PUBLISHED ON:
May 19, 2025
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Jira can be quite overwhelming for beginners and even some seasoned users when label sprawl takes over.
What is label sprawl? It’s the uncontrolled increase in labels in Jira. Most of the time, it happens when users fail to use existing Jira labels, creating new ones by accident or on purpose without following guidelines. As a result, teams sometimes find themselves digging through an ocean full of issues only to discover an urgent task has been mislabeled, or has a typo.
Not only does label sprawl slow down productivity, but it also causes confusion and reporting errors.
4 Common Causes of Label Sprawl
Something as simple as giving an issue a single label shouldn’t cause too many problems, right? Unfortunately, that’s exactly the kind of mindset that contributes to this problem. Let’s take a look at the common causes of label sprawl and learn how to manage labels in Jira.
Lack of governance
When there is no one overseeing the creation and usage of a clear labeling system, this usually leads to people labeling issues their own way. For example, a senior developer might prefer “bug-fix” while a junior developer might prefer “bugFIX”.
Even if the words involved are the same, this poor label organization returns different results during label search.
Overuse of ad-hoc labels
Users often create one-off labels for unique situations that may only be used once or twice. As a result, they clutter the system with unnecessary labels, slowing it down and taking up space in your fields.
Inconsistent, redundant, and duplicate labels
Whether it’s because of a typo, irregular capitalization, or different terminology, most teams have accidentally used different tags to mean the same thing.
Example: Someone uses “critical” instead of “urgent”, “bugs” instead of “Bugs”, or “developmnt” instead of “development”.
Limited cleanup tools
Getting labels under control isn’t just a one time thing. Your labeling system should be audited from time to time so that you can edit, merge or remove tags as needed. However, Jira does not have a simple or intuitive bulk editing tool, making the process of label cleanup tedious and time-consuming.
3 Actionable Best Practices to Beat Label Sprawl
Label sprawl might sound inevitable, but it isn’t. You can get ahead of it and manage your Jira labels by doing a few simple things.
Standardize labeling systems and policy
Invest in creating a formal and well-documented policy with clear guidelines on how labels should be created and used. The document can serve as a reference for all the users on a project and prevent ad-hoc or inconsistent labeling.
Step 1: Draft and write the policy
Key stakeholders should work together to create a naming convention, acceptable formats, and examples. This includes all team leaders and project managers so that everyone agrees and is aware of the policy.
Step 2: Distribute and train
Share the labeling policy across all the teams.Make sure that every single person receives a copy during onboarding. Consider holding a training session to make sure users are familiar with the system.
Step 3: Review periodically
Revisit the policy from time to time and update it based on feedback or changes in your Jira workflows.
b. Use consistent prefixes
Placing prefixes in a label helps to classify a task or issue into a particular category at first glance. Having a consistent system can minimize duplicate, redundant, or ambiguous tags, which makes issues easier to filter and report.
Step 1: Define prefixes
Determine your prefix and format. You can use CamelCase, hyphens, or underscores as long as they all follow the same rules. Examples: csPasswordReset, csRefund, csEscalate, or cs-passwordreset, cs-refund, and cs-escalate.
Step 2: Implement usage
Once the prefixes have been defined, roll out their usage by informing all team members about the changes (if any).
Step 3: Monitor compliance
Team leaders and admins should check back regularly to ensure that other users are adhering to the prefixes.
c. Audit projects periodically
Managing multiple projects and stakeholders may result in multiple tags and new single-use fields. It’s a good practice to audit labels every six months to ensure that label chaos is not creeping up again.
Step 1: Schedule audits
Determine whether you’re going to hold audits on a quarterly, biannual, or annual basis. Make sure people are aware of this downtime.
Step 2: Review and cleanup
Take a look at all the labels currently in use and determine which ones to keep and which ones to discard while keeping in line with the policy. Consider discarding or consolidating labels that don’t see a lot of usage.
Step 3: Communicate changes
If you discovered duplicate, redundant labels during the audit and then merged them, be sure to communicate the changes with all the assignees and stakeholders.
Introduction to Advanced Label Manager for Jira (Custom Labels & Reports)
The process of reviewing and editing labels in Jira can be time-consuming and frustrating for larger teams. But you can save yourself a lot of time by using Advanced Label Manager for Jira (Custom Labels & Reports).
Stay informed using label reports
Advanced Label Manager for Jira has better reporting capabilities that can easily show you how many issues are under a single label. The reports also show you exactly how many labels are not commonly used or misspelled.
View comprehensive breakdowns of label usage in the dashboard using Label Reports by Advanced Label Manager for Jira (Custom Labels & Reports).
Save time with bulk edit
When you discover similar labels during an audit session, it can be difficult to edit each one of them through the native Jira system. However, you can edit all of them through Advanced Label Manager for Jira (Custom Labels & Reports). No more clicking on each issue and deleting them one by one.
Add, merge, or delete multiple Jira labels at the same time using the ‘Manage Labels’ tab.
Final Thoughts
Label sprawl isn’t just organizational clutter, it’s a barrier to productivity that only compounds over time. Implement strategic label management early with powerful bulk editing, proactive label creation, and vivid color coding that help you organize, audit, and optimize your workflow.
Beat the label chaos today – optimize your workflow with Advanced Label Manager for Jira (Custom Labels & Reports).
