templates can be inserted into a description by hand, an Automation rule can write or create from a template, and Clone can copy a work item with its child work items. Each stops somewhere; the guide linked from this page walks through them.

What should I test in a trial?

Create a template with child work items on a throwaway space and check that the children arrive in order and under the right parent. Type into the Create dialog, minimise and restore it, and check your text is still there. Rename a work type the template uses and see whether the app tells you. Count the permission scopes on the install screen. Try export and import if you have more than one site.

• Jira issue templates in Jira Cloud: what Jira does on its own, where each option stops, and what an app adds.
• Jira epic template with stories and sub-tasks: an Automation rule that builds the breakdown, and three epics to copy.
• Jira templates with sub-tasks: the same sub-tasks on every work item of a kind.
• Trust center: what each of our apps can reach and stores, and the questionnaire answers given on the Marketplace.
• Issue Templates documentation: setup, fields, the daily check, limits and data.
• All guides.

Prices, ratings and review counts: the Atlassian Marketplace APIs (/rest/2/addons/{key}, /pricing/cloud/live, /reviews) and the Marketplace website's search, read on 21 October 2026. Features: each vendor's documentation and listing, read the same day, listed here by vendor. Our own column: our documentation and code at 2.14.0.

• Issue Templates & Create Defaults for Jira (ours) and its documentation (3 Nov 2026)
• Deviniti Issue Templates documentation: first steps, supported fields, default template, smart defaults, Jira Service Management, migration, permissions, reports, security statement (21 Oct 2026)
• Appsvio Issue Templates Agent documentation: create templates, supported fields, variables, Jira Service Management templates, permissions, import and export (21 Oct 2026)
• AppLiger Easy Issue Templates documentation: supported fields, permissions, audit log, template scope, integrations, the native Create screen integration (21 Oct 2026)
• Big Fig Tree Default Values documentation: limitations, UI modifications, the JSM portal page, and the 7.4.0 release notes (21 Oct 2026)
• Narva Issue Templates Pro documentation: creating a template, known issues and limitations (21 Oct 2026)
• Seibert Templating.app documentation: key features, issue templates, supported fields, permissions, description templates (21 Oct 2026)
• Big Fig Tree Issue Templates Picker documentation (21 Oct 2026)
• OST Process Templates documentation: prefilling the creation screen, privacy and security (21 Oct 2026)
• TitanApps Smart Templates documentation: supported fields, permissions, template history, and the 2.8.0 notes (21 Oct 2026)
• Terano Templify documentation: automatic fill, applying to an existing work item, import and export, permissions, FAQ (21 Oct 2026)
• AppsDelivered Smart Issue Templates documentation: known limitations, applying a template, permissions, history, migration, data security (21 Oct 2026)
• Runs on Atlassian (21 Oct 2026)
• Forge UI modifications for Jira (21 Oct 2026)

Changelog

• 3 November 2026. First version. Competitor facts as of 21 October 2026; our column at 2.14.0.

Corrections

None yet. If a cell about your app is wrong or out of date, email [email protected] with the documentation page that shows it, and we will change the cell and record the correction here.