Blog - Capacity planning software for engineering teams: A buyer's guide

A project’s success depends on the project manager’s ability to organize the team’s resources and availability. This helps them understand whether their team can take on more work, and if not, when they’ll be able to.

The challenge with planning your team’s capacity is that capacity data lives in a spreadsheet while the work lives in Jira. That means you have to manually copy and paste projects and logged time from Jira into a spreadsheet, and if you pivot mid-sprint, you have to repeat the manual work all over again.

In this guide, we explain what capacity planning software is and how it can reduce the manual workload for a VP of Engineering. We also compare six tools that engineering teams on Jira can use to read from the system where the work happens. 

What is capacity planning software?

Capacity planning software helps you compare committed projects and incoming work against team availability, so you can answer the question "can we do this, and when?" before you decide to fund the initiative.

Most engineering orgs already have a planning tool. Far fewer have a capacity tool, and that’s because the tool they have is for resource management. Let’s explain the difference so you can choose the right tool for your organization.

Capacity planning vs. resource management

A resource management tool helps you see who’s in charge of specific tasks or projects. Capacity planning helps you see whether those people (assigned or unassigned) have the hours to deliver projects. Even when committed to a sprint, developers may be tasked with untracked issues, such as incident responses, which means they have fewer hours to work on the sprint.

To put this into context, a resource view might show that an engineer has four unsolved tickets, but a capacity view might show how those four tickets occupy 150% of their time, putting the work at risk. In short, with capacity planning software, you avoid over-allocation.

Here’s a quick overview of their differences. 

What to look for in capacity planning software

A capacity planning tool suitable for Quarterly Business Review (QBR) lets you pull data from the system where work happens. Use these six criteria to separate real capacity management software from resource management-only tools. 

• Real-time team allocation and individual utilization, so you see who has more time and who already has too much on their plate 

• Skill-based filtering so you can assign the right person when it matters without scrolling through every engineer 

• Scenario modeling so you can see how a new hire or a shift in priorities affects capacity before you commit 

• Two-way Jira integration that turns your sprint data and story points into hours automatically, with no manual copying

• Plan-versus-actual reconciliation so you can compare the time you planned for specific initiatives vs how long it took the team 

• Business as usual tracking (PTO, meetings, incidents, on-call, etc.), so capacity reflects real available hours, not just headcount

With these in mind, take a look at these six capacity planning tools to consider for your engineering teams in Jira. 

The best capacity planning software for engineering teams

These tools come up most often for engineering orgs working in Jira who need a tool to plan capacity. Here’s an overview so you can see what they do and the difference between each one: 

Here’s a deeper analysis of these six tools. 

1. Tempo Capacity Planner: Best for engineering teams on Jira

Tempo Capacity Planner is a Jira-native capacity and resource planning app. It’s a good fit for engineering leaders who need a capacity plan built from their live Jira data without relying on good old spreadsheets.

Capacity Planner reads sprint commitments and story points from Jira, then converts them into hours. It also shows utilization rates by team, individual, and skill, so you can see where you have spare hours and where someone is stretched beyond 100%. 

There’s also a two-way sync to keep the plan fresh, even when you shift priorities. This means your planning capacity is based on what the team is committed to right now.

You can also reconcile logged hours with planned hours to compare the time you booked with the time it took to complete all the tasks.

Key Capacity Planner features

• Two-way Jira sync: As a built-in tool, it updates Jira projects in real time so teams can manage work inside one ecosystem 

• Capacity indicators: It calculates availability using color-coded metrics to help managers spot bottlenecks and prevent team burnout

• Multi-level utilization views: It provides timeline views across teams, individuals, and specific skills to prevent overbooking

• FTE and geographic schemes: It configures holiday calendars and workload hours by region to track global capacity accurately 

• Plan-vs-actual reconciliation: It syncs project plans with Tempo Timesheets to provide accurate forecasts and future cost estimations 

• Centralized portfolio visibility: It aggregates availability data across all teams to help leadership make data-driven hiring decisions 

Pros

• Plan reads from live Jira data

• Adds calendar events to the view so you can see team’s client calls and meetings 

• Zero third-party APIs for data syncing 

• Closed-loop reconciliation that finance asks for

• Modular: Add it to the Jira system you already have

Cons

• Tempo Capacity Planner is billed per Jira user. If you have 1,000 people on your Jira team, and you’re only tracking 500 people, you'll pay for 1,000 regardless

Pricing

• From $3.99 per user/mo (average) for 51-100 users ($3,990/year)

2. Jira Plans: Native planning inside Jira

Jira Plans, formerly Advanced Roadmaps, is Atlassian's planning feature in Jira Premium and Enterprise. It helps coordinate work across multiple teams and projects, like a program or initiative, without adding a separate app. It also pulls from boards, projects, and filters and plans capacity at the team level, so that you can see every detail in one place. 

