Cloning Work Items (Issues)

🧩Clone work item with entire hierarchy

With Clone Expert, you can clone any work item (issue) together with its full hierarchy of child issues, regardless of the issue type or hierarchy level.
This means you’re not limited to epics – you can duplicate stories, tasks, or bugs along with the items linked below them.

Whether you’re working above, at, or below the epic level, this option allows you to clone any work item (issue) together with its entire structure of linked child issues. Clone Expert preserves all relationships and hierarchy, no matter where in your Jira configuration the issue sits.

✅ When to use it

Use this option when you need to:

• Clone any Jira issue – whether it’s above epics (e.g. initiative), an epic itself, or a lower-level item like a story, task, or bug
• Duplicate a complete hierarchy of related issues across levels
• Reuse structured sets of work items for project templates, repeatable workflows, or planning cycles
• Maintain consistency when cloning multi-level issue structures, especially in custom hierarchies configured in Jira Premium (Cloud) or via Advanced Roadmaps (Data Center)
• Avoid rebuilding complex issue relationships manually – everything is cloned in one go

🛠️ How it works

1. Select the work item you want to clone.
2. Click the Clone issue option in the Operations menu

3. In Clone form, review the list of child issues and sub-tasks in the preview table.
4. (Optional) Decide on advanced options.
5. (Optional) Adjust fields such as summary, due dates, assignees, or remove some of the work items from the clone scope.
6. Confirm and create the cloned work item with its full hierarchy.

🔁 What gets cloned

• The selected work item (of any type, such as task, story, bug, custom type, etc.)
• All child issues are associated with it
• Preserved relationships and issue hierarchy
• Optional: comments, attachments, links, and watchers depending on settings

💡 Tips

• You can clone from any level in your Jira hierarchy – whether it’s an initiative above epics or a story with nested tasks
• Ideal for duplicating multi-level workflows, standard work packages, or planning structures
• Great for users working with custom issue hierarchies in Jira Cloud Premium or Advanced Roadmaps for Data Center
• Combine with bulk editing to adjust summaries, dates, or fields before cloning

🧩Clone work item with sub-tasks or without sub-tasks

When cloning any Jira issue (such as a task, story, or bug), Clone Expert allows you to include or exclude sub-tasks with full flexibility.
This behavior builds upon the option described in Clone work item with entire hierarchy, adding more granular control.

You decide whether to copy all sub-tasks, none, or only selected ones – directly in the clone configuration window.

✅ When to use it

Use this option when you need to:

• Clone a work item and all its sub-tasks (e.g. task with steps or story with validations)
• Clone only the main issue, ignoring sub-tasks for a cleaner result
• Reuse a work item partially – by selecting only specific sub-tasks that apply
• Simplify backlog by not recreating unnecessary low-level items

🛠️ How it works

While in the cloning form, you’ll find the option to include or exclude sub-tasks:

1. In the Include section, the checkbox “Sub-tasks” is enabled by default
2. If you want to clone all sub-tasks → leave it checked
3. If you don’t want to clone any → uncheck it entirely
4. If the box is checked, all sub-tasks will appear in the preview table
5. You can then manually uncheck specific sub-tasks you want to exclude from the clone
6. Continue configuring other options and click Clone when ready

🔁 What gets cloned

• issue with sub-tasks or without sub-tasks

💡 Tips

• Sub-tasks are listed just like regular child issues – giving you control at the individual level
• You can adjust sub-task fields (e.g. summaries, due dates) before cloning
• Disabling the “Sub-tasks” option is helpful when you only need a lightweight copy of the issue

🧩Clone work item with selected children

Not every clone needs to include all child issues. With Clone Expert, you can selectively clone only the children that are relevant to your current use case – leaving the rest out.

This option is ideal when you want to reuse part of a structure without duplicating everything below it.

✅ When to use it

Use this option when you need to:

• Reuse a subset of child issues without starting from scratch
• Avoid copying old, unnecessary, or context-specific children
• Build a lightweight version of an existing task set
• Keep control over exactly what gets cloned

🛠️ How it works

While in the cloning form:

1. In the preview table, review the list of linked children (e.g. epics, stories, tasks, sub-tasks)
2. Uncheck the items you don’t want to clone – this can include any type (stories, bugs, tasks, or sub-tasks)
3. Proceed with other configurations as usual
4. Click Clone to create the new work item with only the selected children

🔁 What gets cloned

• issue with a limited list of children

💡 Tips

• This option works for any work type, not just epics
• You can exclude any child manually
• Great for ad-hoc cloning of reusable items within complex structures

🧩Clone single work item

Sometimes, all you need is to clone a single, standalone work item – without any children or sub-tasks.

If the selected work item has no hierarchy beneath it, Clone Expert automatically treats it as a single work item clone.

Even in this simplified case, you still have access to the full power of the app – including all advanced configuration options and adjustment features.

