Jira status vs resolution: what each one means

The short answer

Status tells you where a work item is in the team's process right now: To Do, In Progress, In Review, Done. It changes every time the work moves.

Resolution tells you why a finished work item was finished: Done, Won't Do, Duplicate, Cannot Reproduce. Atlassian describes it as the reason the item was moved to Done. While the work is still open, the resolution should be empty.

The two are separate fields. Jira's filters and reports treat a work item with no resolution as open, whatever its status says. That is why a ticket can be in Done and still show up in an "open work" filter.

Status: where the work is

Every status belongs to the team's workflow, the set of statuses and transitions a work item moves through (see Jira workflows explained). Atlassian's help lists default statuses such as these:

Your team's statuses may be different. The board's columns are built from them.

Resolution: why it is finished

Atlassian's default resolutions:

• Done: work has been completed on this work item.
• Won't Do: this work item won't be actioned.
• Duplicate: the problem is a duplicate of an existing work item.
• Cannot Reproduce: all attempts at reproducing it failed, or there was not enough information.

Resolution matters because a finished item can be finished for very different reasons. "Done" and "Won't Do" both end the work, but a report on what the team delivered should only count one of them.

Side by side

How it goes wrong

Atlassian's help says Done work items do not have to have a resolution, but strongly recommends that they do, and recommends setting up workflows so the resolution is set automatically when work moves to a Done (green) status. When that is not set up, three problems appear:

1. Done but still "open". The item reached Done without a resolution, so filters that look for unresolved work still include it. Atlassian notes that the open work items filter shows work items that do not have a resolution.
2. Struck through but not finished. Boards show resolved items with strikethrough text. If a resolution was set by mistake on an item that is still in progress, it looks finished on the board.
3. Reports that do not add up. Atlassian notes that the Created vs Resolved work items report relies on the resolution being entered appropriately.

What you do as a team member

• Move the status as work happens. That is your job every day.
• Pick the resolution honestly when Jira asks. Some workflows open a small dialog when you move a ticket to Done, asking for a resolution. Choose Done for work that was delivered, Won't Do for work that was dropped, Duplicate when another ticket covers it.
• Search for open work by resolution, not status, when you want everything that is still open. In Jira's query language, resolution is EMPTY finds work items with no resolution set, which Jira shows as Unresolved. Atlassian also warns that a query such as resolution != Fixed skips unresolved work, because an empty resolution is a null value; add OR resolution is EMPTY to include it.

What about Closed and Resolved?

Older and more traditional workflows have statuses called Resolved and Closed, which sit next to the resolution field and confuse things further. That is its own topic, covered in Done vs Closed vs Resolved.

Practise closing work properly

Closing a ticket well means moving it and saying what happened. Agile Board Practice has a workplace task where a colleague tells you by email that something went live, and you find the ticket, move it to Done and leave a comment before you reply, with feedback on each step.