Plans 💳 : Premium, Unlimited, Unlimited+
User Permissions 👥: Employees*, Managers*, Admins
Optional Add-ons: Tasks*
Overview
If your team works in Jira but tracks time in Timely, this integration is here to save your sanity.
Instead of bouncing between tools or duplicating work, the Jira sync integration pipes key data straight into Timely - so your timeline stays accurate, your projects stay organized, and your team doesn’t have to lift a finger (well, maybe just few).
Once connected, Jira projects, tasks, users, and more flow into Timely automatically. Tasks show up as Memories on your timeline, so logging time against actual work is a breeze. You can also map tasks to the right clients and teams, keeping your timesheets clean, tidy, and ready to report on.
Whether you’re juggling client deliverables, managing multiple teams, or just trying to keep your tools in sync, this integration is designed to simplify your workflow - not complicate it.
Table of Contents
🙋 FAQs
🛠️ What does it sync?
Projects – Automatically imported from Jira.
Clients – Jira workspaces become Timely clients (fallback client configurable).
Users – Imported only if they authenticate via Timely and/or have public email visibility configured in their Atlassian profile.
Tags and Teams – Coming soon!
Tasks as Memories – Work done on Jira tasks shows up on your Timely timeline, linked and attached to your time entries.
🆕 Hours – With new two way sync capabilities, the work you assign
🔌 How to connect Jira to Timely - Workspace Admin
Connecting your organization’s Jira instance to Timely is quick and easy - but there are two parts to this integration:
A workspace-wide connection (set up by an admin)
An individual user connection (after the admin setup is complete)
Let’s walk through the admin setup first:
Log into your Timely workspace and navigate to the Settings > Ecosystem area
In the Next-Gen Integrations category you'll see the new enhanced Jira connector
After clicking the Jira option click the "Connect workspace with Jira" button
If not already logged in, you'll be asked to enter in your Atlassian credentials
Next, you'll be prompted to approve the necessary permissions that allow data to flow between your Jira instance and Timely
You'll see the option to select which Jira instance to connect to Timely, if you have more than one
Once selected, scroll down to the very bottom and click the "Accept" button to proceed
🛑 STOP! Once your Jira instance has been successfully connected you'll be prompted with a screen titled "What Jira data are you interested in?" - make sure that the toggle for the desired Jira instance is ON and click the "configure" button to select or de-select the desired projects for sync.
🛑 If you skip this step, all available projects within the Jira instance will sync by default. Click the "Done" button once you've made your selections
If everything looks good so far, go ahead and click the "Next" button to proceed
⚠️ Now you'll be prompted to confirm how Timely will use the data and objects imported from Jira
By default this integration will create projects in Timely based on those projects within Jira
Reference Jira issues when logging time to projects imported
Create clients from Jira organizations
Jira changes will be imported to Timely in "real time"
All admins can access imported data
Additional settings as displayed during setup
To deviate from the defaults, click the "Change Settings" button to customize those options
When prompted select or deselect the objects and data you'd like to keep in sync
Select your fallback option if the client object relationship is unclear from Jira
For more advanced options
Configure if you'd like to enable "real time" updates between Jira and Timely, keeping everything in sync constantly
Restrict imported data to authenticated users
🛑 STOP! If this option is disabled, users in workspace will be able to see all imported objects, regardless if they are personally assigned to that project or task
Once configured, click "Ok" to save your selections
If everything looks good and you're ready to proceed, click the "Synchronize with Jira" button to finalize setup
✅ You're all set! It may take several minutes for the initial sync to take place, you can click the "Continue while import runs in the background" button to return to the Ecosystem tab and work normally while this process completes.
Click the "Complete Jira Setup" button to leave the import menu
🔁 Need to make a change to your setup? Clicking the Jira integration and then "Manage workspace integration" will allow you to make adjustments. Note that only the original authorizing admin can make those adjustments moving forward.
🔌 How to connect Jira to Timely - Personal Integration (Employees, Managers)
If you enabled the “Restrict imported data to authenticated users” option during setup, each user in the workspace will need to connect their own Jira account in order to view or interact with synced Jira objects.
Log into your Timely workspace and navigate to the Settings > Ecosystem area
In the Next-Gen Integrations category you'll see the new enhanced Jira connector
After clicking the Jira option click the "Set up personal integration" button
Click the "Authenticate with Jira" button to proceed
Next, you'll be prompted to approve the necessary permissions that allow data to flow between your Jira profile and Timely
You'll see the option to select which Jira instance to connect to Timely, if you have more than one
Once selected, scroll down to the very bottom and click the "Accept" button to proceed
✅ You're all set! It may take several minutes for the initial sync to take place, you can click the "Continue while import runs in the background" button to return to the Ecosystem tab and work normally while this process completes.
📈 Your Jira timeline experience
Now that you have Jira connected you can expect to see various updates from Jira right alongside your other memories in Timely. Memories will be created on the timeline of the user who interacts with with a Jira issue - including creating, updating, commenting on and logging time to an issue using Jira's work log feature.
