Jira cost in 2026: the real price of Jira and Confluence

For years, Jira was one of the easiest lines in the IT budget.

Once a year, the renewal quote arrived. Someone compared it with last year's, added a few percent and signed. Jira and Confluence kept running, and next year's number was settled.

Then Atlassian raised its prices three times in twelve months: the cloud by 5 to 10 percent in October 2025 and again by 7 to 10 percent a year later. Data Center, the self-managed version, went up by about 15 percent in February 2026. And since March 30, 2026, Atlassian no longer sells Data Center to new customers.

That makes last year's number a poor starting point. And because Data Center support ends in March 2029, every Data Center customer has to plan a move anyway.

What does Jira cost today?

In Atlassian Cloud, Jira Standard runs about €5 to €9 per user per month, and Confluence Standard about €3 to €6.50. The more users you have, the less you pay per head.

The published Jira pricing is only the starting point, though. There's Confluence for documentation, a separate subscription for single sign-on, Marketplace apps and the cost of moving it all. Future price increases add another layer of uncertainty.

To show how those costs add up over three years, we've built the bill for one example company, Example Co., step by step. Example Co. is fictional: 1,000 employees work in Jira and Confluence, both running in its own Data Center today. Keep your own figures at hand, because the same calculation works for your budget.

Key takeaways

1. Atlassian raised prices three times in twelve months and stopped selling Data Center to new customers

   Anyone budgeting for the next three years should build in further increases.

   
   

2. More users lower the cloud price per head

   Jira Cloud pricing on Standard is about €5 to €9 per user per month. Confluence needs its own license, so budget the Confluence cost separately.

   
   

3. Add-ons raise your Jira license cost

   Single sign-on and Marketplace apps cost extra. Apps are usually licensed by the user count of the Atlassian product they extend, so a test management tool can cost money for people who never use it.

   
   

4. The Jira license is only part of the total cost

   In our 1,000-user example, costs add up to about €851,000 over three years. Only 40 percent of that is Jira itself. The rest comes from Confluence, add-ons, apps and the move.

   
   

5. Which license model costs less depends on your organization

   With per-user billing, costs can fall when you need fewer licenses. A company-wide license like sovara's can pay off especially for organizations with many users and a stable or growing workforce.

Jira license cost in Data Center: the starting point

Example Co. runs Jira and Confluence on its own servers. It pays for licenses by user tier, which have cost about 15 percent more since February 2026, and on top of that for running everything: servers, database, upgrades, app maintenance, permissions and user management.

Nobody can give you an honest flat rate for the running costs, but the calculation is simple. Estimate what share of a full-time position your team spends on them, and multiply it by your fully loaded cost per position. Then add hardware or hosting.

Staying put isn't a long-term option. Data Center can no longer be bought new, existing customers can only expand their licenses until March 30, 2028, and support ends on March 28, 2029. Our post on Atlassian Data Center end of life covers what that means for your planning.

For Example Co., the 2027 to 2029 budget period is the one in which it moves. The obvious destination is Atlassian Cloud, and the next sections show what ends up on the bill there.

Line item 1: Jira cost in the cloud

Atlassian sells Jira Cloud in four tiers: Free, Standard, Premium and Enterprise. Free covers up to ten users, and Enterprise is only available with annual billing.

Jira cost in the cloud depends on two things: the tier and the number of users. Jira Cloud pricing is tiered, so the first 100 users pay the full rate and each band above that pays less. On Standard, that works out to about €5 to €9 per user per month, and Premium costs up to twice as much.

Example Co. picks Premium. It needs a sandbox for workflow changes, an uptime guarantee and the advanced admin features it's used to from running its own servers.

Line item 2: Confluence pricing and cost

Jira and Confluence are separate products. Use both, and you have two licenses: two prices, two renewal dates, two user counts and two sets of apps. Confluence follows the same pricing model as Jira at a lower price per user.

Example Co. stays on Premium here too, so both products have the same admin features. Running two systems separately also takes your team time that shows up on no Atlassian invoice. You can estimate it the same way as for Data Center.

