Atlassian Projects are now native in Jira

[#1]

Hi everyone 👋

Some good news for our Projects app customers: as part of the Jira 2026 Summer Release, Atlassian Projects is now natively integrated into Jira. Connect your work items to real projects and see status, owners, and progress right where you work.

Your team's work lives in Jira, but the bigger questions have tended to live elsewhere. What are our key projects? Which work ties to which project? Are we on track? Atlassian Projects brings that context directly into Jira - a single, native connection between the work your team does every day and the projects that work supports.

How it works

1. Connect any work to a Project.

A new Project field on Jira work items lets you connect any work item to an Atlassian Project, regardless of work item type or which space it lives in. You can connect multiple work items to the same Project, and child work items automatically inherit the Project from their parent, so you’re not tagging everything by hand.

This is a meaningful change from the old Connect app setup, which only allowed a single epic per Project. Now, a Project can represent the full picture of work happening across your teams.

2. See project context where you’re working.

Hover over the Project field on any work item to get a preview card showing the project’s status, dates, owner, key contributors, and summary. If you need more detail, open the glance panel for a fuller view without leaving your work item - no more context-switching to figure out what a project is about, who owns it, or whether it’s on track.

3. Group and filter by Project.

In List or Board view, you can group all work items by Project. This is especially useful for team leads and managers who need to see how effort is distributed across projects, which items are in progress, and where things might be stacking up. It turns your view into a portfolio-level snapshot of what your team is working on.

The Project field also supports inline editing, so you can update project associations without opening each work item individually.

4. Filter and query with JQL.

The Project field works with JQL, which means you can build saved filters, custom views, and dashboards around specific work. If your team already relies on JQL for how they organize and triage work, the Project field fits right into that workflow.

How to get started

Before getting started: Admins will need to add the Atlassian Project field to work items in your Jira configuration. Once the field is enabled, team members can follow the steps below:

1. Open a Jira work item
2. Find the Project field in the detail view
3. Search for (or create) the Atlassian Project you want to connect it to

From the Projects app, you can also connect Jira work items directly, and changes stay in sync across both.

For admins: Before the Atlassian Project field can appear on a work item, it must first be added to the space. This is a one-time setup per space. Projects is org-scoped.

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Connect your Jira work to a Project and get a clear, shared view of how your most important work is tracking. Learn more here:

• Get started with Projects
• Use the Atlassian Project field in Jira
• Jira Summer Release 2026
• Launch notes

As always, if you have questions, feedback, or suggestions on how we can make Projects (and Goals!) better, drop a comment below.

Frequently asked questions

How is this different from Jira spaces?

Jira spaces are containers where teams organize and do the work. Atlassian Projects is a cross-product layer for initiatives with clear start/end dates, owners, goals, and status.

Spaces are for execution. Projects are for visibility.

Can I connect work items from different spaces to the same project?

Yes. You can connect work items of any type, from any space, to a single Atlassian Project.

What happened to the old Projects Connect app?

This native integration replaces the previous Connect-based setup. It’s simpler, doesn’t require a separate install, and works consistently across spaces.

[Paul Mazzuca]

Fantastic update! Would we expect the old integrated App to automatically be removed from existing screens or does an Admin need to take action to remove it in favor of the new field?

[Joseph Chung Yin]

Can't wait to test it out in our env.  Sounds very promising... Will post my findings/feedbacks in a week.

Best, Joseph

[Anika Rani]

@Paul Mazzuca great question! You don't need to take any manual action to remove the old integration, its taken care of on our end. You will need to add the new field to your work item configuration as mentioned in the post above. Let us know if you have any issues!