✅ When to use it

Use this option when you need to:

• Duplicate a specific Jira issue without its hierarchy
• Reuse a bug, task, story, or custom issue type in a different context
• Create lightweight templates for repeatable items

🛠️ How it works

When you select a work item that does not contain any child issues or sub-tasks, Clone Expert will:

1. Open the standard cloning form
2. Automatically hide any hierarchy-related options
3. Allow you to configure the issue before cloning fully
4. Click Clone to create the new, fully adjusted issue

💡 Tips

• Great for reusing bugs, tasks, or one-off items
• You can still copy attachments, comments, watchers, and links
• This mode is automatically triggered if no children are present – you don’t have to change anything manually

🧩Clone children to existing work item

Clone epics, initiatives, or other parent-level work items without duplicating their higher-level parent

In advanced project structures – like those used in Jira Cloud Premium or Jira Data Center with Advanced Roadmaps – you often work with multi-level hierarchies, such as:

Capability → Initiative → Epic → Story

Initiative → Capability → Feature → Epic

Etc.

✅ When to use it

Use this option when you need to:

• Reuse only a part of a large hierarchy (e.g. just epics, not the initiative)
• Assign cloned epics to a different initiative
• Clone initiatives under another program or capability
• Move or replicate work within multi-level enterprise structures
• Avoid unnecessary duplication of top-level items

🛠️ How it works

While in the cloning form:

1. In the Advanced options, check the box: Clone child work items to an existing parent
   → The top-level item (e.g. initiative or epic) will be automatically deselected in the preview table.
2. In the dropdown, select the new parent work item — such as an initiative, capability, or other +1 level item.
3. (Optional) Select which child work items (e.g. epics or stories) should be included in the clone.
   You can deselect any that are not needed.
4. (Optional) Adjust any field values, such as summaries, descriptions, or dates, before cloning.
5. Click Clone — the selected child items will be duplicated and linked to the chosen parent issue.

💡 Tips

• This function only applies to parent-level work item, such as programs and initiatives
• Works with custom hierarchies configured in Advanced Roadmaps
• Perfect for scaling frameworks like SAFe or LeSS
• Avoids “orphaned” work item by ensuring all children are placed in the correct parent context

🧩Clone work item hierarchy to parent (e.g. epic or program)

In large-scale Jira configurations, it’s common to reuse full structures – such as initiatives with multiple epics and stories – while linking them to an existing parent, like a program, capability, or strategic theme.

Clone Expert supports cloning an entire work item hierarchy and automatically assigning the top-level cloned item to a selected existing parent.

✅ When to use it

Use this option when you need to:

• Attach the cloned structure to an existing parent item, such as a program, capability, or epic
• Maintain strategic alignment in Advanced Roadmaps, SAFe, or enterprise portfolios
• Avoid duplicating parent items already defined in your roadmap

🛠️ How it works

1. Select the work item you want to clone.
2. Click the Clone issue option in the Operations menu

1. In the Advanced options, check the box: “Set parent for the top-level cloned item”
2. Use the dropdown menu to select the existing parent you want to link the cloned hierarchy.
3. (Optional) Decide on other advanced options.
4. (Optional) Adjust any field values, use placeholders, or apply bulk editing options before cloning.
5. Click Clone – the entire structure will be duplicated, and the top-level cloned item will be linked to the selected existing parent.

💡 Tips

• The top-level cloned item will be automatically linked to the selected existing parent
• Works for any level above Epic, supported in Jira Cloud Premium and Jira Data Center with Advanced Roadmaps enabled

🧩Clone only child issues

Sometimes you don’t need to reuse the parent item – just the child issues it contains. With Clone Expert, you can choose to clone only the children (e.g. stories, tasks, bugs), and skip the top-level issue entirely.

This option gives you full control over what’s duplicated, and helps avoid unnecessary clutter in your backlog – for example, when only the execution work is still relevant.

✅ When to use it

Use this option when you need to:

• Reuse only the child issues, not the parent (e.g. only stories from an epic)
• Create a new grouping or epic later, but preserve existing execution tasks
• Move child work item into a new structure without duplicating higher-level planning items
• Refactor work between projects or teams

🛠️ How it works

1. Select a work item that contains child issues – for example:

• • an Epic with Stories and/or Tasks
  • an Initiative with Epics

2. Click the Clone issue option in the Operations menu

Your content goes here. Edit or remove this text inline or in the module Content settings. You can also style every aspect of this content in the module Design settings and even apply custom CSS to this text in the module Advanced settings.

3. In the preview table, uncheck the top-level item (the one you’re cloning from)

4. (Optional) Deselect any child items you don’t want to include
5. (Optional) Use bulk edit to adjust fields like summary, dates, or assignees
6. Click Clone – only the selected child issues will be duplicated, and they will not be linked to any parent

💡 Tips

• The cloned child items will appear in your backlog without a parent
• You can later assign them manually to a different Epic, Initiative, or group
• Useful for splitting work, reorganizing scopes, or building new templates based on existing tasks

🧩Optional: Do not close after cloning

To repeat the operation with small changes, tick the checkbox labeled “Do not close after cloning”, located next to the Clone button in the cloning form.

This will keep the form open after submission, allowing you to perform another clone without reopening the interface.