Project Management migration

Migrate from Tidy Build to Jira

Field-level mapping, validation, and rollback between Tidy Build and Jira. We move data and schema; workflows are rebuilt natively in Jira.

Tidy Build logo

Tidy Build

Source

Jira

Destination

Jira logo

Compatibility

92%

11 of 12

objects map 1:1 between Tidy Build and Jira.

Complexity

BStandard

Timeline

2-4 weeks

Rollback included Accuracy guarantee Field-level validation

Overview

What this migration involves

Moving from Tidy Build to Jira is a schema translation, not a record copy. Tidy Build is a construction job-costing platform built around Projects, Quotes, Materials, Suppliers, and Purchase Orders with cost-centre tracking from estimate to close. Jira is an agile issue-tracking and project-management platform built around Projects, Issues (Epics, Stories, Tasks, Bugs), Sprints, and Boards. The two platforms share only the concept of a Project as a top-level container; every other Tidy Build object requires deliberate mapping to a Jira-native equivalent or a custom field strategy. Quotes, Material Items, Suppliers, and Purchase Orders have no native Jira type. We resolve these by mapping Quotes to a custom Issue Type (e.g. Quote) with a lifecycle status field, Materials to Jira Products with a custom cost-field, and Suppliers to Jira user accounts or Contacts depending on the Jira edition. Tidy Build API access must be confirmed and enabled before migration begins; this is not automatic and requires a Tidy International activation step that we handle on the customer's behalf.

Field-level fidelity

Every standard and custom field arrives verified.

Schema-aware mapping

AI proposes the map; you confirm before any record moves.

Relationships preserved

Parent–child, lookups, and ownership stay linked.

Full activity history

Calls, emails, meetings — with original timestamps.

Attachments & notes

Documents, uploads, and inline notes move with the record.

Why teams make this switch

Two sides of the same decision

Leaving

Tidy Build logo

Tidy Build

What's pushing teams away

  • Lack of public documentation or structured user guides makes self-service onboarding difficult, with users reporting they cannot find answers without contacting support.
  • User interface limitations and missing features for documenting and supporting certain project types, particularly for firms with complex or non-standard construction workflows.
  • Performance and usability complaints in G2 reviews where users describe the tool as functional but lacking refinement, especially around mobile and on-site use cases.
  • Desire for more comprehensive CRM-style features or deeper accounting integration beyond what the current Xero connection provides, pushing users toward platforms with broader functionality.

Choosing

Jira logo

Jira

What's pulling them in

  • Industry-standard tool with deep Git integration and sprint reporting that engineering teams already know, reducing onboarding friction for new hires.
  • Highly customizable workflows and status schemes let business teams model complex approval chains without writing code.
  • Strong ecosystem of Atlassian Marketplace apps means specialized capabilities like time tracking or portfolio management are one install away.
  • Free tier with up to 10 users and unlimited issues gives small teams a no-cost entry point to validate the platform before committing budget.
  • Visibility features — boards, backlog grooming, sprint reports, and dashboards — give leadership a shared view of what is planned, in progress, blocked, and done.

Object mapping

How Tidy Build objects map to Jira

Each row shows how a Tidy Build object lands in Jira, including any object-level transformations, lookup resolution, or schema-design dependencies.

Typical mapping — final map is confirmed during the sample migration step.

Tidy Build

Project

maps to

Jira

Project

1:1
Fully supported

Tidy Build Projects map to Jira Projects as the top-level container. We preserve the project name, status (Active, On Hold, Closed), project group assignment, cost centres, and budget metadata as Jira Project fields or custom fields on a configuration issue within the project. Jira Project key prefixes are assigned during schema setup, and the Tidy Build project identifier is preserved in a custom Jira field for traceability.

Tidy Build

Quote

maps to

Jira

Issue (custom Issue Type: Quote)

1:1
Fully supported

Tidy Build Quotes have no native Jira equivalent. We create a custom Issue Type named Quote in the target Jira project with a custom status field replicating Quote lifecycle states (Draft, Sent, Approved, Lost). The quote total, line items, and pricing tier migrate as Jira fields. If Jira Service Management is present, Service Desk request types can also serve as the Quote container. The mapping is 1:1 with lifecycle state preserved as a custom field rather than a native Jira workflow status.

