Question regarding moving project keys

Question

I have a project ABC that I want to move to DEF. I also have another project GHI that I want to move to ABC after I moved ABC to DEF. As per the documentation, it is not possible to create a new project with a previously used key (ABC) but can you move an existing project to a previously used key? I would assume not but just wanted to confirm.

Thanks!

Bentsion Berg · Answer

Thanks Mark.

My question was more around reusing the old key for an existing project as you cannot reuse a key for a new project.

So using key ABC for existing project GHI.

Thanks,

Ben

Mark Segall_deyzl9 · Answer

Hi Bentsion,

Correct. You cannot reuse a project key, but you can move issues in one project to another.  This can be done with a bulk action by running a an advanced issue query with the following steps:

* Run Query PROJECT = ABC
* Select Bulk Change from the top right menu
* Select all issues on the next screen and click Next
* Select Move Issues and click Next
* Select DEF project and any desired change to issue type and Click Next
* Execute the move

A couple notes

* Jira caps out at 1,000 results so if you have more than 1,000 issues that you're planning to move, you'll need to repeat this process until ABC returns no results.
* Unless you're planning to make changes to all of your issues, you probably want to make sure the destination project is configured with shared configuration from ABC.

Hope this helps.