Cannot Create Category in Team-Managed Business Project

Question

Summary

Unable to create a new Category in a Team-managed Business project. The issue occurs both from the List view and from the Issue details screen.

Environment

* Jira Cloud
* Business project
* Team-managed project

Steps to Reproduce

* Open a Team-managed Business project.
* Navigate to the List view.
* Create a new issue or edit an existing issue.
* Open the Category field.
* Attempt to create a new category.
* Repeat the same action from the Issue details view.

I have also verified that it is not possible to create a new value for the Category field from Jira Administration, which suggests the problem is not limited to the project UI.

Expected Result

A user with project administration permissions should be able to create a new Category directly from the Category field and assign it to the issue.

Actual Result

It is not possible to create a new Category from either the List view or the Issue details view. Only existing categories can be selected.

Impact

Users cannot create new Categories within the project and must rely on existing values, which prevents proper categorization of work items.

Additional Information

The issue is reproducible in both:

* List view
* Issue details view

The project is configured as a Team-managed Business project.

Lenka Benedíková · Answer

Hi @Liam Do - DevSamurai

Thank you for all your help and support.

I've voted for this improvement in the open ticket and hope Atlassian will consider adding it to their roadmap in the near future.

Best regards,

Lenka

Liam Do - DevSamurai · Answer

Hi @Lenka Benedíková ,

Thanks for the extra details.

Unfortunately, the Category field has some limitations right now. The current order of categories is determined by the sequence in which they were created (new ones always get added to the bottom).

There's currently no way to reorder them using the drag handles you see in the field settings. Even though the UI suggests reordering is possible, it doesn't actually work yet.

The most effective workaround is to delete the existing categories and then recreate them in the exact order you want.

I found a similar feature request for this: Ability to rearrange Category field options in JWM projects. Feel free to vote for it and add a comment to let the product team know.

Hope it helps 🙌
Liam

Lenka Benedíková · Answer

Hi @Liam Do - DevSamurai

May I have one more question?

I am trying to understand how the categories are sorted.

In the list view, I can sort the issues by category in ascending order. However, the sorting seems to be based on the order of the category values as they are defined in edit mode, rather than alphabetically.

In edit mode, I see the list of category options displayed. New categories are always added to the end of the list, regardless of their name. I expected to be able to reorder the options manually, because there is a drag handle displayed on the left side of each item. However, when I try to drag and drop an option, the cursor changes to a "not allowed" icon and the item cannot be moved.

As a result, I currently have no way to keep the categories sorted alphabetically. Every newly added category is placed at the end of the list, and this order is then reflected when sorting issues by category in the list view.

Is this expected behavior, or am I missing a permission, configuration, or some hidden option that would allow reordering or automatic alphabetical sorting of the category values?

Thank you for your help.

Best regards,
Lenka