🐢Tired of stuck work items? Try the Time in Status report for Jira 📊🚀

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Every Agile team knows the frustration of work items getting stuck in limbo. Perhaps a story sits in “In Review” for days, or tasks linger in “Blocked” without anyone noticing. These hidden bottlenecks slow down delivery and leave Scrum Masters and Project Managers guessing.

This is where a Time in Status report comes in – it shows exactly how long each issue spends in each status, making delays glaringly obvious.

👉 Check out this interactive Time in Status report example to see it in action.

Let’s explore why Jira’s native tools don’t quite cut it, and how this report fills the gap.

The limitations of Jira’s native chart

Jira has a few built-in options like the Control Chart and Average Time in Status gadget, but they fall short when it comes to detailed time-in-status analysis.

Here’s what you’re missing:

❌ No full status breakdown – You can’t see how long issues have spent in each status over time. Just averages.

❌ No grouping or customization – Can’t group statuses like “Code Review” + “QA” into “Waiting”.

❌ Static & not interactive – No drill-down by issue or assignee. You’re stuck with static, high-level trends.

❌ Setup is clunky – The Average Time in Status gadget requires extra configuration and still lacks flexibility.

👉 In short, Jira’s native charting gadgets leave teams with blind spots. So, how can we do better? 🤔

Powerful alternative: Time in Status report by Broken Build 🚀

Say hello to the Time in Status report – a simple yet powerful Jira dashboard gadget that fills the gaps left by Jira’s defaults. This report is part of the Agile Cycle Time Chart app and is designed to be highly configurable, putting you in control.

It visualizes exactly how long issues spend in each status, addressing the pain points we listed above. No more one-size-fits-all: you choose the project or filter, the statuses to group, and the time frame. This Jira Time in Status chart gadget makes it easy to spot where work is getting stuck and helps your team take action to rebalance workloads.

Importantly, the Time in Status report aligns with key jobs-to-be-done for different Agile roles:

✅ Scrum Masters can use it to identify bottlenecks and facilitate retrospectives with data.

✅ Team Leads get a clear view to balance team workload, ensuring no one is overloaded or blocked.

✅ Program Managers gain insights across multiple teams, seeing how long work takes in each stage to improve cross-team coordination. In other words, this report empowers everyone to keep the delivery pipeline flowing smoothly.

Time in Status report: Key Features & JTBD

To understand how this report improves your workflow, let’s look at its standout features and what you can achieve with each.

⚡ 1. Total Time in Status across completed issues

This feature shows the total amount of time completed tasks are in each status over a chosen period. The report displays a stacked bar chart by time intervals (e.g., weeks), where each stack segment represents a status. The chart updates over time, so you can track whether those bottlenecks are growing or shrinking each interval.

💡 Why it’s useful:

• Instant bottleneck spotting – Quickly see which statuses (like “Code Review” or “QA”) consume the most time.

• Track trends over time – Watch how delays increase or shrink interval by interval.

• Highlight red flags – For example, too much time in “Dev Done” means work is ready but not released.

It provides big-picture visibility into your team’s throughput. You’re no longer guessing which part of your process is a problem – the chart highlights it. Teams can then focus their continuous improvement efforts on the right spot (e.g., streamlining code reviews if that’s where time accumulates). In short, it makes bottlenecks immediately visible so you can address them proactively.

🔄 2. Multiple chart views: Absolute,%Ratio, and Average

One view doesn’t fit all. The Time in Status report offers three perspectives: Absolute time, Percentage (ratio), and Average time per status.

In Absolute mode, you see raw time spent (e.g., 10 days in “Development”). Switch to Ratio view to see the percentage of time each status took within each period – great for comparing where time goes relative to total cycle time. Or use the Average view to see the average time in status for issues per period, which helps normalize for workload size and spot outliers.

💡Why it’s useful:

• See raw time clearly – Get exact durations like “10 days in QA” to gauge impact.

• Compare across intervals – Ratio% view highlights shifts in time allocation interval by interval.

• Spot outliers fast – Average view shows which periods deviate from the norm.

