Ads and cookie choices

Where ads appear

Needsmembership of the organization, nothing more

The Free plan is ad-supported. An organization on the Free plan shows one ad slot on two screens: the organization overview, headed Projects, and the project screen. See Organizations and Projects for the two screens. On both screens the slot is the last thing on the page, after every other section. Every member who can open the screen sees the slot, whatever bundles they hold.

No other screen carries an ad. The backlog, the planning screen, the board, the Sprint Review, the Retrospective, the item panel and the administration screens show none. The public pages, this help among them, show none.

An organization on the Pro or Enterprise plan shows no ad slot, no consent banner, no vendor script and no Cookie choices control on any screen. This is true whatever answer your browser stores from the banner. See Plans and billing for the three plans.

The consent banner

Needsmembership of the organization, nothing more

While your browser stores no answer, a banner sits at the foot of the window on every screen that has the ad slot. It stays in view while you scroll. It reads The Free plan is supported by ads, and the ads use cookies. Signing in needs a cookie; nothing else here does. with a link named Privacy. Two buttons follow, the same size and the same style. Decline is first, then Accept. A screen reader announces the banner as a region named Cookie consent.

The page keeps room for the banner at its foot. The banner never covers the slot. On a phone the buttons move under the sentence, and the room grows with the banner.

Until you answer, the slot holds the house panel, a notice from the product itself, and the product loads nothing from the ad vendor. The only thing the banner withholds is the ad.

1. Read the banner.
2. If you want to read the privacy page first, click Privacy.
3. Click Decline or Accept.

The product records your answer, and the banner disappears. You stay on the same screen. The slot then shows the house panel after Decline, or an ad after Accept. The product disables both buttons while it records the answer. Click once.

What Accept does

After Accept, the slot holds an ad from Google AdSense, the ad vendor, on both screens. The product loads the vendor script into the page, and the ad vendor can then set cookies of its own. A screen reader announces the slot as Advertisement. If the ad vendor sends no ad, the slot stays blank. That is not an error.

A content blocker or an ad blocker in your browser stops the vendor script the same way. The slot then stays blank for the whole visit, with no message. Your answer still stands, and the product does not ask again.

What Decline does

After Decline, the slot keeps the house panel. The product loads nothing from the ad vendor: no script and no vendor cookie.

Global Privacy Control

Some browsers and extensions send a Global Privacy Control signal. The product treats it as Decline. The banner does not ask, the slot keeps the house panel, and a line under it says why. An earlier Accept in that browser no longer applies.

In Europe, the UK and Switzerland

After Accept, Google shows its own consent message to visitors in these places. Google shows personalized ads only if you consent in that message too.

The house panel

Before you answer the banner, and after you decline, the slot holds a panel from the product itself. It reads Ads support the Free plan. Nothing in it comes from the ad vendor: no script and no cookie. A screen reader announces it as About the Free plan.

The panel and the ad share the same minimum height. An ad can be taller than the panel. When you answer the banner, the contents of the slot change, and nothing above the slot moves.

Change your answer

Needsmembership of the organization, nothing more

A control named Cookie choices sits directly under the slot whenever an answer stands, after either answer. It is absent until you answer the banner. It clears the answer.

1. Open the organization overview or a project screen.
2. Scroll to the slot at the foot of the page.
3. Click Cookie choices.
4. Wait for the page to reload.
5. Click Decline or Accept again.

The page loads again, and the ad is gone. The banner is back, with the same two buttons. The product disables the control from the click until the reload.

The cookie behind the answer

Your answer is one cookie in your browser, named sst_consent. Its value is granted after Accept, and denied after Decline. The product stores your answer in this cookie and nowhere else. The cookie lasts 180 days, about six months. After that it expires, and the banner asks again. This applies to both answers.

The cookie belongs to the browser, not to your account or to an organization. One answer applies to every Free organization you open in that browser. Another browser or another device asks again.

If the organization moves to a paid plan, the cookie stays. The cookie then has nothing to apply to, and a Pro or Enterprise organization shows no Cookie choices control. If the organization returns to the Free plan, the answer applies again. To clear the cookie, use an organization on the Free plan.

1. If you belong to an organization on the Free plan, open it in the same browser.
2. Click Cookie choices under the slot.

Other cookies

The banner says Signing in needs a cookie; nothing else here does. When you sign in, the product sets two cookies. The first, sst_at, signs you in and lasts 15 minutes. The second, sst_rt, lasts 30 days, and your browser does not send it with ordinary requests. When you sign out, the product removes both and ends that sign-in. Every other tab that uses that sign-in stops at once.

The provider buttons are on the landing page, the sign-in page and the create-account page. When you click one, the product sets a third cookie, named sst_oauth. It lasts 10 minutes. The product removes it when the provider signs you in. If you cancel at the provider, the cookie stays until the 10 minutes end. See Getting started for the sign-in providers.

No script in the page can read these three cookies. The consent cookie is different. A script can read it, and a script can change it. It carries no name and no account, only your answer to the banner.

The product sets no other cookie of its own. The landing page and this help set no cookie until you click a provider button. The ad vendor sets the only third-party cookies, and only after Accept.

The landing page and this help can also load an analytics script from another company. That script sets no cookie. It does not run on the organization overview or on the project screen, and the consent banner does not control it.

Other browser storage

The product stores two more kinds of thing in your browser, and neither one is a cookie. The theme button stores your choice of Light or Dark. If you choose System, the product removes the stored choice. The planning screen stores the width you drag between its two panes, and whether the Sprints pane is closed. It stores one entry for each project. The product does not ask before it stores them.

Neither kind leaves your browser, and neither one belongs to your account. The theme button is on the public pages as well, and it stores your choice there too. See Getting started for the theme button.