Jira blocked by vs depends on: link types

New to blocking links in Jira? Start with What “blocks” means.

You want to record that one piece of work waits on another, and Jira offers a list of link types to pick from. On Atlassian Community it reads “I have story A which is waiting for completion of Story B. I was planning to link them. Do you formal definition of guidance on when to use which link type?” (Community, January 2025). This page says what the link types are, which one to use for a dependency and why, how to add one, then what Blockline reads.

The link types Jira lists

Atlassian’s page on linking work items lists these pairs: “is blocked by” and “blocks”, “is cloned by” and “clones”, “is duplicated by” and “duplicates”, “added to idea” and “is idea for”, “is implemented by” and “implements”, “merged into” and “merged from”, “is reviewed by” and “reviews”, “is caused by” and “causes”, and “relates to” (Atlassian). “Depends on” is not among them.

A pair is one link type read from its two ends. Blocks is one type: on the blocker it reads “blocks”, on the work item that waits it reads “is blocked by”. There is one link, not two, so “blocked by” and “blocks” are the same dependency seen from each side (What “blocks” means).

If your list has “depends on”, an admin added it. A Jira admin adds a link type under Settings › Work items › Work item linking, with a name and an outward and an inward description, then Add (Atlassian). Anyone who links needs the Link Work Items permission, on the same page.

Which one to use for a dependency

Use Blocks, from the work item that waits: “is blocked by” the work it needs. The reason is what reads it:

• The timeline. It “can only show work items with the Blocks work item link type and link work items from a single space” (Atlassian). A “depends on” link is not drawn.
• Jira Plans. By default “dependencies in your plan treat all work item links as though they have the Blocks work item link type”. A Jira admin can choose other link types for plans under Jira apps › Dependencies, and the change applies to all plans on the site (Atlassian). Plans needs Jira Premium or Enterprise.

A second type for the same meaning splits the picture: some links are read by the timeline and some are not.

Add a dependency

On a work item, or from a board card’s More actions (•••), choose Link work item, pick a link type, pick the work items, then Link (Atlassian). To add a blocker, open the work item that waits, pick is blocked by, and search for the blocker. Link the story that waits: its epic is held up through it.

On the timeline, drag a dot from one work item to another; the direction (“blocks” or “is blocked by”) follows the order in which the two are scheduled.

With Blockline

Blockline is our app. It reads Blocks by default, so a team that links “is blocked by” needs to set nothing up. If your teams already use “depends on” or another type, a Jira admin ticks it under Jira settings › Apps › Blockline settings, and says which way its outward phrase reads: either the other work item waits, or this work item waits (Settings). At least one link type stays ticked.

Whatever the type, Blockline adds what a link does not say. It reads the links across spaces and says whether the blocker lands after the epic’s date, as one sentence: “PAYC-3 blocks STOR-4 and lands 6 days after this epic’s date”. The seven rules are in How risk is judged. How Jira marks a work item as blocked in other ways is in Jira blocked status, flag or “is blocked by”; how the links show on a timeline and in Plans is in Jira dependencies on the timeline and in Plans. More on the Blockline home page.