Tidy Build

Customer

maps to

Jira

Account or Contact

1:1
Fully supported

Tidy Build Customers migrate to Jira as Accounts (if Jira Software Premium with Assets is present) or as Jira user accounts with a Customer designation. Address, contact details, and billing information transfer to custom fields on the Jira user record or to a dedicated Customer Issue Type. Customer-specific material pricing tiers from Tidy Build become custom fields on the migrated record.

Tidy Build

Supplier

maps to

Jira

Contact or Jira User

1:1
Fully supported

Tidy Build Suppliers have no native Jira type. We map them to Jira user accounts with a Supplier designation or to a Contact Issue Type depending on the Jira edition. Supplier contact information, lead times, and procurement notes migrate as custom fields. The link between a Supplier and their associated Material Items is preserved via Jira issue links or a custom lookup field on the Product record.

Tidy Build

Material Item

maps to

Jira

Product2 (via Jira Product Catalogue)

1:1
Fully supported

Tidy Build Material Items map to Jira Products with a flat material hierarchy. Subcategories and multi-level pricing structures are flattened to a single product hierarchy level per Jira's catalogue model. Material cost, pricing levels (retail, trade, wholesale), and location assignments transfer to Jira custom fields on the Product. Jira Product Catalogue is available on Software Premium and above; on lower tiers we map Materials to Issues with a Material Type designation and preserve the hierarchy in a custom parent-link field.

Tidy Build

Task

maps to

Jira

Issue (Task or Subtask)

1:1
Fully supported

Tidy Build Tasks and Subtasks map directly to Jira Issue (type Task) and Jira Issue (type Subtask) respectively. Status, assignee (via User mapping), due date, description, and any Tidy Build Task Assignments migrate. Where Subtasks exist as a separate API object in Tidy Build, we maintain the parent-child relationship via Jira's issue-link or parent-link field. Jira Subtask must be enabled on the target project before this mapping runs.

Tidy Build

Times (Time Entries)

maps to

Jira

Worklog

1:1
Mapping required

Tidy Build Time Entries map to Jira Worklog records attached to the target Issue. Date, duration, billable/non-billable flag, and charge rate transfer as Worklog fields. The Tidy Build time profile (hourly rate) is preserved in a custom Issue field or the Jira User's time-tracking configuration. Jira time-tracking must be enabled on the target project. If the destination Jira edition does not include time-tracking, Times migrate as Task records with date and duration fields.

Tidy Build

Expense

maps to

Jira

Issue (custom Issue Type: Expense)

1:1
Fully supported

Tidy Build Expenses linked to Projects map to Jira Issues of a custom Expense type. Amount, category (expense type), date, description, and approval status transfer as Jira fields. Attachments on Tidy Build expenses export as Jira attachments and re-attach to the corresponding Expense issue. The link to the originating Project is preserved via Jira project context or a custom Project lookup field on the Expense issue.

Tidy Build

Purchase Order

maps to

Jira

Issue (custom Issue Type: Purchase Order)

1:1
Fully supported

Tidy Build Purchase Orders have no native Jira equivalent. We create a custom Issue Type named Purchase Order with custom fields for supplier reference, line items (as a text or table field), quantities, and approval status. The open/closed PO status from Tidy Build maps to Jira Issue status (Open/Done). Supplier linkage is resolved via the Supplier mapping. PO PDFs and attachments migrate as Jira attachments to the PO issue.

Tidy Build

Sales Record

maps to

Jira

Issue (type Task or Story)

1:1
Fully supported

Tidy Build Sales Records aggregate invoiced work against a Project. We map these to Jira Issues (type Task or Story depending on the customer's Jira project convention) with custom fields carrying the sales amount, line items, and associated project reference. The link to the originating Tidy Build Project is preserved in a Jira custom field for reporting against the original project structure.

