Can no longer create/assign Child tasks to Epics. August 6th 2025

[Alan Johnson]

We have been using the + button on Epics to create "Child work items" under the Epic or to make already created tasks into "Child work items" for the Epic. In the same vein, on a task, we were able to use the "Add Parent" button to select an Epic to add the task under.

Recently, these functions have stopped working and we don't know why. Help please!

P.S. - We are still able to create sub-tasks from tasks though.

Edit - changed "Project" to "Epic" to use Jira terms.

[Alan Johnson · Accepted solution]

We were able to figure it out. The problem was that with our License level, we were not suppose to be able to create our own custom Epic container (called DevProjects), but we did because our new-to-Jira person thought we had to. Now we used this custom Epic (DevProjects) container for all of our Development projects and were assigning/creating child tasks to them. But something changed, maybe a trial period ended, and suddenly we lost the ability to assign/create child tasks to them.

So the fix is to move all of the Epics from our custom Epic (DevProjects) type to the default Epic (Project) type. Once moved over (or a new Epic created) with the default Epic (Project) type, we are able to assign/create child tasks to the Epic.

[John Funk]

Hi Alan - Welcome to the Atlassian Community!

Is this happening on the same project? Or on another project? 

Did it start happening with the new Navigation that has been rolled out? 

[Alan Johnson]

As far as I can tell this is happening on all of our existing Projects. It was working last week and this week it is not.

[Alan Johnson]

This is what pops up when I try to put a Parent into the Parent Field of the Task.

[John Funk]

What work type are you doing this for? And at what level is that work type in the hierarchy? 

[Alan Johnson]

These questions had me confused for a bit. After some digging, it seems I was mixing my terminology bit.

For us in Jira:

1. We have created a Jira Project for each Dev Team.

2. For each Business Development Project assigned to our Dev Teams, we create an Epic under the appropriate Project in Jira.

3. Each Epic then has Tasks created under it.

4. Sometimes a Task needs one or more Sub-Tasks created.

The problem we are having is that we are no longer able to create Tasks (Children) in the Epic, nor are we able to tell a Task that it now has a specific Parent (Epic).

Sorry for the confusion.