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Cortex connects to many third-party vendors whose system interfaces frequently change. As a result, integration behavior or configuration steps may shift without notice. If you encounter unexpected issues, check with your system administrator or refer to the vendor’s documentation for the most current information. Additionally, integration sync times vary and are subject to scheduling overrides and timing variance.
Jira is a project management tool that helps developers track and manage bugs and work items. By integrating Jira with Cortex, you can drive improvements and coordinate issue management across teams. Through the integration, you can create Jira work items directly in Cortex based on an Initiative’s action items. The integration also allows you to enhance insights into a number of key values for your entities:
  • Customer facing incidents
  • Security tickets
  • Ongoing projects

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How to configure Jira with Cortex

It is possible to configure the integration with a Jira Cloud instance or a self-hosted Jira instance (using either basic auth or OAuth). You can also use Cortex Axon Relay to securely integrate your on-premises data. Expand the tabs below for instructions on each option.
Jira CloudPrerequisitesBefore configuring Cortex with Jira Cloud:
  • Create a Jira API token. To generate a token, you must have the Browse users and groups permissions in Jira and access to the needed Jira projects.
  • If you are using a scoped token, you will need your Atlassian Cloud ID. Scoped tokens must include the following scopes:
    • Read: jira-work, jira-user, project-category:jira, project:jira, project-version:jira, project.property:jira, project.component:jira, issue-type:jira, issue-type-hierarchy:jira, user:jira, avatar:jira, project.avatar:jira, application-role:jira, group:jira
    • Write: jira-work
Configure the integration in Cortex
  1. In Cortex, navigate to the Jira settings page:
    • Click Integrations from the main nav. Search for and select Jira.
  2. Click Add configuration. then select Cloud for the integration type.
    • If you are using a scoped token, select Cloud (scoped token).
  3. In the Jira integration modal, “Jira Cloud” is selected by default in the upper right corner. Configure the integration form:
    • Account alias: Enter an alias for your account.
    • Subdomain: Enter the subdomain for your Jira instance.
      • For example, this field would take cortex-docs from https://cortex-docs.atlassian.net.
    • Base URL: This field automatically populates atlassian.net.
      • If you are using a legacy Jira Cloud instance (i.e., you access your Jira instance on jira.com), change the base URL from the dropdown.
    • Email: Enter the email address associated with the user who generated the token in Jira.
      • Note: The email address associated with a given Jira token must match the email address of the user associated with that token.
    • API token: Enter your Jira API token.
  4. Click Save.
Jira on-prem (Basic)PrerequisiteIf you’re using a self-hosted instance of Jira, you’ll need to verify that your Cortex instance is able to reach the Jira instance.We route our requests through a static IP address. Reach out to support at help@cortex.io to receive details about our static IP. If you’re unable to directly allowlist our static IP, you can route requests through a secondary proxy in your network that has this IP allowlisted and have that proxy route traffic to your Jira instance.Configure the integration in Cortex
  1. In Cortex, navigate to the Jira settings page:
    1. In Cortex, click your avatar in the lower left corner, then click Settings.
    2. Under “Integrations,” click Jira.
  2. Click Add configuration.
  3. In the upper right corner of the Jira integration modal, click the dropdown labeled Cloud. Select On-prem (basic auth).
  4. Configure the Jira integration form:
    • Account alias: Enter an alias for your account.
    • Host: Enter the URL for your Jira on-premises host.
    • Frontend host: Enter the URL for your Jira on-premises frontend host.
    • Username and Password: Enter your Jira username and password.
  5. Click Save.
Jira on-prem (OAuth)PrerequisitesTo integrate Cortex with Jira using OAuth, you must be running a self-hosted Jira instance with Jira server version 8.22 or higher.If you’re using a self-hosted instance of Jira, you’ll need to verify that your Cortex instance is able to reach the Jira instance.We route our requests through a static IP address. Reach out to support at help@cortex.io to receive details about our static IP. If you’re unable to directly allowlist our static IP, you can route requests through a secondary proxy in your network that has this IP allowlisted and have that proxy route traffic to your Jira instance.Step 1: Create an application link from Jira
  1. In your Jira server, navigate to Settings > Applications > Application Links. Click Create link.
  2. Configure the application link settings:
    • Application type: Select External.
    • Direction: Select Incoming.
    • Redirect URL: For default configuration, enter the URL of your Cortex instance appended with /oauth/internal/jira. For a non-default configuration, enter the URL of your Cortex instance appended with /oauth/internal/jira/.
    • Permission: Select write.
  3. Click Save.
  4. The application link will have an associated client ID and client secret. Copy these values and store them in a secure location, as you will need them in the next steps.
Step 2: Configure the integration in Cortex
  1. In Cortex, navigate to the Jira settings page:
    1. In Cortex, click your avatar in the lower left corner, then click Settings.
    2. Under “Integrations,” click Jira.
  2. Click Add configuration.
  3. In the upper right corner of the Jira integration modal, click the dropdown labeled Cloud. Select On-prem (OAuth).
  4. Configure the Jira integration form:
    • Account alias: Enter an alias for your account.
    • Host: Enter the URL for your Jira on-premises host.
    • Frontend host: Enter the URL for your Jira on-premises frontend host.
    • Client ID and Client secret: Enter the client ID and secret associated with the application link you created in the previous steps.
  5. Click Save.
  6. You will be redirected to the Jira settings page. Click Install next to your integration name.
    • A confirmation modal will appear, asking you to allow Cortex access to your Jira account.
    • The accessing user can be a user persona or a system account. We recommend using a system account to maintain your organization’s access in case the user who set up the integration leaves your organization.
Configure Jira with Cortex Axon RelaySee Internally hosted integrations for instructions.
Configure the integration for multiple Jira accounts↗ The Jira integration has multi-account support. You can add a configuration for each additional by repeating the process above. Each configuration requires an alias, which Cortex uses to correlate the designated with registrations for various entities. Registrations can also use a default configuration without a listed alias. You can edit aliases and default configurations from the Jira page in your Cortex settings. Select the edit icon next to a given configuration and toggle Set as default on. If you only have one configuration, it will automatically be set as the default.