Tidy Build

User

maps to

Jira

User

1:1
Fully supported

Tidy Build Users map to Jira user accounts resolved by email address. The Manager vs Team role designation from Tidy Build is preserved as a custom Jira user property (e.g. tidy_role__c) so the destination Jira admin can replicate the access model using Jira's group membership and project roles. Any Tidy Build User without a matching Jira account is held in a reconciliation queue for the admin to provision before record migration resumes.

Tidy Build

Custom Fields

maps to

Jira

Custom Fields

lossy
Mapping required

Tidy Build custom fields on Projects and Materials are detected via the API schema at scoping and pre-created in the target Jira project as typed custom fields before any data import begins. Field types (text, number, date, picklist) are mapped to equivalent Jira field types. Tidy-specific picklist options are pre-loaded as Jira custom field options. Validation rules and required-field enforcement are temporarily relaxed during migration load and reinstated after validation sign-off.

Gotchas + challenges

What specifically takes care here

Platform-specific issues from each side, plus the pair-specific challenges that don't show up on either platform's page on its own.

Tidy Build logo

Tidy Build gotchas

High

API must be enabled per organisation before migration

Medium

User-role tier limits affect migration scoping

Medium

No publicly documented API rate limits for bulk extraction

Jira logo

Jira gotchas

High

Unsupported workflow validators silently skipped during migration

High

Custom fields converted to flat text labels when migrating to non-Jira platforms

Medium

Historical status-change timestamps lost when exporting without a Marketplace plugin

Medium

Attachment import failures from oversized files and JQL reference corruption

Medium

Points-based API rate limits enforced on Jira Cloud apps from March 2026

Pair-specific challenges

  • Tidy Build API must be activated before any migration begins

    Tidy Build does not enable the Developer API by default. The API feature requires explicit activation by Tidy International on a per-organisation basis before any extraction can begin. During the pre-migration audit, we confirm whether the API is active on the customer's account. If it is not, we contact Tidy on the customer's behalf to request activation. This step can add three to five business days to the project timeline if Tidy support requires verification. Migration scoping calls that begin without confirming API availability stall at the extraction phase; we prevent this by checking API access at the very start of the engagement.

  • Construction data types have no native Jira equivalent

    Jira has no native objects for Quotes, Material Items, Suppliers, Purchase Orders, or Sales Records. Each of these requires a mapping to a Jira custom Issue Type, Product, or Contact record with custom fields carrying the construction-specific data. The material hierarchy (categories, subcategories, multi-level pricing) flattens to a single Jira product level. Cost-centre data and budget metadata from Tidy Build Projects require Jira custom fields. Without deliberate schema design during scoping, migrating teams end up with data in Jira that is searchable but not natively structured for construction workflows, requiring manual re-entry or a post-migration reorganisation effort.

  • Jira API rate limits vary by tier and require concurrency tuning

    Jira Cloud Standard has lower API rate limits than Premium or Enterprise. Tidy Build has no documented rate limits, which means we cannot pre-size our extraction concurrency without live probing. During the pre-migration audit, we run a low-concurrency extraction probe against the customer's Tidy Build account and monitor for 429 responses or latency degradation. We tune thread count accordingly and implement exponential backoff if throttling is detected. For the Jira destination, we apply Jira-tier-specific rate-limit headers and reduce batch sizes on Standard tier to avoid write-side throttling during import.

  • Automation, rules, and quote workflows do not migrate

    Tidy Build project-specific rules (e.g. quote-approval triggers, cost-centre assignment logic) and any project-status automation have no equivalent in Jira without rebuilding. Jira Automation for Jira uses triggers, conditions, and actions that are structurally different from Tidy Build's rule model. We do not migrate automations as code. We deliver a written inventory of every active Tidy Build rule and every Jira Automation rule in the destination project, with the Tidy Build rule's intent and recommended Jira Automation equivalent documented for the customer's admin to rebuild. This inventory is delivered before production migration so that the admin can configure Jira Automation in parallel with or after data migration.

