Jira is a deep, battle-tested home for engineering work. Align keeps that delivery rigor and adds the half Jira leaves out — the client, the approvals, and the invoice.
Jira is excellent at complex engineering workflows: granular issue types, powerful JQL, advanced roadmaps, and a vast app ecosystem. For a large internal dev org, few tools go deeper.
But Jira was built for internal teams. Clients can’t log in to a delivery view, there are no native estimates, eSignatures, or invoicing, and billing depends on third-party apps. The loop from request to revenue runs across other tools.
Based on natively available capability for client-delivery teams. “Limited” means possible via add-ons, marketplace apps, or integrations rather than built in. Competitors evolve — check current docs before deciding.
Where Jira is internal-only, Align gives each client a branded, role-filtered portal on the same work.
Estimates, approvals, time, and invoicing are native — not a stack of paid apps bolted onto issues.
Boards, sprints, dependencies, and git links stay — you add the client and money layer, you don’t lose tracking.
Bring your work in from Jira or a CSV — IDs, statuses, and history intact.
Spin up a role-filtered portal so the client sees only their work.
Add an estimate and a release — and watch the first draft invoice generate itself.
The fairest test is your real work. We’ll run it end to end on one record in 25 minutes.