As you select your Jira memories you'll also see that you can choose to associate that work with a specific issue ID imported from Jira. Timely will provide helpful suggestions, you'll just want to make sure you select the appropriate task before finalizing your entry.
➡️ It's an important step to associate your time entry with a specific Jira task, as this is required to report on the time you spend on Jira issues from Timely, including the export options mentioned in detail below.
📊 Exporting and reporting on Jira time entries
You've logged your hours and now you'd like to deep dive into your data - great! You can leverage the powerful export features in Timely to generate a comprehensive file containing the hours you've logged from Jira. You'll see a new option in the CSV and Excel export menu to create a column with those linked Jira Issue IDs for easy reference:
🧠 Behind the scenes (for the curious)
Made a change in Jira but not seeing it show up in Timely right away? Some of our sync tasks run quietly in the background on a set schedule - this helps keep your data in sync without overloading Jira’s APIs. So don’t worry if updates take a little time to appear!
Task | Frequency | Purpose |
Sync Webhooks | Hourly | Refreshes webhooks before expiry |
Sync Projects | Every 15 mins | Keeps project data fresh |
Sync Tasks (legacy) | Daily @ 2am | Backup sync task (not always used) |
Sync Identities | Every 6 hours | Brings in newly added users (with public email) |
🆕 Sync hours back to Jira (two-way sync)
We’ve leveled up the Jira integration! 🎉
You can now sync time entries from Timely back to Jira, so within a few moments your logged hours show up as Jira worklogs automatically—no extra steps, no switching tabs, no copy-pasting.
This enhancement is perfect for teams who report time in Timely but still need those hours visible in Jira for billing, time tracking, or reporting. It keeps everyone (and every tool) on the same page.
How it works:
When this feature is enabled any eligible time entry in Timely will be sent to the linked Jira issue as a worklog, including:
Start time
Duration (rounded to the nearest minute)
Description (added as a comment)
Project (based on task reference)
Jira will calculate end times automatically based on the start + duration—no need to set those manually.
Once synced, you’ll see a status icon on the time entry in Timely confirming the sync, plus a direct link to the Jira worklog. 🧩
What makes a time entry eligible?
Not all time entries are sent to Jira. To be eligible:
You must have Jira sync enabled in your integration settings.
The time entry must be linked to a Jira task/issue.
It must have at least 1 minute of logged time (drafts and zero-duration entries won’t sync).
The user who created the time entry must have connected their own Jira account in Timely. (You can’t create Jira worklogs on behalf of others!)
What gets updated?
Timely is the source of truth for hours logged, so any changes made in Timely will reflect in Jira. That includes:
Action | Response |
Editing a synced entry (duration, description, start time) | ✔️ Jira worklog gets updated |
Deleting a synced entry | ✔️ It’s removed from Jira |
Reassigning a time entry in Company View | ✔️ The original worklog is removed, a new one is created for the reassigned user (as long as both users have connected their Jira accounts) |
Important Note: If you change the task reference, like moving hours from one Jira issue to another, we’ll delete the original Jira worklog and create a new one on the updated task. If you remove the task reference entirely, the corresponding worklog is also removed from Jira.
You can expect the following items to sync FROM Timely TO Jira:
Timely | Jira Worklog | Synced |
Duration | Time spent | ✅ |
Start time | Started | ✅ |
Description | Comment | ✅ |
End Time | ⚠️ Inferred from Start Time + Duration | ❌ |
Tags | ⚠️ Not currently supported | ❌ |
Project | ⚠️ Determined by the Task's parent object | ❌ |
Important Setup Information
The two way sync relies on a per-user connection. Even if your workspace admin has connected the Jira integration, each individual team member must still connect their own Jira account if they want their time entries to sync. See the instructions for both connection steps above.
Pro tip: If your Jira worklogs look empty, double check that your Jira account is connected under Settings > Ecosystem > Next-Gen Integrations > Jira in your personal Timely account.
🙋 FAQs
I've logged hours to a Jira task in Timely but don't see those hours reflected in Jira?
Currently, time entries created in Timely don’t sync back to Jira—it’s a one-way sync from Jira into Timely only.
Do tasks show up on my timeline automatically?
Yep! If you’re working on a Jira task, it’ll appear on your Timely timeline as a memory, ready to log.
What if my hours fail to sync back to Jira?
If something goes wrong (e.g. your Jira login expired, or you don’t have permission to log time on a specific issue), we’ll mark the entry with a sync error and explain what happened—no guessing required.
You might see statuses like:
• Pending – Waiting to sync
• Syncing – Currently processing
• Synced – All good!
• Auth required – Reconnect your Jira account
• Failed – Something’s gone wrong; check the error message for next steps
I've deleted a worklog in Jira and it keeps popping back up?!
With two-way sync enabled, Timely is the source of truth for those hours logged against that specific linked item. So you would need to delete the hours in Timely first, to prevent it from syncing back over to Jira.
Need more help?
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