Nimbus vs Jira.
A realtime kanban board for the browser against the heavyweight of issue tracking. An honest feature and pricing comparison, updated August 2026.
Which should you pick?
Both tools track issues, but they fit different teams. Jira wins when you need scrum sprints, roadmaps, reports, automation, and the Atlassian ecosystem, and its free tier is genuinely useful up to 10 users. Nimbus wins when you want realtime kanban at $0 with no user limits, nothing to install, and a board that is live minutes after signup.
Pricing and capabilities checked August 2026. We update this page when either product changes.
Feature comparison
The two tools answer the same question, realtime issue tracking, with very different answers. The table keeps it honest.
| Criterion | Nimbus | Jira |
|---|---|---|
| Realtime collaboration | Cards, comments, and presence sync to every screen over WebSockets the moment they change. No refresh, no polling. | Pages refresh without a reload, but there is no live presence layer and updates are not instant across boards. |
| Pricing | $0 forever. No per-seat billing, no user limits, no feature gates. | Free for up to 10 users, then Standard from about $7.91 per user per month and Premium about $14.54, annual billing (July 2026 list). |
| Hosting | Hosted for you. Sign up and sign in from any browser; nothing to install, nothing to run. | Jira Cloud is hosted too. Data Center self-managed is quote-based and new-customer sales wound down in 2026. |
| Boards and views | A realtime kanban board built around live collaboration. | Kanban and scrum boards, sprints, backlog, timeline, calendar, and summary views. |
| Roles and permissions | Three clear roles, owner, admin, and member, scoped per workspace. Explicit and quick to set up. | Project roles and permission schemes. Powerful, but more to learn and administer. |
| Search | Full-text search across every issue, one keystroke away. | JQL, a powerful query language with a real learning curve. |
| Agile reports | Not available yet. The activity log covers what changed and who changed it. | Velocity, burndown, dashboards, and advanced roadmaps on Premium. |
| Automation and apps | Not available yet. Deliberately simple. | Automation rules plus a marketplace of thousands of apps, billed separately. |
| Time tracking | Not available yet. | Via paid marketplace apps such as Tempo Timesheets. |
| Audit trail | Every move, edit, and invite lands in the activity log on every plan. | Audit logs arrive on paid plans; the free tier does not include them. |
| Mobile | Responsive web app; no native apps yet. | Native iOS and Android apps included with every plan. |
| Support | Email support plus an open source community on GitHub. | Atlassian community on Free, 9/5 support on Standard, 24/7 with SLAs on Premium. |
| Data ownership | Your data stays in Nimbus's hosted database, never sold or shared, and you can delete it any time. | Your data lives in Atlassian's cloud unless you run the quote-based Data Center tier. |
| Setup time | Minutes: sign up, create a workspace, invite the team. | The site starts fast, but workflow and permission configuration takes real time to get right. |
Jira details reflect the official pricing page, checked August 2026. Nimbus details reflect the current release.
Pricing at a glance
Nimbus
$0 forever
Free to use with unlimited boards, issues, and team members. Sign up and sign in from any browser; nothing to install and no servers to run.
Jira
Jira Free
$0
Up to 10 users, 2 GB storage, scrum and kanban boards, 100 automation runs per month.
Jira Standard
~$7.91 / user / month
Annual billing (July 2026 list). Adds permissions, audit logs, and more automation.
Jira Premium
~$14.54 / user / month
Annual billing. Adds advanced roadmaps, unlimited storage, and SLA-backed support.
Choose Nimbus if...
You want realtime kanban at $0
No per-seat billing, no user limits, no feature gates. Free to use, so the price never surprises you.
You want zero setup
Sign up, sign in, and the board is live in minutes. Nothing to install and no server to run, while Jira takes real time to configure workflows and permissions.
Your team lives in kanban, not process
A quiet board with roles, search, labels, presence, and an activity log. No workflow engine to configure, no permission schemes to learn.
Choose Jira if...
You run scrum with sprints and reports
Sprints, velocity, burndown, dashboards, and roadmaps are native. Nimbus is kanban-only for now.
You depend on the Atlassian ecosystem
Confluence, Bitbucket, deep JQL search, automation rules, and a marketplace of thousands of apps.
You need enterprise compliance and support
Audit logs, SSO and SCIM on paid tiers, SLA-backed support, and custom enterprise contracts.
Frequently asked questions
Yes. Nimbus is free to use, with unlimited users and boards and no per-seat billing. Jira is free for up to 10 users, then Standard costs about $7.91 per user per month and Premium about $14.54 per user per month on annual billing, at July 2026 list prices.
It depends on your workflow. Teams that track work on a kanban board can replace Jira with Nimbus in minutes, with nothing to install and no setup project. Teams that need scrum sprints, burndown reports, roadmaps, automation rules, or Atlassian apps should stay on Jira. Nimbus is kanban-first and deliberately simple.
Not yet. Nimbus ships a realtime kanban board with workspaces, roles, search, labels, presence, and an activity log. Sprints, velocity, and burndown reports are not available today, so scrum teams should evaluate Jira or another scrum tool.
No. Nimbus is a hosted web app. Sign up, sign in, and start tracking from any browser. There is no download, no server to run, and no infrastructure to maintain. Nimbus handles hosting, storage, and access control for you. Jira's self-managed option is quote-based, and new-customer sales wound down in 2026.
For a team that wants a realtime kanban board with no cost ceiling, Nimbus. There is no per-seat pricing and no user limit, so growing past 10 users costs nothing. Jira's free tier is also strong for small teams, but it caps at 10 users and adds per-seat cost after that.
More comparisons
See how Nimbus stacks up against the other issue trackers.
Ship your first sprint today.
Create a workspace and invite the team — the board is live the moment you open it.