Jira Export: 6 Tips to Export from Jira
If you’ve ever thought to yourself, “There’s gotta be an easier way to get all this Jira data out of here,” well, you’re in the right place. We’ve got you covered with this easy-to-read guide to exporting data from Jira.
6 Tips to Export from Jira (Like a Pro)
Now, let’s dive into the good stuff. Here are 6 legit tips to get your Jira data where it needs to go.
1. How to Export Jira Tickets to Excel / CSV
How to export Jira tickets to Excel / how to export Jira board to Excel / how to export Jira backlog to Excel are super popular questions. While you can't export a board, you can export the issues that are associated with a board. for some good ol’ spreadsheet magic? Here’s how:
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Head to the Issues section.
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Use the filter to grab the tickets you want.
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Click on the Export button at the top-right, and select Export Excel (All Fields) or Export Excel (Current Fields).
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Boom—your tickets are now Excel-ready.
*Apart from Excel, there are other options for export you can find here like Word or HTML.
2. Handy Tools to Ease Jira Export to Excel
With Atlassian Marketplace, there are tons of tools to make your life easier, like:
2.1 Planyway
While Planyway is the addon for project planning and time tracking, it provides a great exporting tool which exports data from Jira almost without any limitations at a click.
Set up automation rules to export data on a schedule.
3. How to Export Jira Tickets to PDF
PDFs make everything look a little more professional, don’t they? Exporting your tickets into a nice PDF is easy:
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Go to your Issues view.
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Use the filters to pick the tickets you need.
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Click Export, and choose Print list.
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Once the print menu shows up, make sure Save as PDF is selected and then Save.
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Now you’ve got a snazzy PDF ready for your next meeting.
4. How to Export Jira Dashboards
Got a shiny dashboard you want to share with the team? While Jira doesn’t provide this option by default, you can explore Better PDF Exporter for Jira app. It exports Jira issues to PDF documents to share, print, email, archive and report issues in the standard business document file format.
5. Limitations When Exporting Jira Issues (Yes, They Exist)
Alright, we love Jira, but it’s not perfect. Here are a few limitations to be aware of:
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Field Limitations: Some custom fields may not export correctly, depending on the format.
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Formatting Issues: Excel exports sometimes look a bit… wonky. Be prepared for some spreadsheet cleanup.
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Size Limits: Large exports can be a bit slow or may require splitting into smaller chunks.
6. The Advanced Move: Use REST API for Custom Exports
If you’re tech-savvy (or just curious), you can use Jira’s REST API to customize exports with code. It gives you the flexibility to pull exactly what you need, without having to rely on pre-built export options. If you're comfortable with a bit of code, here's a breakdown of how you can use the REST API to create custom exports:
Step 1. Get Your API Token
First, you need an API token for authentication. Here's how you get one:
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Go to your Jira account settings.
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Look for Security > Create API token.
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Generate the token and store it somewhere safe.
Step 2. Choose Your API Endpoint
Jira’s REST API has various endpoints depending on what you want to export. Here are a few common ones:
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Issues: /rest/api/3/search
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Projects: /rest/api/3/project
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Boards: /rest/agile/1.0/board
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Sprints: /rest/agile/1.0/sprint
For example, if you want to export all issues from a specific project, you’ll use the /search endpoint with the right JQL filter.
Step 3. Build Your API Request
Let’s say you want to export issues. Here’s a basic request structure:
GET https://your-jira-instance.atlassian.net/rest/api/3/search?jql=project=YOURPROJECTKEY
Replace YOURPROJECTKEY with the key of your project. You can add filters like status, assignee, or date to get more specific results.
For example:
GET https://your-jira-instance.atlassian.net/rest/api/3/search?jql=project=YOURPROJECTKEY AND status="In Progress"
You can also specify fields to export by adding parameters like:
GET https://your-jira-instance.atlassian.net/rest/api/3/search?jql=project=YOURPROJECTKEY&fields=summary,description,status
This will return only the summary, description, and status of the issues.
Step 4. Send the Request
To send the request, you can use tools like:
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cURL (for command-line lovers)
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Postman (great for testing APIs)
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Python/JavaScript scripts (if you’re automating the process)
Here’s an example with cURL:
curl -D- -u your-email@example.com:your-api-token \
-X GET \
-H "Content-Type: application/json" \
"https://your-jira-instance.atlassian.net/rest/api/3/search?jql=project=YOURPROJECTKEY"
Step 5. Process the Response
The API will return your data in JSON format. You can then parse this data in your language of choice (Python, JavaScript, etc.) and write it to a file format of your preference (CSV, Excel, etc.).
Here’s a quick Python example using the requests library:
import requests
import json
url = "https://your-jira-instance.atlassian.net/rest/api/3/search"
headers = {
"Accept": "application/json"
}
auth = ('your-email@example.com', 'your-api-token')
query = {
'jql': 'project=YOURPROJECTKEY',
'fields': 'summary,description,status'
}
response = requests.get(url, headers=headers, auth=auth, params=query)
data = response.json()
print(json.dumps(data, indent=4)) # This prints the response in a readable format
# You can now process the data and save it in your preferred format.
Step 6. Export Your Data
Once you’ve got your data, you can export it to whatever format you want—CSV, Excel, PDF, or even import it into another tool. For instance, with Python, you can use the csv or pandas libraries to create CSV or Excel files from the JSON data.
Example of Writing Data to a CSV
import csv
with open('jira_export.csv', mode='w') as file:
writer = csv.writer(file)
writer.writerow(["Summary", "Description", "Status"]) # Headers
for issue in data['issues']:
writer.writerow([issue['fields']['summary'],
issue['fields']['description'],
issue['fields']['status']['name']])
Wrapping It Up
Whether you’re a Jira newbie or a seasoned pro, exporting data doesn’t have to be a headache. Just use our tips, use the right tools, and you’ll be an export master in no time. Now go show your team those sweet Excel exports!
Got any other export tricks? Share them with the community below. 👇
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Mary
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