External users change the user count

Example Co. counts 1,000 internal people. As soon as suppliers or agencies work in its Jira projects, that number grows.

On paid plans, Atlassian allows free guests, but in Jira a guest is limited to a single space per site, and anyone who once held a paid license can't become a guest. A supplier working across several projects therefore needs a full license. The example leaves these out. In your own calculation, every one of them belongs in the user count.

Line item 3: SSO and SCIM with Atlassian Guard

In a company this size, everyone signs in through single sign-on with Entra ID or Okta. SCIM comes with it, so accounts are created and deactivated automatically as people join and leave.

In Atlassian Cloud, both come from a separate product with its own per-user price: Atlassian Guard. The Enterprise plan includes Guard Standard, which explains part of the price jump from Premium to Enterprise. Example Co. stays on Premium and adds Guard Standard as the third line.

Line item 4: Marketplace apps are billed for every user

Most Jira setups that have grown over the years run on apps from the Atlassian Marketplace, and Example Co. is no exception. In the cloud, these apps are billed by the host product's user count, not by actual use. Atlassian says so itself: with Confluence for 25 people, you pay the 25-user price for every app.

Example Co. uses two widely used apps: ScriptRunner for automation and Xray for test management. Only the 40 people in quality assurance work in Xray, yet the app is billed for all 1,000 Jira users. Go through your own app list and check how many people really use each one.

With Jira, Confluence, Guard and these two apps, Example Co.'s first year looks like this:

That's about CHF 236,000. A partner discount would come off every line. As long as it's the same everywhere, the split doesn't change: Jira is still less than half the bill.

Line item 5: Atlassian pricing over three years

A budget for 2027 to 2029 needs years two and three as well, and today's price won't carry that far. Atlassian pricing has gone up in quick succession, and whether it rises in 2027 and 2028, and by how much, isn't known.

So Example Co. assumes the October 2026 step repeats. At 1,000 users, Premium went up by about 7 percent for both Jira and Confluence, so Example Co. applies 7 percent a year to every line. The price increases alone cost it a five-figure sum over the three years, with no change in usage.

Replace that with your own assumption, or ask for a price lock when you renew.

Line item 6: what switching costs

That leaves the move itself. Switching costs money too, whether you go to Atlassian Cloud or to another vendor, and how much depends mostly on your existing setup. Plan for four costs in particular:

• Parallel operation. During the move, both systems often run at the same time. Example Co. assumes three months. Align the project plan with the date your old licenses end early on, so you don't pay twice for longer than you need to.

  
  

• Data and configuration. Issues, pages, attachments, workflows, fields and permissions all have to be moved and checked. The effort depends on how much your setup has been customized over the years, and hardly at all on the number of users.

  
  

• Apps and custom scripts. This is often where most of the work is. Not every app arrives in the same form even when you move to Atlassian Cloud, and Atlassian itself recommends auditing your apps before you migrate. If you're leaving Atlassian, you also have to decide for each app whether the new platform already does the job, whether an integration can replace it, or whether you'll build it yourself.

  
  

• Training and change. All 1,000 people at Example Co. have to learn a new interface and, in part, new ways of working. Plan training and support for the period after the move, and expect some tasks to take longer while people adjust.

The result: about €851,000 over three years

Added up, Example Co.'s bill for three years of Atlassian Cloud Premium comes to about €851,000 (about CHF 793,000), price increases and parallel operation included:

Jira's list price, the number most people search for, accounts for about €339,000 of that, or 40 percent.

And the figure is on the cautious side: it has only two apps, no external users, no migration project, no training and no admin effort.

What the bill looks like with sovara

Atlassian Cloud is one option. Another is sovara, rready's European alternative to Jira and Confluence. Run the same line items for sovara, and Example Co.'s table looks like this:

Guard and the price increases alone come to about €150,000 of Example Co.'s three-year bill, almost a fifth of the total. Neither exists at sovara.

Behind that is a different model. Tasks, projects and knowledge run on one shared platform instead of two products. The license covers the whole company, internal and external users included, so suppliers and partners don't need a seat of their own. Single sign-on works over SAML and OIDC, including with Microsoft Entra ID, and accounts are provisioned and synced through SCIM, Active Directory or LDAP.

