Agile software development is a new revolutionary way to developing software and organizations from all over the world have adopted this new iterative approach over the traditional waterfall model to deliver better results and higher customer satisfaction. But the abundance of agile software development tools makes it a little tough for organizations to choose the right tool. Two such popular tools for agile development approach are Atlassian Jira and Broadcom’s Rally Software. We take a look at how the Atlassian tool stacks up against the Broadcom’s Rally Software.

What is Jira?

Jira is a popular project planning and management tool based on the Agile methodology and one of the most recognized productivity tools developed by the Australian software company, Atlassian. Agile is a new iterative approach to software development that has offered organizations a new revolutionary way of developing software over the traditional waterfall model. Jira is an enterprise grade bug and issue tracking software that has been around for a while. It is mainly accessed using a web browser but it also offers several different integrations with other tools.

It was originally developed for tracking bugs, but as project management evolved over the years, agile processes have become increasingly popular, and Jira has ultimately evolved into a full-fledge project management tool for both Scrum and Kanban. Jira is currently available in three different packages: Jira Core, Jira Software, and Jira Service Desk. It offers issue tracking functionalities out of the box, but it can also be customized to become a help desk system, a simple test management suite, or a fully functional project management tool.

What is Rally?

Rally Software, formerly CA Agile Central, is an enterprise-grade SaaS platform that is specially designed for scaling Agile development practices that transform businesses. Rally is an easy to use project management tool to handle agile based software. It connects your work to your company’s most important business initiatives, empowering your teams to make informed business decisions by focusing on the right work at the right time. It is a central hub for teams to plan, prioritize and track work collectively in a synchronized manner.

With Rally, you and your team can keep tabs on their progress, step by step to make sure everybody is on the same page. The entire project lifecycle can be depicted in the form of boards, lists, and views, so that you can track your project iterations and release cycles in real time, all while staying aligned to your business goals. Rally Software allows you to create a hierarchy of projects to represent multiple products, teams, or value streams, which depict the development structure of your company.

Difference between Jira and Rally

Tool 

– Atlassian Jira is a full-featured project management tool that offers issue tracking functionalities right out of the box, but it can also be customized to become a help desk system, a simple test management suite, or a fully functional project management platform. Even if you do not wish to use Jira with the agile methods, you can do so with Jira Core. Rally Software, on the other hand, is an easy to use project management tool to handle agile based software. Rally deals well with resources and time management when your teams are working on different projects concurrently.

Ease of Use 

– Rally is a flexible tool that enables organizations to plan, track, and manage work across teams systematically and collaboratively. It is easy to set up and you can all get started and running in no time. However, it is not as intuitive as Jira and also lacks some features. Jira, on the other hand, is more robust and versatile, and does not require lengthy setup. Your teams can get started immediately and iteratively add new features as they go along with the project. Jira is also more intuitive and has a clean, polished interface which is easy to navigate.

Workflow 

– The best thing about Jira that makes it stand out from the rest of the competition is its dynamic workflow engine. Workflows are arguably one of the best features in Jira, which allows you to customize workflows by adding new steps and transitions, and for each transition you can add conditions, validators, and post functions. You can also use various plug-in modules to extend workflows in Jira, regardless of the size or structure of your team. Workflow is fixed in Rally and cannot be customized according to your team needs.

Dashboard

 – Jira allows you to create custom dashboards showing you information from one or multiple projects. You can add gadgets to keep tabs on your tasks and issues you are working on. You do not need to go individual projects and configure different reports one by one. The dashboard is your hub of project management which gives a clear picture of what is happening in your project or team, and who is working on what in one go. Rally also allows you to customize the dashboard, from which you can view individual work items, team metrics, notifications, and more.

Pricing

 – Jira has a transparent pricing structure, offering something for everyone. Jira offers a free plan for a small team of up to ten users and which comes with a storage limit of 2 GB. The paid plans start at an average $7 per user per month for up to 10,000 users and with storage capacity of 250 GB, and for organizations that need scaling of workflow, there’s a Premium plan that costs $14 per user (average) and offers unlimited storage and 24/7 support. The pricing plans of Rally are not disclosed by the software vendor and you need to contact the sales team to know more about the pricing.

Jira vs. Rally: Comparison Chart

Summary

There’s more than just one reason why Jira is the #1 project management tool used by agile teams all over the world. For starters, its dynamic workflow engine which allows you to customize workflows as per your team needs, and its robust ecosystem of over 1,000 plug and play add-ons which allow you to extend its usability – these are just few of the reasons why Jira is preferred over Rally Software. Jira is primarily a bug tracking tool, but also acts as a full-fledge project management tool, providing you the complete experience of running your projects the agile way. Rally has a robust sprint management system and it offers more automation features, and overall, it’s a nice agile development tool.

Sharing is caring!