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Set a default JQL query for your Jira integration

You can set a custom JQL query for your Jira integration instances and for individual entities. This allows you to filter which Jira work items are surfaced on entity pages or in other places in Cortex where CQL is used. The default JQL applies to jira.issues() and jira.numOfIssues() but not to jira.rawJql().
Note that if you define additional filter logic for your default JQL query when writing a Scorecard rule, you must add that logic in a filter clause. See Adding filter logic to the default JQL query in a Scorecard for more information.
Set default JQL query at a tenant levelFrom the Jira settings page in Cortex, you can set a custom JQL query for your Jira integration.When Cortex queries for Jira work items, the statusCategory is directly grabbed from the API response.The default query — statusCategory in ("To Do", "In Progress") — will filter your Jira tickets to display only those with To Do and In Progress statuses, excluding closed tickets. The indeterminate status category will map to In Progress according to the API. Cortex does not use the status field for mapping these categories.Entering a custom JQL query on the Jira integration settings page allows you to override the default for all entities in your workspace. To map work items with a custom status, you can write a custom JQL query that uses status instead of statusCategory.
Set default JQL query at entity levelYou can configure default JQL for entities in their entity YAML. For example:
Entity-level default JQL is not applied to project management metrics in Data Explorer. To filter those metrics, use the available filters in the Data Explorer UI.

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Fallback logic for default JQL

It is possible to set custom JQL at both the entity and tenant level, but note the fallback logic:
  1. If any JQL is passed into a query, Cortex uses that.
  2. If not, Cortex uses entity-level default JQL.
  3. If not, Cortex uses tenant-wide default JQL.
  4. If none, then no JQL is used for filtering.

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Adding filter logic to the default JQL query in a Scorecard

The CQL statement will use the default JQL setting in a Scorecard rule only if you do not define additional filter logic. Any filter logic applied to the statement will override the default JQL query. To work around this: If you need to include additional filter logic on your query in a Scorecard, you can move the filter logic to the filter clause. For example, if your default JQL query is set to "project = project_a", then you can add jira.issues() to a Scorecard rule to automatically surface only the work items relating to Project A. However, you cannot use jira.issues(some_other_filter_logic) in a Scorecard; Cortex will not append your default JQL to the additional filter logic. In this example, the workaround would be to add a filter clause:
jira.issues().filter(some_other_filter_logic).

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How to connect Cortex entities to Jira labels, components, or projects

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Discovery

By default, Cortex will tie Jira tickets to entities by searching for any tickets where the label, component, or project field for the work item includes the Cortex tag. For example, if your Cortex tag is “my-entity,” then the corresponding tickets in Jira should have “my-entity” as a label, component, or project. If your Jira label/component/project doesn’t cleanly match the Cortex tag, you can override this in the Cortex entity descriptor. Without an override, a ticket’s label, component, or project must exactly match the Cortex tag in the descriptor.