The ability to toggle views means you’re not stuck with one metric. Absolute times show impact in concrete terms, percentage shows balance and expose hidden imbalances, and average time in status reveals trends and outliers for continuous improvement. It’s like having three reports in one – catering to team members, stakeholders, and managers who might each care about a different angle of the data.

🎯 3. Flexible issue states (Completed, Created, Open, Status Changed)

The report isn’t limited to completed work items. You can choose which issue state to analyze during the reporting period:

1️⃣ Completed issues: Focus on items finished in the time frame, to see how their journey went (default mode).

2️⃣ Status-changed issues: Analyze any issues that transitioned between statuses in the period, even if they didn’t start or finish, capturing mid-flight work.

3️⃣ Created issues: Track new work introduced, to see how quickly fresh issues move through statuses.

4️⃣ Open issues: Look at items still in progress (not done yet), spotlighting where current work might be stuck.

💡 Why it’s useful:

• Target any stage of work – From new backlog items to stuck in-progress issues

• Analyze before completion – Spot blockers without waiting for resolution

• Tailor by role – Scrum Masters, PMs, and leads each get insights that matter to them

It gives you versatility in analysis. You’re not constrained to only finished work. By switching states, you can catch problems early (with open or newly created issues) as well as retrospectively (with completed issues).

⏱️ 4. Custom status grouping (“In Progress” vs “Waiting”)

Not all statuses are equal – some mean active work, others mean waiting or blocked. This feature lets you group your workflow statuses into high-level buckets like “In Progress” and “Waiting”. For example, you might group “In progress” and “Dev Done” under “In Progress”, and group “To do” and “Done” under “Waiting”. On the chart, the time spent is then visualized in two stacked sections per interval: one for all In Progress time and one for all Waiting time.

💡Why it’s useful:

• Clarify where time goes – Instantly see how much time is spent actively working vs. waiting

• Focus your team’s attention – Highlight the balance between progress and idle stages

• Simplify complex workflows – Combine many statuses into clear, high-level categories

• Standardize reports across teams – Normalize workflows into common buckets for easier comparison

This makes it much easier to explain where time is going – are things mostly “In Progress” or do they spend half the time “Waiting”? By highlighting progress vs friction, teams focus on what matters.

🔍 5. Hierarchical breakdown

The Time in Status report isn’t just a static chart – it’s interactive. You can drill down into the data to see finer details. The breakdown hierarchy goes like this:

1️⃣ Status group (e.g. click on the “In progress” portion of a bar),

2️⃣ Individual status within that group (e.g., “In Progress”, “Dev Done”),

3️⃣ List of stories that contributed to the time for that status,

4️⃣ Assignees for each story.

It provides full transparency and accountability. Instead of abstract averages, you get concrete examples to act on.

💡Why it’s useful: No more guessing - just click, explore, and get to the root cause in seconds.

📋 6. Detailed issue breakdown with flexible columns

Alongside the chart, the report provides a table of issues with time-in-status details. This table lists each issue and exactly how long it spent in each status. You can also see the number of times it transitioned (e.g., how many times it went in and out of a status). Plus, the table is customizable – you can add columns like Epic Link, Project, Priority, or any field that helps your analysis.

💡 Why it’s useful: It gives teams the data behind the charts. While the visual graph is great for spotting trends, the issue list provides evidence and specifics. It highlights which issues contributed most to a given status’s time, helping you spot patterns (e.g., a certain type of task always gets stuck).

Wrap-up: All these features work together to make the Time in Status report an incredibly comprehensive tool for workflow transparency. It’s simple enough for anyone to read at a glance, yet powerful enough to answer detailed questions about your process. Whether your goal is to reduce waiting time, balance team workload, or improve predictability, this report provides the data to back your decisions.

How Time in Status report works in action (Interactive example)

It’s one thing to talk about it – it’s another to see it live. We’ve prepared an interactive example of the Time in Status report on our website. In this example, you can play with the actual gadget as if it’s on your Jira dashboard. Adjust the settings and watch the chart update instantly.

Essentially, it’s a fully working Time in Status chart gadget that you can test-drive, demonstrating exactly how the report would behave with your own data.

