Issues

In Plane, an issue serves as the fundamental unit of work. They represent the tasks you need to accomplish to make progress Think of issues as the to-dos of your project management flow—assignable, trackable, and actionable.

Create issue

The quickest way to add a new issue is to press C on your keyboard. By default, the issue will be assigned to the project you are currently on or the one you last visited.

You can also head over to the Issues tab in the sidebar and click Add Issue at the top right of the screen.

In the Create new issue modal, you can define all the attributes of the issue, including title, description, assignees, state, priority, labels, due dates, and more. You can also enable the Create more option to add multiple issues one after the other.

When you create an issue, Plane assigns it a sequential identifier based on your project (e.g., PROJ-1).

tip

Plane automatically saves your half-written issues so you can access them later in Drafts, in case you're not ready to finalize them or if you accidentally close the modal.

Quick add issues

For when you're in the middle of your workflow and need to jot something down fast, Plane lets you create an issue with minimal input and come back to refine it later.

View issue details

An issue in your board opens by default in the peek overview mode, which allows for easy switching between contexts when browsing multiple issues simultaneously. In this mode, you can choose different styles, such as modal, full screen, or side peek, with side peek being the default option.

Set issue properties

You can set various properties for an issue, including its state, assignees, priority, start date, and due date. For a complete list of all available properties, check out the Properties page.

Create sub-issues

Break down larger tasks into smaller, manageable components by creating sub-issues. Sub-issues can be either newly created or linked to existing issues, giving you flexibility in organizing work.

Add relations

You can also set up relations and dependencies between issues using the Relations property. These relationships help clarify how issues are interconnected and how the completion of one task might affect another.

• Relates to
  This relation is used when two issues are linked by some kind of context or dependency, but one does not directly affect the other’s completion.

• Duplicate of
  This relation is used when one issue is a duplicate of another. The original issue remains active, while the duplicate issue is linked and typically closed or archived.

• Blocking
  When an issue is marked as Blocking, it means that the issue needs to be resolved first before the second issue can progress.

• Blocked by
  If an issue is marked as Blocked by, it indicates that the issue cannot proceed until the blocking issue is completed.

Add links and attachments

You can easily add links and upload attachments to issues in Plane to provide additional context or resources.

You can link to external resources, documentation, or related issues by adding URLs in the Add link modal. This helps in providing quick access to important references without cluttering the issue itself.

Plane allows you to upload different file types directly to the issue. Whether it’s an image, video, PDF, or a zip file, use the Attach button to upload it.

View issue activity

Inside each issue, you’ll find an Activity log tracking updates like status changes, reassignments, or due date modifications. This feed also logs comments, which support rich formatting for discussions, updates, or sharing resources related to the issue.

You can filter the activity log to display specific types of acticity, such as comments, updates, or worklogs. Additionally, you can sort the log by activity date in either ascending or descending order.

Subscribe to notifications

You’ll automatically receive email notifications for updates on issues that you’ve created or are assigned to. You can also view these notifications directly in Inbox on the sidebar. If you'd like to start receiving notifications for an issue you’re interested in, click Subscribe at the top right of the issue detail page.

If you no longer want to receive updates, simply click Unsubscribe to stop the notifications.

You can subscribe other users to the issue by mentioning them using @username in the comments or the issue description. This ensures they’re notified about the updates and stay in the loop.

Archive issues

Completed or canceled issues can be archived, and automations can be set up to archive such issues. Archived issues can be found under the three dots menu next to your project name.

Delete issues

You can delete issues that were created accidentally or are no longer relevant to the project. Deleted issues cannot be recovered, so be sure to review them carefully before removal. Once deleted, the issue is permanently removed from the project.

Set up automations

Within your project, you can set up automations to perform the following tasks:

• Auto-archive closed issues
  You can set up an automation to archive issues that are marked as closed. This helps keep your active project board clean and organized, while still retaining closed issues for reference. You can customize the time period after which closed issues will automatically be moved to the archive.

• Auto-close issues
  You can also automate the closing of issues that are still open after a certain period of time. This is useful for ensuring that issues don’t remain open unnecessarily, helping to keep your project board organized and up to date. The automation will move all open issues matching the time period to a selected closed state.