What is Jira AI? A deep dive into Atlassian’s AI in 2024

There’s a lot of noise around AI in project management, and if you’re using Atlassian tools, you’ve probably heard about Jira AI. But trying to figure out what it actually is, what it does, and if it’s worth the price can feel like a full-time job. It’s not just one product, but a whole collection of features that are changing fast.

We’re here to cut through the marketing jargon. We’ll give you a clear, practical look at what Jira AI is, what it can (and can’t) do, how much it costs, and where it falls short. By the end, you’ll have a much better idea of whether it’s the right call for your team.

What is Jira AI, really?

Let’s get one thing straight: "Jira AI" isn’t a single product you can just go out and buy. It’s the catch-all term for AI features powered by a platform called Atlassian Intelligence, which is now being rolled into a bigger, cross-product tool named Rovo.

The main idea is to stick AI directly into the Atlassian suite (Jira, Jira Service Management, and Confluence) to help automate boring tasks, summarize long conversations, and offer up smart suggestions. It’s all powered by what Atlassian calls the "Teamwork Graph," which is basically a data map connecting information across their apps and some third-party tools. This gives the AI context about your projects, people, and how you work.

But here’s the big catch: to get your hands on most of these AI features, you have to be on an Atlassian Cloud plan, specifically Standard, Premium, or Enterprise. If you’re still on a Data Center setup, this is a huge deal. It often means you’re looking at a painful and expensive migration just to get access to the AI.

Key features in Jira and Jira Service Management

Atlassian’s AI features change depending on which product you’re using. While there’s some overlap, the most interesting capabilities are split between Jira Software (for project management) and Jira Service Management (for IT and customer support).

Jira Software for project management

For teams deep in software projects, the AI features are mostly about speeding up the admin work that slows everyone down.

• Natural Language to JQL: This lets you search for issues using plain English, like "find all open bugs in the current sprint," and Jira translates it into its own Jira Query Language (JQL). It’s a nice idea for beginners, but let’s be honest, most seasoned Jira admins are way faster just writing the JQL themselves.

• AI-powered summaries: This one is genuinely useful. It lets you summarize those long, winding comment threads on a ticket with a single click. It’s perfect for getting up to speed on an issue without having to read a novel.

• Content generation: You can ask the AI to whip up a first draft of a user story, task description, or comment. It’s a decent starting point, but it doesn’t have the deep, nuanced context that a real product manager or developer brings. Don’t expect it to write perfect acceptance criteria for you.

• Work breakdown: The AI can look at a massive epic and suggest smaller, more manageable user stories or sub-tasks. This can help kickstart the planning process, but a human still needs to come in and make sure the suggestions actually make sense.

Jira Service Management (JSM) for support teams

This is where Atlassian has put more of its AI muscle, aiming to automate frontline support and help agents resolve things faster.

• Virtual agent: JSM’s virtual agent can answer questions in tools like Slack and Microsoft Teams by pulling answers directly from your Confluence knowledge base. The catch? It’s only as good as your documentation. If your knowledge base is a mess, your virtual agent will be, too. Garbage in, garbage out.

• Ticket triage and summarization: The AI can look at incoming requests to suggest the right category, guess the customer’s mood (positive, negative, neutral), and summarize the ticket history for the agent.

• AI-drafted replies: The AI can generate draft responses for agents by looking at how similar tickets were handled in the past. This really shows how important it is for an AI to learn from your specific company history to be truly useful.

• Knowledge base generation: When an agent writes a great response that solves a problem, the AI can suggest turning it into a new knowledge base article. This helps you fill gaps in your documentation over time.

To make it a bit clearer, here’s a breakdown of where you’ll find the key features:

Feature	Jira Software	Jira Service Management	Primary Use Case
Natural Language JQL	✅	✅	Searching for issues
Ticket/Comment Summaries	✅	✅	Getting context quickly
Content Generation	✅	✅	Writing stories & replies
Virtual Agent (AI Answers)	❌	✅	Deflecting common support questions
AI-powered Triage	❌	✅	Organizing incoming requests
AIOps (Alert Grouping)	❌	✅	Managing IT incidents

The true cost: Pricing and plans explained

Okay, let’s talk money. Atlassian’s AI features aren’t a freebie. They are only available on paid Cloud plans, and even then, your usage is limited. Atlassian uses a confusing system of "AI credits" and "indexed objects" that are doled out per user each month. This makes budgeting a total guessing game, especially if you have a busy month.

