FastPoll documentation — polls, votes and surveys for Jira

Where to find FastPoll

FastPoll adds three surfaces, and each keeps its own separate polls — a poll created on an issue belongs to that issue only.

Surface	How to open it	Best for
Issue panel	Open an issue → find FastPoll among the app buttons (under Apps, the + Add menu or •••, depending on your layout). Requires the new Jira issue view.	A decision about that specific ticket.
Project page	Project sidebar → Apps → FastPoll.	Team-wide questions and backlog prioritization.
Dashboard gadget	Dashboard → Edit → Add gadget → FastPoll.	Standing votes visible to everyone at a glance.

Creating a poll

Click New poll and work through the four steps:

01 Type — pick one of the nine types. A one-line explanation appears under your choice.
02 Question — what you're asking.
03 Details — depends on the type: the options, time slots, dots per voter, score range, or the JQL query for a backlog poll.
04 Rules — who sees results, whether voting is anonymous, and an optional auto-close time.

Create stays disabled until the poll is valid; the reason appears next to the button (for example, "Add at least two options").

Poll types & how results are scored

Type	Use it when	How results are scored
Single choice	One answer from a list.	Votes per option; the share is the percentage of voters who chose it.
Multiple choice	Voters may pick several.	Votes per option, each as a share of voters — so the shares can add up to more than 100%.
Yes / No	A quick go/no-go call.	Votes for Yes and No.
Rating (1–5)	Confidence or sentiment checks.	Votes per rating value.
Meeting / time	Finding a slot everyone can make.	Voters may tick several slots; the slot with the most votes leads.
Dot voting	Weighing several options against each other.	Each voter spends a budget of dots (default 5). Results show total dots per option and each option's share of all dots cast.
Score poll	Evaluating options independently.	Each option is scored from 0 to your maximum (default 5). Results show the average score. A deliberate 0 counts as a rating and lowers the average.
Ranked choice	Order matters, and you want the option the team can live with.	Borda count: with N options, a voter's top pick earns N−1 points, the next N−2, and so on down to 0. An option that is nobody's favourite but everyone's second choice can — and often should — win.
Backlog prioritization	Ranking real Jira issues.	Dot voting over issues you choose with JQL, and the result can be written back to Jira. See below.

Voting and changing your vote

One vote per person, enforced on the server — not just hidden in the interface.
While a poll is open you can change your vote: click Change vote, adjust, and submit again. Your original vote is replaced, never duplicated.
Results appear on the card once you've voted. Before that you see the ballot; if the poll hides results until you vote, a note beside the button says so.
A dot-voting ballot shows how many dots you have left, and won't let you spend more than your budget.
Rank a ranked-choice poll with the ↑ and ↓ buttons — top is best.

Anonymity & who sees results

Set both of these when you create a poll, under 04 Rules.

Who sees results

Everyone — anyone who can see the poll can see the results.
After voting — results unlock once a person has voted. Useful when you don't want early results to influence later voters.
Creator only — only the person who created the poll sees the breakdown. Everyone else still sees how many people voted.

The poll creator always sees results, whichever mode is chosen. These rules are enforced on the server: when results are hidden from you, they are not sent to your browser at all.

Anonymous voting

Tick Anonymous and FastPoll never reveals who voted for what. Voter names are not stored for anonymous polls, no names or avatars are shown, and vote timestamps and ordering are withheld from results so individual ballots can't be inferred. One vote per person is still enforced.

On non-anonymous polls, voters appear as small avatars under the option they chose (with their allocation or rank where relevant). Hover an avatar for the full name.

Auto-close and notifications

Set Auto-close at when creating a poll and it closes itself at that time. The card shows the closing time while the poll is open.
The check runs hourly, so a poll closes within the hour after its deadline rather than to the exact minute.
When a poll on an issue closes — automatically or manually — FastPoll posts a comment on that issue summarising the outcome. Polls on project pages and dashboards have no issue to comment on, so no comment is posted.
A closed poll stops accepting votes, shows a Winner line, and can be reopened by its creator.

Backlog prioritization & Jira write-back

This turns a Jira query into a votable list, then writes your team's ranking back to the issues.

Create a poll and choose Backlog prioritization.
Enter a JQL query (a sensible default is provided) and click Load. Untick any issues you don't want included.
Choose how many dots per voter to allow, and where the ranking should be written — Labels, Priority, or a number field.
The team votes by spending dots on the issues that matter most.
When you're ready, click Apply to Jira and confirm.

What each write-back target does

Labels — adds fastpoll-rank-1, fastpoll-rank-2 and so on, in dot order. This is additive: your existing labels are untouched. Note that re-applying adds new rank labels without removing earlier ones.
Priority — sets each issue's Priority according to its rank. This overwrites the current priority.
Number field — writes the rank number (1, 2, 3 …) into a number field you choose. This overwrites that field's value.

Only issues that received at least one dot are written to, and writes happen as you — so nothing changes on issues you don't have permission to edit. FastPoll always asks for confirmation, and the dialog spells out exactly what will be changed.

Exporting results

Export CSV — the question, type, voter count, and a row per option with its value and share. Opens in Excel, Numbers or Sheets.
Export PNG — a clean bar chart of the results, ready to paste into a document, deck or Confluence page.

Both are available whenever you can see the results.

Managing polls

Close / Reopen and Delete are available to the poll's creator only. Other people don't see those buttons.
Deleting a poll permanently deletes it and all of its votes. This can't be undone.
Polls are listed newest first, per surface.

Limits

Question: up to 500 characters. Option labels: up to 255 characters.
Up to 50 options per poll (at least 2 are required, and they must be distinct).
Dot voting: 1–50 dots per voter. Score polls: maximum score 2–10.
Auto-close must be a time in the future.

Permissions & your data

FastPoll is built entirely on Atlassian Forge. Poll definitions and votes are stored in Forge storage inside your own Atlassian tenant; the app declares no egress permissions, so nothing is sent to us or any third party, and it follows your site's data residency automatically.

The app asks for permission to read Jira issue data (to search issues for backlog polls and to list fields and priorities), to create and update issues (to apply a backlog ranking and post the results comment), and to view user profiles (to show voter names on non-anonymous polls).

See the privacy policy and security policy for the full picture.

Troubleshooting

I can't find FastPoll on an issue

The issue panel works in the new Jira issue view only. Hard-refresh the page (Cmd/Ctrl-Shift-R); if the app was just installed or updated, give it a minute to appear.

Voter names or avatars aren't showing

Names are only shown on non-anonymous polls, and only when results are visible to you. Names are captured when a person votes, so votes cast before the feature was available may not have one. If your site restricts user visibility, an avatar may be omitted rather than showing an unhelpful identifier.

My poll hasn't auto-closed yet

The closing check runs hourly — a poll closes within the hour after its deadline. The creator can always close it immediately with Close.

I can't see the results

The poll may be set to After voting (vote, and they unlock) or Creator only. The card tells you which.

I can't close or delete a poll

Only the poll's creator can. Ask them, or create your own poll.

"FastPoll license is inactive"

The subscription needs attention — a site administrator can check it in Atlassian Administration → Apps. Existing results stay viewable; creating polls and voting resume once the licence is active.

Something else

Email support@niramasolutions.com with what you did, what you expected and what happened — a screenshot helps. We aim to reply within two business days.