Extensions and the move still belong in the calculation. sovara has no marketplace with thousands of ready-made apps like Atlassian's. Extensions connect through the REST API, webhooks and custom plugins. For every app you use today, check whether sovara already covers the function or whether you'll need an integration or your own development, and put that effort into the comparison. rready's migration guarantee covers standard data and configuration from Jira, but not plugins or custom code.

IT and security leaders will also want to know who can access the data. sovara's contracting party is rready AG, based in Zurich, with no US parent company. Our recent post on the US CLOUD Act explains what that means for access by US authorities. For a feature comparison, see sovara vs. Jira and Confluence. For other vendors, see our comparison of European alternatives to Jira and Confluence.

When Atlassian stays cheaper

Small teams face a different calculation. Up to ten people use Jira and Confluence for free, and above that, Standard often stays affordable for a small user count. Switching purely to save money may not pay off then, because migration and training can eat up the savings.

Per-user pricing can also be an advantage when your user count falls. If Example Co. sells a division, it can lower its license costs by adjusting its subscription accordingly. With a fixed company-wide license, the price doesn't automatically go down with it.

So also consider how your organization is likely to develop over the next three years.

The number you actually need

The next renewal quote will arrive, as it does every year. This time, reliable planning takes more than comparing it with last year's.

Take Example Co.'s bill and put in your own figures. How many internal and external people need access? Which apps do you use? What do Guard, administration and operations cost? What annual price increases do you want to build in? And what would switching cost?

Regulated companies have further requirements to consider, such as outsourcing rules under DORA, an exit strategy and audit rights. This cost calculation leaves them out. You'll find information and evidence for sovara in our Trust Center.

Your last renewal quote is the starting point for both sides of the comparison, and what counts is the total over three years. We calculate sovara's annual price for each organization individually. Bring your current Atlassian renewal quote, and we'll put a three-year quote next to it, line by line, migration included.

FAQs

How much does Jira cost per user?

In Atlassian Cloud, Jira Standard costs about €5 to €9 per user per month, and Premium up to about twice as much. Because pricing is tiered, the average price per head falls as your user count grows. There's a free plan for up to ten users.

These figures are based on list prices as of October 14, 2026, converted from US dollars.

How much does Confluence cost?

Confluence Standard costs about €3 to €6.50 per user per month in the cloud, and Premium up to about twice as much. Even if you already use Jira, Confluence needs its own license.

What do Jira and Confluence cost together?

That depends mostly on the tier, the number of users and any add-on products. In our example, with 1,000 users on Jira and Confluence Premium, Atlassian Guard and two Marketplace apps, it's about €253,000 in the first year.

Over three years, the bill adds up to about €851,000. That includes an assumed annual price increase of 7 percent and three months of parallel operation. Migration, training and ongoing administration come on top.

Is Jira pricing available in euros?

The Atlassian list prices used in this post are in US dollars. Whether you can pay in euros or francs is best clarified with your reseller.

If your quote is based on US dollars, budget for the exchange rate too. A weaker euro or franc can raise your costs even when Atlassian's prices stay the same. The euro and franc figures in this post are converted at the ECB reference rate of October 13, 2026.

Can you get a discount on Jira?

Published Jira pricing is list pricing. Your actual quote can differ, for example through partner terms or individually negotiated discounts.

When you compare, keep in mind that a discount on Jira alone says little about the total cost. Look at Confluence, Guard and Marketplace apps too.

How often does Atlassian raise its prices?

Three times in the last twelve months: for the cloud on October 15, 2025 and October 13, 2026, and for Data Center on February 17, 2026. That doesn't establish a fixed rhythm for future increases. For a multi-year budget, it still makes sense to plan with several scenarios.

Is Jira Cloud cheaper than Data Center?

Jira license cost alone won't answer that. On license prices alone, Cloud Standard is cheaper than Data Center, while Premium costs more.

Data Center adds servers and operations. In the cloud, Atlassian Guard can add to the bill. Which comes out cheaper overall depends on your tier and on your internal operations and admin effort.