Synchronizing JIRA subtasks to TFS / VSTS links

Owned by Former user (Deleted)
Last updated: Sept 14, 2018 by spg bot
2 min read

Subtasks synchronization can be enabled on Subtask Mapping screen (during new profile creation via wizard) or on Field Mappings on profile edit screen. The following settings are available:

  1. Synchronization direction:
    • synchronization disabled,
    • synchronize only from TFS / Azure DevOps (formerly VSTS) to Jira,
    • synchronize only from Jira to TFS / Azure DevOps (formerly VSTS),
    • synchronize in both direction.
  2. TFS / Azure DevOps (formerly VSTS) link type that maps to Jira subtasks (Default: Parent->Child).
  3. Subtasks Mappings - Jira allows to define many various issue types of subtasks (Please see Jira documentation for details). You can define here how they will be mapped to TFS / Azure DevOps (formerly VSTS) work item types.

Due to technical limitations Jira does not support changing issues to subtasks and subtasks to issues.
This means that if you link a "standalone" TFS / Azure DevOps (formerly VSTS) work item to a parent work item, or unlink a TFS / Azure DevOps (formerly VSTS) task from its parent work item, a corresponding Jira issue will not be changed to/from subtask.

Jira subtasks cannot have their own subtasks, so you cannot synchronize multi-level TFS / Azure DevOps (formerly VSTS) work item hierarchies to Jira subtasks.

Case study

The following examples show how subtasks synchronization works in practice with default Jira and TFS /Azure DevOps (formerly VSTS)  workflows and default settings of synchronization profile.

  1. Let's assume that we have a Jira Task that is synchronized to a TFS / Azure DevOps (formerly VSTS) Work Item.


  2. Jira Subtask has been created by user.


  3. After synchronization the Jira Subtask is synchronized to new TFS / Azure DevOps (formerly VSTS) Task, and a parent/child link is established in TFS / Azure DevOps (formerly VSTS).


  1. Let's assume that we have a TFS / Azure DevOps (formerly VSTS) Work Item that is synchronized to a Jira Task.


  2. A Task with parent/child relationship has been created by user in TFS / Azure DevOps (formerly VSTS).


  3. After synchronization a new Subtask is created in Jira.
  1. Jira Subtask is correctly synchronized to child TFS / Azure DevOps (formerly VSTS) Task.


  2. Jira Subtask has been promoted by user to a regular Jira Task.


  3. After synchronization the parent/child link is removed in TFS.
  1. Jira Subtask is correctly synchronized to child TFS / Azure DevOps (formerly VSTS) Task.


  2. The parent/child link has been removed in TFS / Azure DevOps (formerly VSTS).


  3. Due to technical limitations Jira Subtask corresponding to child TFS / Azure DevOps (formerly VSTS) Task is not changed to a regular Task after synchronization.
  1. We have two distinct Jira Tasks that are correctly synchronized to two TFS / Azure DevOps (formerly VSTS) Tasks.


  2. New child/parent relationship has been added by user in TFS / Azure DevOps (formerly VSTS).


  3. Due to technical limitations Jira Task corresponding to child TFS / Azure DevOps (formerly VSTS) Task is not changed to Subtask after synchronization.