Here’s how the AI features are packaged into the Jira Software plans as of late 2024.

Plan	Price per user/month	AI Inclusion	Rovo Usage Limits (per user/month)
Free	$0 (up to 10 users)	None	N/A
Standard	$7.53	Rovo Search, Chat, Agents	25 AI credits, 100 indexed objects
Premium	$13.53	Rovo Search, Chat, Agents	70 AI credits, 250 indexed objects
Enterprise	Contact Sales (Annual)	Rovo + Atlassian Analytics	150 AI credits, 625 indexed objects

While it might be bundled differently in these plans, the value for money is a big question mark for many teams.

This complex, credit-based model can make planning your budget a headache. For teams that need more predictability, solutions like eesel AI offer straightforward, flat-rate pricing based on overall usage, so you never get hit with surprise fees for being productive.

A screenshot of eesel AI's straightforward pricing page, offering a clear alternative to Jira AI's complex credit system.

Limitations and where it misses the mark

While some of Jira’s AI features are helpful, it has some major limitations that can make it the wrong choice for a lot of companies.

Heavily reliant on the Atlassian ecosystem

Here’s the biggest string attached: Jira AI really wants you to live 100% inside the Atlassian bubble. Its AI is smartest when all your knowledge is in Confluence and all your work is in Jira. But that’s not how most of us work, is it? Your team’s brain is probably spread across Google Docs, Notion, Slack conversations, and past tickets in other helpdesks.

This infographic explains how an AI platform can integrate knowledge from various sources, a key aspect when considering what is Jira AI versus more flexible solutions.

This is where a dedicated AI platform really shines. Instead of locking you in, tools like eesel AI are built to connect all your existing knowledge, wherever it lives. You can plug in your helpdesk, wiki, and internal docs in a few minutes to build an AI that actually understands your whole business, without forcing you to move everything.

A "rip and replace" approach for your support workflow

If you want to use JSM’s best AI features, you pretty much have to go all-in. That means moving your entire support team over to their platform. For anyone happy with their current setup on Zendesk or Intercom, that’s a huge, painful migration project that can disrupt your whole team for months.

A much better way is to add powerful AI to the tools you already know and like. eesel AI plugs directly into popular helpdesks like Zendesk, Freshdesk, and Gorgias. You get top-tier AI agents and copilots without having to ditch the workflows your team has already perfected.

Lack of risk-free testing and rollout

Dropping a big investment on an AI tool without knowing the potential return is a massive risk. With Jira AI, there’s no good way to simulate how the AI would perform on your real historical data before you commit. This makes it tough to build a business case and get approval from stakeholders who want to see some numbers first.

This is exactly why eesel AI has a powerful simulation mode. You can test your AI agent on thousands of your past tickets to get a precise forecast of its resolution rate. You can see exactly how it would have answered, giving you complete confidence before you ever let it talk to a single customer.

A screenshot of the eesel AI simulation mode, answering the question of what is Jira AI's alternative for risk-free testing.

A better way for your workflows

So, what’s the takeaway? Jira AI has some neat tricks, but it often comes with a high price tag, locks you into the Atlassian world, and demands a big, all-or-nothing commitment. The good news is, you don’t have to choose between your current tools and powerful AI. You can have both.

This is where eesel AI fits in. It doesn’t live inside a single tool; it acts as an intelligent layer that connects your helpdesk, your knowledge bases, and Jira. For example, an eesel AI agent in Zendesk can analyze a customer support ticket, realize it’s a bug, and automatically create a detailed, linked issue in Jira for the engineering team. It’s a seamless workflow that lets each team work in the tool they prefer.

This workflow diagram illustrates a seamless support process, providing a visual answer to what is Jira AI's alternative for integrated workflows.

Get started with AI that works for you

Instead of just asking "what is Jira AI?", maybe the real question is, "is it the right AI for us?"

If your company’s knowledge is spread across different platforms and you value flexibility, transparent pricing, and a risk-free way to get started, then a dedicated AI platform is almost certainly a better fit. You get all the benefits of automation and smart assistance without the vendor lock-in and disruptive migrations.

See how eesel AI can boost the support and project management tools you already use. Go live in minutes, not months. Try it free today.