Jira Timeline (Roadmap): How to Plan Epics on a Timeline
Plan epics on the Jira timeline: read the epic bars, add a new epic, give it a start date and a due date, and drag its bar when plans change. Step by step on a real Jira site.
Step by step
The timeline
- Jira timeline. A roadmap shows when each big piece of work will happen. In Jira, that view is the timeline, and you plan your epics on it.
- Timeline tab. This is the space for an online shop. The timeline has its own tab, Timeline, at the top of the space.
- One row per epic. Each row is an epic. An epic is a big piece of work, like Checkout, with its stories inside it. The bar shows when the epic happens. This one sits under sprint 1 because its stories are planned in that sprint.
Add an epic
- Create epic. To plan a new epic, click Create epic under the last row. Type Wish list and press Enter. The epic gets its own row but no bar yet, because it has no dates.
Give it dates
- Set the dates. Click the epic's name, and its details open in a panel on the right. Find the Start date field and click it. Type 10/26/2026 and press Enter. That is 26 October, the Monday after sprint 1 ends. Then click the Due date field. Type 11/13/2026 and press Enter. That is 13 November, almost 3 weeks later. Click away from the field, and Jira saves the date.
Read the plan
- See the bar. Go back to the timeline. Wish list now has a bar. It starts right after sprint 1 and runs into November. Now anyone can see the plan at a glance: which epic comes first and which one follows.
Plans change
- Drag to move. Plans change, and the shop wants the wish list sooner. Drag the whole bar left into October. Jira moves both dates and keeps the bar the same length.
Recap
- Plan with bars. In short: one row per epic. Give each epic a start date and a due date, read the order from the bars, and drag a bar when plans change.
Common mistakes
- Expecting a bar for an epic with no dates. A new epic gets a row but no bar. Set its Start date and Due date in the details panel, and the bar appears.
- Typing the date in the wrong order. The date field reads dates in the format your Jira site uses. Here that is month/day/year, so 26 October is 10/26/2026. Check that the calendar shows the day you meant.
- Dragging the end of the bar when you meant to move it. Dragging the left or right edge changes only that date, so the epic gets longer or shorter. To move both dates and keep the same length, drag from the middle of the bar.
When a business analyst uses this
In a release planning workshop, a business analyst puts each epic from the requirements on the Jira timeline with a start date and a due date. Stakeholders can then see the order of the work and agree on it before sign-off. When priorities change, they drag the bar right there in the meeting.
Questions people ask
Is the Jira timeline the same as the Jira roadmap?
Yes. In Jira Cloud, the view that used to be called Roadmap is now called Timeline. It still shows epics as rows with bars for their dates.
Does the Jira timeline only show epics?
No. Each top row is an epic, but you can expand an epic to see the stories and other work items inside it.
Why does my epic have no bar on the Jira timeline?
The epic has no dates yet. Open it and set a Start date and a Due date, and the bar appears. An epic whose stories are planned in a sprint can also show a bar under that sprint.