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Connecting via YAML or the Cortex UI

Connect Jira entities via the Cortex UI
  1. Navigate to an entity’s details page in Cortex.
  2. In the upper right corner, click Configure entity. In the upper right side of an entity, click 'Configure entity.'
  3. Click the Project management tab, then click +Add. Click Project management, then click Add.
  4. In the side panel, configure the details:
    • Jira service type: Choose component, label, or project.
    • Alias: If you have multiple Jira configurations, select which one this service is associated with.
    • Name: Enter the name of the service.
  5. At the bottom of the side panel, click Add.
Editing the entity descriptorIf you need to override automatic discovery, you can define x-cortex-issues blocks in your Cortex entity descriptor.Note: For all of the following, alias is optional, and the default Jira configuration will be used if not provided. You can use Jira labels, components, or projects to match entities.Each of these blocks has the same field definitions.
By default, Cortex will surface outstanding issues per entity in the catalog with a default JQL query: statusCategory in ("To Do", "In Progress"). If you’d like to override this, you can provide a new default query with:

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Identity mappings

Cortex maps Jira accounts to team members defined in the team catalog, so you do not need to define Jira users in a team member’s YAML file. You can confirm that users’ Jira accounts are connected from the Jira user mappings section in Settings.

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Using the Jira integration

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Entity pages

Once the integration is established, you’ll be able to pull in data about the work items in any linked Jira instances for a given entity:
  • Number of issues: Unresolved issues associated with an entity that have the JQL status “in progress” or “to do”
  • Number of issues from JQL query: Issues associated with an entity that match an arbitrary JQL query
Cortex will tie Jira tickets directly to entities within the catalog. Click Issue tracking in the entity’s sidebar to see associated Jira tickets. From this tab you can find a list of all issues with a label that matches the Cortex tag.
  • Key: The issue key (or “ticket number”) for a Jira work item.
  • Issue summary: Title of the Jira work item and the user designated as the issue reporter.
  • Assignee: User designated as the work item assignee.
  • Priority: The work item’s priority level in Jira - Lowest, Low, Medium, High, Highest. This will display with the icon that corresponds to the priority level in your Jira instance.
  • Created: Date the work item was created.
  • Due: Due date for the work item, if applicable.
This list will also be available from a team’s homepage when the team’s Cortex tag matches a label, component, or project in Jira.

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Initiatives

Initiatives allow you to set deadlines for specific rules or a set of rules in a given Scorecard and send notifications to users about upcoming due dates. From the Issues tab of an Initiative, you can automatically create a Jira ticket from a failing rule. Read about creating Jira issues from Initiatives in the documentation: Creating issues based on initiatives.

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Dev homepage

The Jira integration enables Cortex to pull information about issues into the dev homepage. You can find open work items assigned to you under the Issues tab. The work items that display will depend both on the Jira instances you’ve connected and the JQL query defined in Settings. Work items are refreshed every 5 minutes. You can use the Refresh work items button to manually refresh issues at any point.

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Scorecards and CQL

With the Jira integration, you can create Scorecard rules and write CQL queries based on Jira work items. See more examples in the CQL Explorer in Cortex.
Number of unresolved issues associated with the entity, where unresolved is defined as the JQL status = “Open” OR status = “To Do”.Definition: jira.numOfIssues()ExampleFor a Scorecard measuring entity maturity, you can use this expression to make sure entities have fewer than 3 Jira issues:
Number of issues associated with the entity based on arbitrary JQL query.Definition: jira.numOfIssues(jqlQuery: Text | Null)ExampleFor a more specific rule in an entity maturity Scorecard, you can use this expression with a JQL query to make sure entities have no more than 3 open customer-facing tickets.

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View integration logs

This feature is available in Cortex cloud.
While viewing an integration’s settings page, select the Error logs tab to view errors from the last 7 days. You can filter the logs list by configuration and by operation (for example, you could filter to view errors surfaced only via Scorecards).
The 'Logs' tab on an integration's settings page shows error information over the past 7 days.
Click into a row to get more information, including time stamp, status code, full error, and request path.

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Background sync

The engineering homepage runs a background job every 5 minutes to refresh the Issues tab.

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Troubleshooting and FAQ

See frequently asked questions below.
When running Scorecard rules, Cortex appends AND (component = cortex-tag OR labels = cortex-tag OR project = cortex-tag) to the JQL you defined, where cortex-tag is the Cortex tag.
Make sure that the ticket has a label, component, or project that matches exactly with the Cortex tag or the list defined in your entity descriptor.
When using Jira Cloud, you’ll need to create a Jira API token and add it on in Jira Settings in Cortex. The email address in Settings must be the same as the user that the token is associated with. Cortex also expects only the subdomain of your Jira instance, not the entire URL.
  1. Make sure that the entity name in Cortex matches the label, component, or project name in Jira.
  2. Make sure the subdomain and base URL correspond with the Jira instance you’re trying to connect.
  3. Verify that the Jira token you added is still valid. You can run the following curl command to confirm:
The background job fetches work items every 5 minutes. However, a fresh integration configuration may result in longer waiting times, as it also fetches historical data.
Last modified on September 25, 2026