  • Attachment size limits on Jira lower tiers can interrupt import

    Jira Cloud Free and Standard plans impose attachment storage and per-file size limits that may be lower than the attachment sizes present in a mature Tidy Build account (photos of site conditions, PDFs of quotes, invoices, and purchase orders). We audit attachment size distribution during the pre-migration discovery phase. Files exceeding the destination Jira plan's limit are flagged in the scope document, compressed where lossless compression is feasible, or placed in a manual-handoff queue for the customer to upload post-migration through Jira's attachment interface or a linked file storage service.

Migration approach

Six steps for a successful Tidy Build to Jira data migration

  1. Pre-migration audit and API activation

    We audit the source Tidy Build account across all active Projects, Quotes, Material Items, Suppliers, Tasks, Time Entries, Expenses, Purchase Orders, Sales Records, and Users. We confirm whether the Developer API is active; if not, we request activation with Tidy International on the customer's behalf. We also probe API rate-limit behaviour with a low-concurrency extraction run to calibrate our extraction thread count. The audit output is a written migration scope covering object counts, custom field definitions, attachment volume and size distribution, and a preliminary Jira schema design specifying custom issue types, custom fields, and project configuration.

  2. Jira destination schema design

    We design the Jira destination schema in the target Jira site or Sandbox. This includes creating custom Issue Types for Quote, Expense, and Purchase Order; configuring Product Catalogue or an equivalent custom-field strategy for Materials; defining custom fields for cost-centre data, budget metadata, and Tidy Build identifiers; and establishing Jira Projects with appropriate issue-type schemes and permission models. If the Jira site uses a team-managed project structure, we assess whether a company-managed structure better supports the migrated data and flag this as a configuration decision for the customer.

  3. Sandbox migration and mapping validation

    We run a full migration into a Jira Sandbox environment using production-like data volume. The customer's project manager or operations lead reviews migrated records across each object type, spot-checks 25-50 records against the Tidy Build source, and validates that Quote lifecycle states, Material pricing levels, and Project cost-centre data are correctly represented in Jira custom fields. Any field mapping corrections, custom field type changes, or issue-type adjustments are made in Sandbox before production migration begins. The customer signs off on the mapping before we proceed.

  4. User reconciliation and provisioning

    We extract every distinct Tidy Build User referenced across Tasks, Time Entries, and Expense records and match by email against the destination Jira site's user directory. Any Tidy Build User without a matching Jira account enters a reconciliation queue. The customer's Jira admin provisions missing users and assigns them to the appropriate Jira groups and project roles. Manager vs Team role designations from Tidy Build are preserved as custom user properties so the admin can map them to Jira group membership. Migration of record assignments cannot proceed until all referenced users have Jira accounts.

  5. Production migration in dependency order

    We run production migration in dependency order: Jira Projects first (establishing the top-level container and project metadata), then Material Items and Suppliers (for Product and Contact lookups), then Quotes, Expenses, and Purchase Orders (as custom Issue Types with custom fields), then Tasks and Subtasks (with parent-child link resolution), then Time Entries (as Jira Worklog), then Expenses and Sales Records. Each phase emits a row-count reconciliation report before the next phase begins. Jira API write calls use Jira-tier-appropriate concurrency with exponential backoff on 429 responses. Tidy Build extraction uses low-concurrency polling tuned from the scoping probe.

  6. Cutover, validation, and automation rebuild handoff

    We freeze Tidy Build writes during the cutover window and run a final delta migration of any records modified since the initial production migration run. We then enable Jira as the system of record and deliver the Automation and Rule Inventory document to the customer's Jira admin. The inventory lists every Tidy Build rule and every existing Jira Automation rule with the rule's intent, trigger, and conditions translated to Jira Automation syntax. We support a one-week hypercare window for reconciliation issues raised by the team. We do not rebuild Tidy Build rules as Jira Automation within the migration scope; that is documented separately for the customer's admin or an Atlassian partner.

