Create a formatting rule

A formatting rule is a small recipe: when this field matches this condition, paint this color. This page walks through adding one rule and saving it to a view.

Create a rule when you want a visual signal — overdue, blocked, high priority — surfaced without editing Jira data.

Open the rules dialog

1. Open the lens and switch to the view where you want the rule to apply.
2. In the toolbar, click Conditional Formatting. The Configure Formatting dialog opens.
3. Any existing rules for this view appear at the top of the dialog under Active rules.

Build the rule

Fill in the Add Rule form at the bottom of the dialog:

1. Scope — choose Row to paint the whole row, or Cell to paint only a single column’s cell. See Row vs cell scope for guidance.
2. Field — pick the field the rule should check (Status, Priority, Due Date, a custom field, etc.).
3. Operator — pick how to compare (equals, contains, is empty, greater than, between, in the next N days, and more). See Operators reference.
4. Value — type the value to match. For “Between” and range operators, enter two values. Some operators like is empty, is not empty, today, and in the past need no value.
5. Background color — pick a preset: Red, Yellow, Green, Blue, or Gray. These are tuned for Atlassian Design System so they look right against the grid.
6. Text color — optionally change the text color for extra contrast. Leave as default if you want the row’s normal text color.
7. For Cell rules, optionally check Bold to render the matched cell in bold.

Click Add to put the rule into the Active rules list.

Stack multiple rules

Add as many rules as you need. Remember:

• Foundation applies the first matching rule to each row or cell.
• Drag a rule or delete-and-recreate it to reorder — put the most specific rule first.
• Row rules and cell rules coexist. A row rule paints the background of the row; a cell rule on top of that paints only its column.

Click Remove on any rule in the list to delete it.

Save and see the result

1. Click Save at the bottom of the dialog.
2. The grid re-renders with the rule applied.
3. Switch to another view and the formatting goes away — rules are scoped to the view you saved them to.

Examples

• Overdue work in red: Row, field = Due Date, operator = In the past, color = Red.
• High priority cells in bold red text: Cell, field = Priority, operator = Equals, value = Highest, background = Red, bold on.
• Stale rows (no update): Row, field = Last Updated, operator = In the last N days (inverted by layering a rule above), color = Gray.
• Empty assignee flagged yellow: Cell, field = Assignee, operator = Is empty, color = Yellow.

Related

• Conditional formatting overview
• Operators reference
• Row vs cell scope