Key features

• Cross-team timeline planning for programs and initiatives 

• Dependency mapping that lets you catch blockers early 

• Scenario planning in a sandbox, so you can model changes before you commit to specific projects 

• Team capacity against sprint estimates, so overbooked sprints show up early in the planning phase 

Pros

• Native to Jira, with nothing extra to buy on Premium or Enterprise

• Strong cross-team dependency and program visibility

• Scenario planning for what-if timelines

Cons

• No reconciliation of the plan against logged actuals

• Capacity is team-level, with no individual or skill view

• Advisory cap of about 10,000 issues per plan

Pricing 

Jira Plans are included in Jira Premium and Enterprise. Here are the pricing details for a team of 100 users:

• Standard tier priced at $9.05/user/month ($9,050/year) 

• Premium tier priced at $18.30/user/month ($18,300/year)

• Enterprise tier requires a sales call 

3. ActivityTimeline: Embedded Jira resource scheduling

ActivityTimeline by Reliex is a resource scheduling app that runs within Jira. It’s a good fit for a team that wants visual planning and time tracking in one Jira-embedded view. It schedules tasks and custom events on a timeline, with leave and workload built in. 

ActivityTimeline is a capable, low-cost Jira scheduler, but its financial and closed-loop depth is lighter than a dedicated tool like Tempo Capacity Planner. This is because ActivityTimeline can show who is working on what right now, but lacks a 'closed-loop' system that ties those hours back to corporate dollars.

With Tempo Capacity Planner, for example, you can close the loop: You plan a budget, schedule the capacity, track the exact worked hours, and use Tempo Timesheets to automatically convert those hours into financial metrics like billable revenue, labor capitalization (CapEx vs. OpEx), and project profitability. 

Key features

• Embedded in Jira Cloud and Data Center

• Timeline scheduling for tasks and events

• Resource forecasting and leave management

• Built-in time tracking

• More than one assignee on a single issue

Pros

• Low entry price for a Jira-embedded tool

• Granular, individual-level capacity insights: It features color-coded workload indicators for individual users to show who is overbooked, who has remaining capacity, and who is on leave 

• Unified Outlook/Google Calendar Integration: Pulls external meetings directly into the planner alongside Jira issues so non-project time (like workshops or client syncs) can be viewed and logged automatically

• Allows "task-splitting" and collaborative assignment: Bypasses Jira’s single-assignee constraint by letting managers split a single issue across multiple calendars or teams, dividing up estimated hours synchronously 

• Skill-based resource filtering: Includes built-in capabilities to tag and filter users by specific roles, competencies, or skills, ensuring the right developer or specialist is assigned to the right critical path task

Cons

• Lacks advanced financial architecture: While it tracks billable and non-billable hours, it lacks built-in billing rate logic, financial auditing trails, and CapEx/OpEx cost tracking found in enterprise suites like Tempo 

• No real-time stopwatch/timer feature: Relies entirely on manual logging or smart-time suggestions based on assignments

• Slower Jira data sync latency: Changes made in standard Jira issues can sometimes take 15 minutes or more to reflect on the ActivityTimeline canvas, occasionally requiring manual sync refreshes to align data

• Limited portfolio-level strategic modeling: It’s great at short-to-medium-term operational scheduling (days, weeks, sprints), but lacks the sandbox modeling depth needed to forecast long-term multi-year corporate initiatives

Pricing 

For 10 users, the pricing is: 

• $10/month for 10 users (annually, it's $100)

• $250/month for 100 users (annually, it's $2,500)

4. Float: visual scheduling across teams

Float is a standalone resource scheduler built for visual planning. It’s a good fit for a manager who wants fast, drag-and-drop scheduling and treats Jira as a secondary source. It tracks availability, PTO, and skills, and free guest viewers can see the schedule. 

Its Jira connection imports data rather than syncing both ways. So the schedule can drift from Jira between updates. Also, because it operates outside Jira, its financial and closed-loop depth is lighter than a native tool pairing; it handles operational scheduling smoothly, but lacks native Jira-tied billing rates, cost-tracking, and automatic financial reconciliation.