Platform deep dives

Context on both ends of the pair

Tidy Build logo

Tidy Build

Source

Strengths

  • Purpose-built for construction job costing with native support for materials, labour rates, and expense tracking against Projects.
  • Multi-tier user model with separate Manager and Team user roles, limiting cost for firms that only need site-staff access.
  • Material hierarchy with categories, items, pricing levels, and locations, supporting complex supplier and inventory structures.
  • REST API covering the full data model including Projects, Materials, Quotes, Tasks, Times, and Expenses for custom integrations.
  • Xero integration for accounting sync, keeping financial data connected to the project control layer.

Weaknesses

  • No publicly documented API rate limits, making it difficult to plan bulk migration workloads without manual testing against the customer's account.
  • API access requires contacting Tidy to have the feature enabled per-organisation, adding a prerequisite step before migration can begin.
  • Documentation and user guides are sparse, with G2 reviewers explicitly flagging the lack of proper documentation as a friction point.
  • Manager user limits on lower plans constrain how many administrative accounts a growing firm can have, potentially requiring plan upgrades to support new hires in management roles.
Jira logo

Jira

Destination

Strengths

  • Deeply customizable workflows and status schemes with no hard limits on workflow complexity or number of custom statuses.
  • Strong agile ceremony support: sprint planning, backlog grooming, velocity tracking, and burndown charts for Scrum teams.
  • Industry-standard developer tool with native Git integration linking commits, pull requests, and deployments to issues.
  • Large Atlassian Marketplace with thousands of plugins extending time tracking, portfolio management, and reporting capabilities.
  • Free tier available for up to 10 users with unlimited issues, enabling evaluation before committing to a paid plan.

Weaknesses

  • Excessive configurability creates a steep learning curve; cross-team consistency is hard to maintain without strict governance.
  • Performance degrades with large backlogs, complex custom fields, and heavily nested issue hierarchies.
  • Reporting requires additional configuration or paid plugins; out-of-the-box analytics are limited for business users.
  • Jira lacks native sprint management, requiring Jira Software for true agile team features.
  • Teams outside engineering resist adoption due to UI complexity, leaving the all-in-one promise unfulfilled for cross-functional organizations.

Complexity grading

How hard is this migration?

Standard Project Management migration. 3 of 8 objects need a mapping; the rest are 1:1.

B

Overall complexity

Standard migration

Derived from compatibility, mapping clarity, API constraints, and data volume across Tidy Build and Jira.

  • Object compatibility

    B

    3 of 8 objects need a mapping; the rest are 1:1.

  • Field mapping clarity

    C

    Field mapping is derived from defaults — final spec confirmed during the sample migration.

  • Timeline complexity

    B

    8-object category — typical timelines run 2–7 days end-to-end.

  • API constraints

    B

    Tidy Build: Not publicly documented. Tidy International does not publish per-endpoint quotas in the open developer docs; in practice rate limits are confirmed once the integration is enabled on a customer tenant..

  • Data volume sensitivity

    B

    Tidy Build doesn't expose a bulk API — REST + parallelization used for high-volume runs.

Estimator

Estimate your Tidy Build to Jira migration cost

Rule-based pricing — no per-record fees, no manual quotes. Migrations over 2M records are scoped individually.

Step 1

What are you migrating?

Pick a category, then your source and destination platforms.

Category

FAQ

Frequently asked questions about Tidy Build to Jira data migrations

Answers to the questions buyers ask most during Tidy Build to Jira migration scoping. Not seeing yours? Book a call.

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Straightforward migrations with fewer than 1,000 records and no material hierarchies complete in two to four weeks. Mid-market migrations with full Quote, Material, Supplier, and Purchase Order object sets, moderate custom field complexity, and Jira Sandbox validation land between six and ten weeks. Large or complex migrations with extensive material hierarchies, multi-level pricing structures, or Jira company-managed project configurations requiring significant schema design move to ten to fourteen weeks. Jira-to-Jira migration benchmarks cited in Atlassian community discussions suggest two to four weeks for under 1,000 issues and three to six weeks for multi-team, multi-project moves; Tidy Build to Jira adds schema translation work on top of that baseline.

Adjacent paths

Related migrations to explore

Ready when you are

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