How to sort a Jira backlog by priority

The short answer

The backlog is ordered by rank: the position you give each item by dragging it. Priority is a separate field that says how urgent or serious something is. Dragging a ticket changes its rank, not its priority, and setting a priority does not move it.

To get the backlog into priority order, drag the high-priority items to the top, or select several and send them to the top in one go. Changing the board's filter to sort by priority instead breaks manual ranking, so do not do that unless your team decides to give up dragging.

Rank vs priority

The tie is the point. Atlassian's ranking help uses the example of two items that both have High priority: ranking is how you decide which one comes first. The Scrum Guide describes the product backlog as an ordered list, and order means every item has its own position.

Jira's default priorities, with Atlassian's descriptions:

• Highest: this problem will block progress.
• High: serious problem that could block progress.
• Medium: has the potential to affect progress.
• Low: minor problem or easily worked around.
• Lowest: trivial problem with little or no impact on progress.

Admins can rename these and add others, so your site may use different names.

How to put the backlog in priority order

1. Open the Backlog. Some teams add the Priority field to the backlog view so it is visible on each row; priority can also be edited directly on the backlog.
2. Drag each item to its place. Atlassian's help describes ranking by dragging a work item to a higher or lower position in the scrum or kanban backlog.
3. To move several at once, select them, right-click, choose Move work item, then To top of backlog or To bottom of backlog. This is the quickest way to pull every Highest item to the top.
4. From the keyboard, s then t moves the selected item to the top of its column, and s then b to the bottom.

A simple routine for a messy backlog: send all Highest items to the top, then the High ones below them, then rank within each group by what the team should do first.

The board filter trap

Company-managed boards have a filter, and it ends with a sort order. It is tempting to change it to sort by priority. Atlassian's help explains what happens: if the board's filter puts another sort before rank, you get the error "Issues can't be manually ranked" and a note that the board's filter query isn't sorted by rank. Rank has to be the first sort. Atlassian's example of a filter that works:

project = "<Project name>" ORDER BY Rank ASC, priority DESC

Atlassian also describes a workaround for teams that really want priority first, using a separate filter, but it needs a board admin and changes how the board behaves for everyone.

Who decides the order

The Scrum Guide gives the job of ordering the product backlog to the Product Owner. In Jira terms, that is whoever your team trusts to rank the backlog. If you are not that person, suggest changes rather than dragging items yourself: a quiet re-rank can undo a decision someone made with information you do not have.

When you think a ticket's priority is wrong, change the priority field and comment why. Leave the rank to the person who orders the backlog.

On the board

Rank also orders the cards inside each column on the board. Atlassian notes you can rank items in a column on the active sprint or kanban board view as well. The card at the top of a column is the one the team expects to pick up first (see also backlog vs sprint).

Practise reading priority

Agile Board Practice has lessons where you read a ticket's priority and, on a busy board, find the one Highest ticket among several High ones and pick it up first, with feedback on each step.