"We couldn't connect to that work item." - issue loading tasks

[Wojciech Kosmala]

For the last couple of weeks, around 1/3 of the tasks I open result in the following error:

We couldn't connect to that work item.

Make sure that this work item actually exists in that space. If it does, try again in a few minutes. If you still can't link to the work item, contact your Jira admin.

Upon 2nd, sometimes 3rd try, they open fine.

I've already tried:

- connecting to a different Wi-Fi

- clearing cache

- removing cookies

- relogging to Atlassian

[Leigh Rushworth]

Hi, we've troubleshot this issue and for us it was related to the parent work items being in a resolved / done state.  Where the parent work item had a status change that triggered the automation to set it to a done state, but it still had unresolved child / linked work items it wouldn't open them correctly displaying the 'We couldn't connect to the work item' message.  Troubleshoot with two screens with alternate browsers helps.  I used MS Edge, Chrome and Safari (Mac).  It took a while :).  Look for resolved work items that appear with a Strikethrough font and reset their status to an Unresolved / Open state.  Hopefully this fixes the issue.  It has for us. 

[Shalini Pradhan]

Hello @Wojciech Kosmala ,

Good day! Welcome to Atlassian Community :)

Could you please tell us if this is happening only on your user account? I understand you have tried few troubleshooting steps, but I would request you to try out the following action plan step by step and see if that helps

Clear browser cache and cookies

1. Log out of your Atlassian account.
2. Clear all browser cache and cookies, not just cookies.
3. Log in to your Atlassian account and try to access Jira again and access the issues
4. Try in incognito mode as well

Disable all browser extensions and add-ons

1. Disable all browser extensions and add-ons.
2. Try to access Jira again and access the issues

Check for firewall

If your device or network has a firewall setup, I would request you to check if they have allowed connection to Atlassian's IP addresses. You can refer to the following document for more details:

• IP addresses and domains for Atlassian cloud products.

Allow 3rd party cookies

I would request you to follow the below steps (The steps are for Chrome but should be similar for other browsers):

1. Go to Chrome settings.
2. Go to Privacy and Security.
3. Click on Third-party cookies.
4. Select Allow third-party cookies.
5. Restart the browser and try to access Jira again.

Additionally, please ensure that you are using the latest version of one of the supported browsers listed here.

Thank you!

[Valerie Knapp]

Hi @Wojciech Kosmala , welcome to the Atlassian Community and thanks for your post.

Are you the only person using your site that has this problem?

A site to bookmark, if you haven't already, is this one - https://jira-software.status.atlassian.com/ . There have been some incidents recently impacting Jira, so it might be related to that, if you weren't having this problem before.

It sounds like you have tried already the standard troubleshooting solutions. I wanted to write because I was curious if others trying to use the Jira site are also experiencing this.

I look forward to your reply.

Best wishes

[Wojciech Kosmala]

There's at least 1 person seeing similiar errors in our company

[Valerie Knapp]

Hi @Wojciech Kosmala , thank you for your reply.

It sounds like this is a site-specific issue so I would ask that you report it to the service desk - https://support.atlassian.com/contact/ 

I have also flagged this post to Atlassian but the ticket would be the correct route so they can get the details of your site, etc.

Best wishes

[Leigh Rushworth]

We're also experiencing this issue, exactly as described above.  Multiple users.

[Matt Brown]

I'm getting this error with a specific issue that has sub tasks.  I can see the issue when I search the list view and the sub-tasks still have it as their parent, but when I go to view it I get the issue described above.

[Jared Cross]

We are having this same issue today.

All subtasks are unavailable with the "We couldn't connect to that work item." message.

I see from the status page at https://jira-software.status.atlassian.com that there was an incident earlier today (10/27/2025) that was apparently resolved, but this issue is ongoing if it was related to that status incident.

[Valerie Knapp]

Hi @Jared Cross , thanks for your post. There is still an active incident - https://status.atlassian.com/ so please keep an eye on status page for when it is resolved.

Sorry!