Guides for Jira teams

Guide · Connect end of support

CucumberStudio for Jira and the end of Connect: keep scenarios linked to your issues

If your team links CucumberStudio scenarios, tests and results to Jira issues through SmartBear's add-on, here is what Atlassian's move away from Connect means for that link, what to write down now, and three ways to keep it.

What is changing

  • Connect end of support is 31 January 2027. After that date Atlassian no longer supports Connect apps, and they may stop working as the platform changes.
  • Connect apps can no longer ship updates through the Marketplace since spring 2026.
  • Jira has started telling admins, and then users, when an installed app "might stop working soon".

Apps built on Forge, Atlassian's current platform, are not affected.

Is your CucumberStudio add-on affected?

On the Atlassian Marketplace, CucumberStudio - BDD & Test Management by Cucumber, a SmartBear company, is listed as a Connect app: its latest cloud version is 1.1.28-AC (the -AC ending marks Connect), released on 24 April 2025, with about 1,050 installs as of November 2026. Two ways to check your own site:

  • In Jira, open Apps → Manage your apps and look for the "might stop working soon" notice next to it.
  • Ask SmartBear whether a Forge version is planned and when. If one is coming, waiting may be the simplest path.

What lives where

Your scenarios, tests and test runs live in CucumberStudio, not in Jira. The add-on is the bridge: it links scenarios, tests and results to Jira issues and lets you create Jira issues, such as bugs, from CucumberStudio (SmartBear documentation). If the add-on stops working, CucumberStudio keeps everything. What you lose is the view of scenarios and results on the Jira issue, and the links between the two.

Write down now, while everything works:

  • Which CucumberStudio projects are linked to which Jira projects.
  • Which stories have linked scenarios, and who looks at them in Jira: product owners, testers, release managers.
  • Whether anyone relies on bugs being created from failed tests, and where those bugs go.

Way 1: wait for SmartBear

If SmartBear confirms a Forge version before January 2027, keep the add-on and plan the update. Ask for a date; "planned" without one is a risk.

Way 2: keep CucumberStudio, link with tags

CucumberStudio can turn a tag into a link without any Jira app ("fast links", SmartBear documentation). Pick a tag key, for example JIRA, tag scenarios with the issue key, and create a linker in the project settings with this URL:

Terminal
https://YOUR-SITE.atlassian.net/browse/%s

Clicking the tag then opens the Jira issue. The link only goes one way: the Jira issue no longer shows the scenarios or their results. If your team mostly works in CucumberStudio, that may be enough.

Way 3: scenarios on the issue and in Git

If the people who need the scenarios live in Jira, keep them there and in your repository, where the test runner reads them. Cucumber and other Gherkin runners need plain .feature files, not CucumberStudio, at run time.

  1. Get your scenarios as .feature files

    CucumberStudio can generate them with its open-source publisher, or through its Git integration if you use it. Check SmartBear's documentation for the route that fits your edition.

  2. Commit them to the repository your tests use

    Run the suite once to be sure nothing changed.

  3. Make the Jira key visible on each feature

    Tools that link files to issues usually look for the key on the Feature: line's tags or in the file name. If your keys sit only on scenarios (for example @JIRA:SHOP-12), add @SHOP-12 aboveFeature: or name the file SHOP-12-checkout.feature.

  4. Install the new app next to the add-on and import one project

    Compare a few stories with what the add-on shows.

  5. Move CI results last

    If your pipeline reports runs to Jira, switch that step once the scenarios are in place.

What to look for in that app:

  • Built on Forge (look for "Runs on Atlassian" or ask the vendor), so you don't face the same move again.
  • Two-way sync with Git, so the files your tests run are the ones the team reviews in Jira.
  • Results per scenario from your CI report, on the issue.
  • An import with a preview, so you see which file goes to which issue before anything is saved.

Several Forge apps work with Cucumber scenarios: large test-management suites such as Xray and Zephyr, and BDD-focused apps such as AssertThat BDD.

Ours

FeatureBridge – BDD & Gherkin scenarios with Git sync (made by us, YTI Digital) keeps Gherkin scenarios on Jira issues, syncs them with GitHub, GitLab or Bitbucket in both directions, shows CI results per scenario, and imports .feature files or a whole repository with a preview of every match (import page). Questions: support@yti.digital.

For the format itself, see Gherkin feature files in Git and Jira and Show Cucumber test results on Jira issues.