Key features

• Drag-and-drop visual scheduling

• Availability, PTO, and skills tracking

• Free guest access for viewers

• Actuals and estimates-vs-actuals on the Pro plan

• One-way import from Jira

Pros

• Clean, fast interface that teams adopt quickly

• Guests view the schedule at no charge

• Smart availability and leave tracking: It factors in part-time hours, local holidays, and custom PTO to prevent overbooking

Cons

• The Jira link is a one-way import, not a native sync

• Plan-vs-actual sits behind the Pro plan

• No long-term strategic modeling: Float lacks the portfolio-level sandboxes and advanced forecasting needed for multi-year planning 

Pricing 

• Starter is priced at $7/user/month ($8.50/user/month billed annually) 

• Pro is priced at $12/user/month (_14/user/month billed annually)

• Enterprise tier requires a sales call 

5. Resource Guru: Lightweight resource booking

Resource Guru is a standalone tool for booking people and resources. It’s a good fit for teams that want quick booking with clash detection, rather than capacity built from Jira. It tracks availability, skills, and leave, and it flags double-bookings. 

It connects to Jira through a plugin, allowing it to schedule Jira tickets while keeping its own resource records. Because it is a standalone planner, its financial and closed-loop depth is light; it focuses on team scheduling, while deeper forecast-vs-actual comparison requires the high-tier Blackbelt plan. 

Key features

• Multi-resource bookings on a shared schedule

• Skills, roles, and leave management

• Clash detection to prevent double-booking

• Forecast-vs-actuals on Blackbelt and Master

• Jira scheduling through a plugin

Pros

• Quick to set up and use

• Strong clash and availability management 

• Instant clash and overbooking alerts

• Non-human resource scheduling: It schedules physical assets alongside people. Managers can track and book meeting rooms, testing devices, or lab equipment in the same view

Cons

• Keeps its own records and database rather than reading live Jira

• Reporting and forecast-vs-actual need higher plans. You cannot easily compare planned hours against actual logged time without upgrading to the expensive Blackbelt plan

• No multi-year strategic modeling: Resource Guru is designed for short-term booking. It has no portfolio sandboxes and macro-level forecasting for long-term project planning

Pricing 

Pricing is based on the number of people on your account, whether they log in or not. “Resources” here refer to non-human resources like meeting rooms and equipment booked. 

• Grasshopper Plan is priced at $6/user/month (annually, $5/user/month). $2.50/m for resources (billed annually)

• Blackbelt plan is priced at $9.60/user/month (annually, $8/user/month). $4/m for resources (billed annually)

• Master Plan is priced at $14.40/user/month (annually, $12/user/month). $6/m for resources (billed annually)

6. Runn: For capacity and demand forecasting

Runn is a standalone platform that pairs capacity planning with demand forecasting. It’s a good fit for a leader who models hiring against a pipeline of committed and prospective work. It tracks actuals, supports placeholders, and runs scenario plans for reorgs or hiring freezes. 

It syncs with Jira but operates as its own planner. Unlike simpler schedulers, Runn provides deeper financial and closed-loop depth by connecting project schedules directly to people costs and revenue projections. It also connects to hiring pipelines, so leaders can accurately project project profitability and prevent capacity bottlenecks before winning new business. 

Key features

• Capacity and demand forecasting in one view

• Scenario planning for hiring and reorgs

• Unlimited placeholders for unfilled roles

• Timesheets and actuals tracking

• Jira integration that syncs work

Pros

• Advanced pipeline and demand modeling: Leaders can map out tentative or prospective projects. This lets you forecast future hiring needs before a contract is signed

• Built-in financial forecasting: It connects hours directly to dollars. The tool tracks project budgets, profit margins, and people costs in real time 

• Sandbox scenario planning: You can model major changes safely. It lets you simulate hiring freezes or team reorgs to see the impact on delivery dates

Cons

• Runs as its own planner, not inside Jira

• Separate tool data drift: Because it operates as a standalone planner, changes in Jira don't always align perfectly. Managers must occasionally reconcile the two systems

• The focus on financial forecasting and pipeline metrics makes the interface dense. It requires dedicated training to set up and manage correctly

Pricing

Pricing for 50 users: 

• Lite tier starts at $9/user/month (annually, 7/user/month) 

• Standard tier is priced at $13/user/month (annually, $11/user/month) 

• Advanced tier requires sales call 

Choosing the right capacity planning software

The right tool depends on where your team works. If your engineers use Jira to plan and deliver work, you need a solution that reads directly from Jira. It should also match this data against logged actuals. We used that closed-loop standard to evaluate every tool in this guide.

Tempo Capacity Planner provides native, two-way Jira sync with clear team and individual views. And with Tempo Timesheets, you get a seamless financial reconciliation for every project. Start a free trial of Tempo Capacity Planner today.