Short answer: if your team runs Scrum or Kanban with sprints, backlogs, epics, releases and reports, Jira does that and Jinear does not. Jinear is a fit for small teams that want a simple, self-hosted tool for tasks, calendar, notes and files. I build Jinear, so read with that in mind.
The short version
Jira is built for software development at scale: backlogs, sprints, epics, custom workflows, JQL search, reports, and deep links to Bitbucket, GitHub and Confluence. It is powerful and configurable, and many teams find it heavy.
One thing changed this year. Atlassian stopped selling new Jira Data Center licenses on March 30, 2026, and most Data Center products reach end of life on March 28, 2029. For a team that wants to keep its issue tracker on its own servers, Jira is no longer a long-term option. That is the main reason people who self-host are looking at alternatives.
Jinear is not a Jira replacement for a large engineering organization. For a small team, it can be a self-hosted Jira alternative: an open-source (AGPL-3.0) tool for tasks, a calendar, notes and files that you can run with Docker Compose.
| Jinear | Jira | |
|---|---|---|
| Hosting | Hosted, or self-hosted with Docker Compose | Cloud. Data Center: no new customers since March 30, 2026, end of life March 28, 2029 |
| Source code | Open source, AGPL-3.0 | Closed source |
| Free plan | Up to 3 people | Up to 10 users, 2 GB of storage |
| Paid plans | Team: $24.90/mo flat, unlimited people | Standard about $8.48, Premium about $15.56 per user/mo (monthly billing; varies with team size) |
| Scrum and sprints | None | Backlogs, sprints, story points, burndown |
| Views | List, status board (kanban), calendar | Board, backlog, list, timeline, calendar, summary |
| Workflows | Custom statuses per team | Fully custom workflows with transitions and conditions |
| Search | Task search | JQL |
| Dev integrations | None | Bitbucket, GitHub, GitLab, CI/CD, Confluence |
| Calendar, notes, files | All built in | Calendar view; docs live in Confluence |
| SSO | None yet | Enterprise-grade identity on higher plans |
Where Jira is better
- Agile software development. Sprints, backlogs, epics, versions, story points, burndown and velocity reports. Jinear has none of them.
- Workflow control. Jira workflows can enforce transitions, required fields and approvals. Jinear has custom statuses and nothing more.
- Search and reporting. JQL and dashboards answer almost any question about your issues.
- Ecosystem. Code integrations, Confluence and thousands of Marketplace apps.
- Scale. Jira handles thousands of users and projects. Jinear is built for small teams and has never been tested at that scale.
Where Jinear is better
- Self-hosting with a future. Jinear's self-hosted edition is the same code as the hosted one, free under AGPL-3.0, with no end-of-life date and no license server.
- Simplicity. No schemes, no screens, no permission matrices. Tasks, statuses, a calendar.
- Built-in calendar, notes and files. In the Atlassian world, documentation means adding Confluence and paying per user again.
- Flat price. One price for the whole team on the hosted plan, and free when self-hosted.
What it costs a team of 25
- Jira Standard: about 25 x $8.48 = $212 a month
- Jira Premium: about 25 x $15.56 = $389 a month
- Jinear Team (billed monthly): $24.90 a month
- Jinear self-hosted: $0, plus the cost of your server
For a team of up to 10, Jira's free plan costs nothing, and that is a strong offer. Jira prices per user change with team size and billing period, so use Atlassian's calculator for your own number.
Which one should you pick?
Pick Jira if you are a software team that works in sprints, depends on code integrations, or needs reports for management. Jira Cloud is still a good product even if Data Center is going away.
Pick Jinear if you are a small team, you need to keep your data on your own servers after Data Center ends, and a simpler tool for tasks, a calendar, notes and files is enough for you. If you need sprints on your own servers, also look at open-source issue trackers such as Plane or OpenProject.