How can I automatically add a user to a Jira group when they are added to a project?

Question

Hi @everyone,

I’m trying to understand whether Jira supports automatically adding a user to a specific group when that user is added to a project.

For example:

* A user is added as a project member.
* Jira automatically adds that user to a predefined group.
* If the user is removed from the project, they are also removed from that group.

Is this possible using Jira Automation, workflows, or another built-in Jira feature?

If so, what would be the recommended way to configure it?

Thanks!

Josh · Answer

Hi, to add something practical to Arkadiusz, Tobi and Gor: Jira Automation has no trigger for "user added to a space/project role," so there's nothing clean to hang this rule on. What works in practice is to reverse the direction:

* Create the group (e.g. proj-abc-members) in Atlassian Administration → Directory → Groups.
* In the project's Access / People settings, give that group the role (Member, Developer, etc.), instead of adding people one by one.
* From then on, "add someone to the project" means "add them to the group," and removing them from the group removes their access too. Membership and access can't drift apart, because there's only one list.

If you use an identity provider with user provisioning (Entra ID, Okta, Google), sync that group from the IdP and it's fully hands-off: joiners and leavers follow HR/IT processes, not Jira admin tickets.

If you really must keep per-person role assignments as the source of truth, the fallback is a scheduled Automation rule. It would read the role members with GET /rest/api/3/project/{key}/role/{roleId} via Send web request, then add missing users with POST /rest/api/3/group/user. It works, but removals get fiddly and it needs an admin API token stored in the rule. That's why the group-in-role pattern is what most admins settle on.

Gor Greyan · Answer

Hi @RoarByte(Attacker),

Arkadiusz makes an important distinction here.

If your goal is to grant/remove access when someone is added to a specific Jira project, I would use Project Roles rather than Jira groups. Groups are organization-level membership, while roles are project-specific. You can configure your permission scheme against roles such as Developers, Members, etc., and then add/remove users from those roles for each project.

Jira does not natively treat “user added to project” as “add this user to a global Jira group,” and automatically removing them from that group could also be problematic if the same group grants access elsewhere. If you genuinely need to manage group membership, that becomes a user-management/API automation use case rather than a normal project workflow. Atlassian does provide APIs for adding users to groups, so it can be implemented with an integration/Automation and REST API, but I would first confirm that a project role doesn't already solve the requirement.

Regards,

Gor

Tomislav Tobijas · Answer

The use case/requirement is important here as Arkadiusz said @RoarByte(Attacker)

We tried something similar in one environment if I'm not wrong but things could get easily complicated. The better way is to follow the process where user management is handled mainly through Atlassian Administration (user and group directory) or via IdP. This is then later connected to Jira space access as it's mainly defined by assigning space roles to groups. ⚙️

The biggest issue here is finding the trigger when user is added to space role. Then the rest would mainly be (probably) via REST API to add them to the specific user group. 🤔

Cheers,

Tobi