👉 Try it yourself: Check out the interactive example of the Time in Status report and see firsthand how it can highlight stuck work and streamline your workflow.

Don’t just take our word for it; experience it! 🚀

Time in Status report: Pro tips

Before you dive in, here are a few pro tips to get the most out of your new Time in Status chart:

• 💡 Combine with other reports: Add the Time in Status gadget alongside other Jira dashboard gadgets (like the Agile Velocity Chart Gadget or Agile Burnup Burndown Charts) to get a 360° view. For example, use Time in Status to spot bottlenecks and a Burnup chart to see how those bottlenecks impact scope delivery.

• 💡 Focus on problem statuses: Configure the gadget’s settings to display only the statuses that matter most. If you know “Blocked” and “In Review” are your usual culprits, zero in on those. This way, the time in status graph highlights exactly what you need to monitor, cutting out noise from stages that aren’t pain points.

• 💡 Watch the ratios for improvement: When you start using the report, take note of your typical “In Progress vs Waiting” ratio. Over time, aim to shrink the waiting portion. The Ratio view is great for this – it lets you celebrate improvements (e.g., waiting time dropping from 40% to 20% of cycle time) or catch regressions early. Make it a team goal to improve this metric interval over interval!

• 💡 Use it in retrospectives: Bring the Time in Status data into your retrospective meetings. The visual nature of the Time in status graph in the Jira dashboard makes it easy to discuss. Using real data fosters constructive, objective conversations on process improvement.

These tips will help you unlock even more value from the Time in Status gadget. It’s a versatile tool – with a little creativity, you can adapt it to many scenarios to continuously optimize your Jira workflow.

How to set up Time in Status report on your Jira Dashboard

Getting started with the Time in Status report is quick and easy. In just a few steps, you’ll have the gadget up and running on your Jira dashboard, ready to shine a spotlight on stuck work items. Here’s how to set it up:

1. 🗓️ Go to your Jira Dashboard: Navigate to the dashboard where you want to add the Time in Status report (or create a new dashboard for this purpose).

2. ➕ Click “Add gadget”: In the dashboard menu, select the option to add a new gadget. This opens the gadget directory where you can search among the available items.

3. 🔎 Search for “Agile Cycle Time Chart”: In the search bar, type Agile Cycle Time Chart. This is the gadget that includes the Time in Status report functionality.

4. 📊 Add the gadget and configure it: Click “Add” next to the Agile Cycle Time Chart gadget. The gadget will be added to your dashboard. Now, configure it to display a Time in Status report: choose your project or filter, pick the time interval (e.g. last 4 weeks), and select the statuses or status groups you want to track.

5. 💾 Save and view the report: Once configured, save the gadget settings. You should now see the Time in Status chart gadget on your dashboard, populated with your data. Take a moment to verify everything looks right (the chart, the drill-down ability, the issue table). You can always click the gadget’s edit icon to adjust filters or options as needed.

That’s it! 🎉 You now have a working Time in Status chart in your Jira dashboard. Going forward, this gadget will update automatically with the latest data, so your team can continuously monitor and react to any signs of work getting stuck.

Wrap-up

Overall, tracking Jira time in status helps teams become more proactive and improve their processes continuously. The result? Faster delivery and fewer surprises. Even team morale gets a boost, because there’s less frustration with “stuck” work and more celebrating improvements when those bars start shrinking!

Ready to transform how you track work in Jira? Try the Agile Cycle Time Chart app (which includes the Time in Status report as a separate chart option) or get the whole Agile Reports & Gadgets bundle to supercharge your dashboards. Both options give you the Time in Status report and more, helping you build out a robust reporting toolkit for Agile teams.

👉 See it in action: Don’t forget to check out our interactive example of the Report for time in status. It’s a live demo that lets you experience the gadget’s capabilities with real data scenarios. Play with it, share it with your team, and envision how it could fit into your daily workflow.

Stop letting work items stay hidden in the shadows of your workflow. It’s time to shine a light on them with the Time in Status report for Jira – and keep your team’s productivity on track! 🎉🚀