Jira Data Center End of Life 2029: Review your platform strategy and options now

What the end of Jira Data Center means for organizations

Atlassian is consistently advancing its cloud strategy. After support for its Server products ended on February 15, 2024, the end of most Data Center products has now also been confirmed: Jira Software Data Center and Jira Service Management Data Center will reach end of life on March 28, 2029. After that date, the corresponding licenses will expire and the systems will generally become read-only.

Affected products include Jira Software Data Center, Jira Service Management Data Center, Confluence Data Center, Bamboo Data Center, and Crowd Data Center. Special conditions apply to individual products such as Bitbucket Data Center. Atlassian also provides extended maintenance beyond 2029 in certain exceptional cases. For Jira Service Management customers, the direction is therefore clear: the existing Data Center deployment is no longer a viable long-term platform strategy.

Organizations that still manage Jira themselves, for example as an on-premises deployment or in a self-managed cloud environment, need to reassess their future platform strategy. However, the key question should not be: “How do we move our current Jira environment to the cloud?” Instead, organizations should ask: “Which Service Management platform will we need over the next five to ten years?” If data, integrations, apps, processes, and permissions need to be reviewed anyway, now is the opportunity to reconsider the long-term platform strategy.

Why organizations should address the platform question before migrating to Jira Cloud

For many organizations, Atlassian Cloud is the most obvious path forward. Those that rely heavily on Jira for software development, DevOps, and Service Management have good reasons to remain within the Atlassian ecosystem. Still, the transition should not be treated as a pure hosting project. A migration to Jira Cloud also requires apps, integrations, processes, and data to be reviewed. Depending on the existing environment, adjustments may be necessary to provide the same functionality in the cloud. If a migration project is required anyway, it therefore makes sense to look beyond the hosting question and assess whether the existing platform still aligns with the organization’s long-term Service Management strategy.

Options for existing Jira Data Center customers

1. Move to Atlassian Cloud

For many organizations, this is the most direct path.

Atlassian has significantly expanded its cloud offering in recent years. Jira Service Management is now part of the Atlassian Service Collection, which also includes Customer Service Management, Assets, and Rovo. Atlassian no longer positions the solution exclusively for IT and DevOps, but also for service processes across HR, Finance, Legal, Facilities, and other business functions.

Staying within the Atlassian ecosystem is particularly compelling if:

• Jira is already deeply integrated into development and DevOps processes,
• existing Atlassian processes generally meet future requirements,
• the required apps and integrations are available in the cloud, and/or
• no fundamental consolidation of the Service Management landscape is planned.

Even in this scenario, organizations should analyze early on which changes will be required when moving from Data Center to the cloud.

2. Evaluate an alternative target platform

The second option is to view the upcoming transition not simply as a migration, but as an opportunity to reassess the platform landscape. This is particularly relevant for organizations whose requirements have grown well beyond a traditional service desk.

A platform change may therefore be worth considering if an organization wants to:

• expand Service Management beyond IT,
• more closely connect ITSM, IT Operations, and Configuration Management,
• consolidate different Service Management tools,
• establish a shared data and workflow model across multiple business functions, and/or
• use automation and AI not only within individual tools, but across end-to-end business processes.

The key consideration is which operating model and platform approach best fit the organization’s future requirements.

We are already seeing initial examples of this in conversations with our customers. In two specific cases, Jira is used for project planning while ServiceNow is already established for Service Management. Rather than migrating project planning to Jira Cloud, the decision was made to further expand ServiceNow as an Enterprise Service Management platform and use Strategic Portfolio Management for project planning going forward. Tip: Our article “Jira has to move to the Cloud. Does your PPM have to?” takes a closer look at how this approach can work in project and portfolio management.

ServiceNow as an alternative platform strategy

For organizations considering a platform change, ServiceNow is worth a closer look. The following comparison highlights Jira Cloud and ServiceNow to help organizations assess which approach better aligns with their individual requirements and long-term target architecture.

The comparison also shows that “Jira Cloud or ServiceNow?” is not purely a feature question. An organization with a strong Jira Software and DevOps focus may reach a different conclusion than one looking to more closely integrate ITSM, IT Operations, Customer Service, HR, Strategic Portfolio Management, and other service processes.

Good to know: ServiceNow takes a broad platform approach. IT Service Management, IT Operations Management, Asset Management, Security, HR Service Management, Customer Service Management, Procurement, Strategic Portfolio Management, and other workflow areas can be managed on a central platform with shared data and workflows.

Within IT Service Management, for example, ServiceNow connects Incident, Change, Problem, and Request processes with CMDB data and dependencies. Its broader platform approach also enables ITSM and IT Operations to be more closely integrated.

7 questions organizations should ask now

Before choosing a target platform, it is worth taking a closer look at your future Service Management requirements:

1. Do you want to expand Service Management beyond IT? Should HR, Customer Service, Security, Procurement, or other business functions also be supported on the same platform?
2. Do you want to more closely integrate ITSM and IT Operations? Will CMDB, Discovery, Service Mapping, and dependencies between services and infrastructure become more important?
3. Do you want to consolidate different service and workflow solutions on a shared platform? Should data, processes, and workflows become more standardized while reducing silos?
4. Do you need end-to-end automation across multiple systems and business functions? Should processes be automated not only within individual applications, but from end to end?
5. Should AI be used across different service and workflow areas? Do you want to use AI not only for individual use cases, but as part of a broader automation strategy?
6. Are centralized governance, standardization, and transparency important requirements for your organization? Should processes, data, and responsibilities be managed more consistently across the enterprise?
7. Do you want to use the upcoming migration as an opportunity to establish a long-term platform strategy? Is your goal not simply to move Jira to a new operating model, but to realign your Service Management landscape for the years ahead?

If you answer yes to several of these questions, it is worth taking a closer look at ServiceNow as a potential target platform. This is particularly true if you want to expand Service Management beyond IT, more closely connect ITSM and IT Operations, or consolidate processes and automation on a shared platform.

Don’t just plan the cloud migration — define the target platform

March 28, 2029 may still seem far away. However, for larger Service Management environments with numerous integrations, apps, customized processes, and extensive data sets, the actual planning horizon is considerably shorter. Organizations using Jira Data Center should therefore decide early which long-term path they want to take.

• Organizations that want to remain within the Atlassian ecosystem and align with its strategic direction have a clear migration path with Atlassian Cloud and Service Collection.
• Organizations that want to use the upcoming transition to consolidate ITSM, IT Operations, and other service processes more extensively should also evaluate alternatives such as ServiceNow.