Flow Metrics & Forecasting for Jira

Setup & Usage Guide

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Installation

Install Flow Metrics & Forecasting for Jira from the Atlassian Marketplace. No configuration is required. It adds a Flow Metrics tab to your Jira projects, software and service (JSM) projects alike, and works immediately on any Jira plan.

How It Works

  1. Open a Jira project and select the Flow Metrics tab.
  2. Pick a project and a period (weekly, biweekly, or monthly).
  3. See the headline stats (throughput with recent trend, lead-time p85 with p50/p95 inline, items done), the distribution scatterplot, and the trend chart instantly.
  4. Enter the number of items remaining and the forecast leads with your 85%-confidence commitment date, with every confidence tier on a today → 95% timeline and a completion-date histogram beneath it (Pro).

Metrics Explained

  • Throughput: items completed per period, counted on each item's completion date (not last-edited), with recent and all-period averages.
  • Lead time: how long items take from creation to done, reported as 50th / 85th / 95th percentiles so you can set realistic expectations and SLAs.
  • Cycle time (Pro): how long items take once work starts (first move into In Progress → done), read from each issue's real status history, with its own 50/85/95 percentiles on a lead ⇆ cycle chart toggle. Items that never entered In Progress are excluded and counted, never silently measured from their created date.
  • Monte Carlo forecast (Pro): simulates your historical throughput thousands of times to answer “when will the remaining work finish?” as dates at 50/85/95% confidence, led by the 85% commitment date.
  • Aging WIP (Pro): every in-progress item gets an age bar against your 85th-percentile threshold, measured from its first move into In Progress; items that age past it go solid and flagged at-risk.
  • Cumulative flow diagram (Pro): daily To Do / In Progress / Done bands over your whole metrics window. A widening middle band means work is starting faster than it's finishing, visible weeks before due dates slip.
  • Insight tables (Pro): the slowest items in this window (top outliers, linked) and cycle time by issue type (per-type p50/p85/p95).

Ask in Rovo

The app includes a Rovo agent (“Flow Metrics Analyzer”) so you can ask your metrics in plain English: “what's our lead time?”, “how many items did ABC finish per week?”, or “when will the remaining work be done?”. Throughput and lead-time questions are free; delivery forecasts, capacity forecasts, cycle-time, and aging-WIP questions require Pro. Answers come from the same calculations as the in-page charts, so the agent and the tab always agree.

Exports

  • Charts as PNG or SVG: any chart exports in its on-screen colors, dark or light.
  • Throughput history CSV: per-period completions with ISO Period Start / Period End columns, so periods sort, filter, and chart correctly in spreadsheets.
  • Per-issue CSV (Pro): every completed item with created/resolved dates and lead time, for your own reporting.

Free vs Pro

Free: throughput, lead-time percentiles, the lead-time distribution and trend charts, throughput CSV export, PNG/SVG chart export, Rovo throughput & lead-time Q&A, and dark mode that syncs with your Jira theme.

Pro: Monte Carlo delivery forecasting (in-app and via Rovo), cycle time with the per-type breakdown, the cumulative flow diagram, Aging WIP with at-risk flagging, and per-issue CSV export. A free trial is available, and the app works on any Jira plan, with no Premium or Advanced Roadmaps upgrade required.

Privacy & Security

The app is read-only, accesses Jira only in the viewing user's own context, and stores nothing: metrics are computed fresh from Jira on each view. It runs entirely on Atlassian's Forge platform with no external servers and no data egress. See our Security Statement and Privacy Policy.

FAQ

Which Jira plans does it work on?

Any Jira plan, including Free. The app computes everything itself from issue data via standard read APIs, so you do not need Jira Premium or Advanced Roadmaps.

Does the app store my data?

No. It's read-only, makes no external calls, and stores nothing: metrics are computed fresh on each view.

How is the forecast calculated?

A Monte Carlo simulation samples your historical throughput thousands of times to estimate finish dates at 50/85/95% confidence: honest probabilistic ranges, not a single false-precision number.

What's the difference between lead time and cycle time?

Lead time runs from creation to done: the wait your requesters experience, including backlog time. Cycle time runs from the first move into In Progress to done: how long work takes once started, read from each issue’s real status history. The distribution chart has a toggle for each (cycle time is Pro).

Does it work with Scrum and Kanban?

Yes. Flow metrics don't depend on sprints, so the app works for both Scrum and Kanban teams.

Does it work with Jira Service Management?

Yes. Service (JSM) projects appear in the project picker like any other project, and requests are ordinary issues to every metric, forecast, and the Rovo agent.

Do I need Rovo for the agent features?

The Rovo agent requires Rovo to be available on your site. Everything else (the Flow Metrics tab, charts, and exports) works without it.

Support

Need help? Reach out: contact@9bynight.com or via our contact page.