How to Report Jira Hours by the Person Who Logged Them

When you want to know who logged Jira hours, group the hours by the worklog author. The issue's assignee is a different fact. An assignee changes over the life of a work item, and one logged hour does not move when the assignment does.

The author and the assignee are different records

Each worklog carries an author field in the worklog API. Jira fills it with the person who logged the time, and it stays with the entry after that person leaves the project. The work item's assignee is a separate field, and a transfer replaces it everywhere, including in reports that group by assignment.

The JQL field reference documents worklogDate for date searches. A person search over worklogs uses the same worklog family of fields, and Daylight's search builds on it.

One transfer, two totals

ACME-52 is a fictional work item. Priya Nair held it until October 14, 2026, when Theo Marsh took it over. On October 21, Priya logged a final 0.5 hours to close her documentation work. Theo was the assignee that day.

Download the example CSV. All six rows are fictional, and every date falls in October 2026 in America/Edmonton.

Grouping by author gives Priya Nair 6.5 hours and Theo Marsh 3.0 hours. Grouping by assignee gives Priya 6.0 and Theo 3.5, because row 100406 moves. The issue total stays at 9.5 hours in both groupings. You must split by author to see the difference. Row 100406 is the difference. An assignee report credits that half hour to Theo Marsh, and he did not log it.

Total the hours yourself

Use an account that can see the project and any restricted worklogs.

1. Search for issues in the project with the Jira REST API and a worklogDate range for your report period.
2. Request GET /rest/api/3/issue/{issueIdOrKey}/worklog for each issue.
3. When the issue holds more worklogs than one page, page through the response with startAt and maxResults.
4. Keep author.accountId, author.displayName, started, and timeSpentSeconds from each worklog.
5. Convert started to one report time zone. Place each worklog on its local work date.
6. Divide timeSpentSeconds by 3,600. Total the decimal hours per author.accountId.

The worklog API describes the account ID as unique across Atlassian products. Display names can differ from the person's usual name, because Atlassian privacy settings control what the field returns. A person search over worklogs follows the same access limits as the API. Totals come out low when your account sees fewer projects than the person whose hours you review.

Where a report by person already exists

Native Jira totals time per work item. It does not give you a ready report that totals hours per person across a team. Teams either run the API steps above or use a time tracking app.

Daylight's Team tab gives approvers and admins person totals for This month or Last month, with an export that totals hours by person and project. The reports guide documents both the team table and its export. Daylight writes each entry as a native Jira worklog under the person's own account, so the author field carries the person who logged the time.

Daylight also keeps an internal index for entries that arrive as imports. An imported worklog's Jira author is the import app, and not the person. Person totals in Daylight read from that index, so imported hours stay with their person.

Check a person total before you bill it

1. Pick one person. Re-add the rows for their account ID. Compare the sum with the report total.
2. Find any row where the author and the assignee differ. Make sure the report credits the author.
3. Compare the issue total with the sum of the person totals. Both groupings must total the same hours.

This walkthrough uses Atlassian's published documentation and Daylight's product source, reviewed on November 2, 2026. ACME-52, the people, and the hours are fictional examples, and this article reports no live Jira trial or customer result.

Inspect the sample report to see Daylight's own time and cost report with its fictional sample week.