Watcher list

[Francesco Carullo MMS]

HI, I'm trying to understand how to set the way users are added to the watcher list. In this ticket there are 3 watchers and I cannot see any event that added them to the list. I'm also sure that nobody manually added them. I believe that comments add autoamtically users to the watcher list, but I'm not sure. I'd also like to understand if there are other events that may add users to the list. Where can I set this? Thanks, Francesco

[Walter Buggenhout]

Hi @Francesco Carullo MMS,

Users can manually decide to watch a work item by adding themselves as a watcher to it. But apart from that, there is also an auto-watch feature in Jira that adds users automatically as watchers when they actively interact with a work item. This happens when they create or interact with it (e.g by adding a comment).

This support article describes how you can modify the auto-watch settings, either globally for your entire site or as an individual user from your user profile settings.

Hope this helps! 

[Christos Markoulatos -Relational-]

Hi @Francesco Carullo MMS ,

Watchers in Jira Service Management can be added through several automatic mechanisms, which is likely why you're not seeing a clear audit trail for them.

The most common automatic triggers are: being the reporter or assignee of the issue (Jira adds these users as watchers by default based on your notification scheme settings), being mentioned in a comment, and yes, adding a comment does also add the commenter to the watcher list. Beyond that, project admins can configure notification schemes that auto-watch users when certain events occur, and automation rules can also add users to the watcher list as a post-action. To review and control this behavior, go to Project Settings, then Notifications, and check the notification scheme linked to that project. That scheme defines which events trigger watch/notification behavior. If you also have automation rules in place, it's worth checking under Project Settings and then Automation to see if any rules include an "Add watchers" action.

If after checking those settings you still can't trace how those three users ended up on the watcher list, the audit log in Atlassian Administration may have more detail, and raising a support ticket would be the best next step to get Atlassian eyes on the specific issue.

Hope this helps!