Estimates

This page helps you size a project’s tickets, so you can plan cycles by how much work they hold rather than how many tickets. By the end you’ll know how to pick a scale, set an estimate on a ticket, and read the points where they add up.

An estimate is a ticket’s size in points, picked from the project’s scale. Estimates are off until a project admin picks a scale, and each project picks its own. Once a scale is on, every ticket in the project can carry an estimate, and the project’s cycles count their progress, velocity and capacity in points. With no scale, nothing asks for an estimate and cycles count tickets.

The scales

Scale	Values
Linear	1, 2, 3, 4, 5
Fibonacci	1, 2, 3, 5, 8
Exponential	1, 2, 4, 8, 16
T-shirt	XS, S, M, L, XL

T-shirt sizes are points underneath, because that’s what cycles add up: XS is 1 point, S 2, M 3, L 5 and XL 8. Wherever a t-shirt size shows, hovering it or opening the picker tells you the points.

The other scales differ in how fast they grow. Linear keeps every step the same size, so it suits a team whose tickets are much alike. Fibonacci and Exponential leave bigger gaps between the large values, because a big ticket is harder to size exactly, and a gap that wide is a hint to split the ticket instead.

Turn estimates on or off

1. Open Settings›, then This project›, then Estimates.

2. Pick a Scale, or No estimates to turn them off. The change saves at once.

Only project admins and org admins can change the scale. Everyone else sees it, with a note saying so. When you set up a new project, its How you work step offers the same choice.

Changing the scale keeps every existing estimate as it is, and only new estimates are held to the new scale. By Dawn doesn’t convert them, so switching from Fibonacci to Linear leaves an 8 as an 8. A ticket whose estimate isn’t on the current scale keeps showing its number until someone picks a new one.

Choosing No estimates hides every estimate: the pickers and the card chips go, and cycles go back to counting tickets. The estimates stay on the tickets, so picking a scale again brings them back.

Set an estimate on a ticket

• On an open ticket, choose Estimate in the ticket’s header, next to its status and cycle (on a phone, under the title). Pick a value, or No estimate to clear it. The value shows in place of the word from then on.
• When you create a ticket, choose Estimate in its row of properties.

The picker only appears on a project with a scale, because By Dawn refuses an estimate on a project without one. If the scale changes while a ticket is open, your pick may be refused, and By Dawn says so and puts the old value back.

Where points show and add up

On cards

An estimated ticket shows its value in the footer of its card on the board, next to its cycle. An unestimated ticket shows nothing there, so a board you’ve only started to estimate stays quiet.

In cycles

Points add up in a project’s cycles, because that’s where a team plans how much fits. A cycle counts in points once a ticket in it has an estimate. Until then it counts tickets, so a cycle that nobody has estimated reads “2 tickets” rather than “0 pts”. An unestimated ticket in a cycle that counts points adds nothing to its total.

In points, you’ll see:

• The cycle list: each cycle’s row reads like 8/11 pts done · 3 started.
• A cycle’s page: the Scope, Started and Completed figures, and the progress ring, are in points.
• Burn-up: scope and completed are drawn in points. The started band is only drawn when counting tickets.
• Breakdown: each row counts points where they’re known and tickets where they aren’t.
• Report: Scope and Completed lead with points and keep the ticket counts beside them. A cycle that closed before the project used estimates reads in tickets.
• Planning: each ticket in the backlog and the cycle shows its estimate, so you can see what a move adds.

See Cycles for how cycles themselves work.

Velocity

Velocity is how much the team usually finishes in a cycle: the average completed over the project’s last three completed cycles, or fewer if it has fewer. It shows at the top of the cycle list, such as Velocity 8 pts. With a scale it’s in points, and without one it’s in tickets.

A points velocity skips any of those cycles that ran without estimates, because counting one as zero points would make the team look as if it had stopped delivering. Velocity also reads each cycle’s numbers as they were when it closed, so a ticket moved out of a finished cycle later doesn’t change it.

Capacity

The capacity bar compares what’s planned into an active or upcoming cycle with the project’s velocity, such as 13 / 8 pts · 163%. It reads Within capacity while the plan fits, and turns to Over capacity once it runs past velocity, so you can move work out before the cycle starts rather than after it rolls over. While you plan a cycle, the bar follows every ticket you move in or out.

There’s no capacity bar on a completed cycle, because its plan is history. A project needs one completed cycle before it has a velocity, so until then planning says “no velocity yet — capacity shows once a cycle has completed”.

Do and don’t

Do:

• Pick a scale before the first cycle you want to measure in points. Velocity only counts cycles that ran with estimates.
• Estimate the tickets in a cycle before it starts, so its capacity bar has something to measure.

Don’t:

• Change scales expecting old estimates to be converted. They keep their old numbers.
• Read a cycle’s points as complete while some of its tickets are unestimated. Each of those adds nothing to the total.

FAQ

I turned estimates on. Why does my cycle still count tickets?

A cycle counts in points once one of its tickets has an estimate. Estimate a ticket in it and the cycle switches to points.

Why is there no capacity bar?

Capacity needs a velocity, and velocity needs at least one completed cycle. Completed cycles never show one.

Can different projects use different scales?

Yes. The scale is a project setting, so each project picks its own, and each project’s velocity is its own.

Next

• Cycles: where points add up into velocity and capacity.