Time in State for Calculating Azure DevOps Work Item States

DEMO SUPPORT

Time in State calculates how long work items stay in each status of your workflow. By analyzing state change history, it measures the exact duration spent at every stage - from creation to completion.

As a result, you can:

• Understand where work slows down
• Detect bottlenecks and repeated rework
• See how stable your workflow really is
• Make planning decisions based on actual data instead of assumptions

Click the image below ⬇️ to watch a short overview video and explore the main features of the extension in action.

The extension works with all Azure DevOps processes - Basic, Agile, Scrum, CMMI, and fully supports custom workflows and custom states, adapting to your existing setup without requiring process changes.

🚀 What is Time in State?

Time in State is your all-in-one tool for analyzing workflow in Azure DevOps.

• Total Cycle Time Visibility - instantly calculate the total time spent on each work item to identify bottlenecks and optimize overall delivery speed.
• Custom Scope Selection - effortlessly define the scope of your report using flexible queries to analyze time metrics across specific projects or tasks.
• SLA Management - set and monitor Service Level Agreements for any state to ensure your workflow stays on track and deadlines are met.

1. Detailed Time Reports for Workflow Optimization

• Time in State – Analyze how long work items stay in each state of the Azure DevOps workflow.
• Average Time – Understand the average duration in each state to improve planning.
• State Count – See how many times a work item has been in each state.
• Transition Count – Track transitions between states to detect bottlenecks and process inefficiencies.

Together, these metrics help teams evaluate workflow efficiency, detect delays, and improve process predictability.

2. Define SLA Goals for Time in State

With the SLA feature, you can visually highlight work items that are approaching or exceeding defined time limits.

By setting time thresholds for specific workflow states, the report automatically marks items with color indicators, helping you quickly identify risks and delays.

3. Tailor Your Work Hours for Accurate Reports

Time in State allows you to configure custom working calendars to ensure accurate time calculations.

Configure your team’s schedule to ensure accurate time tracking and reporting to avoid inflated or misleading time metrics.

• Define working days, hours, time zones, breaks, and holidays
• Automatically exclude non-working hours from calculations

4. Workflow Insights Through Clear Data Visualization

Using the collected data, you can easily visualize workflow insights and share them with your team.

• Generate Pie, Bar, and Area charts

Use visuals in reports, presentations, and stand-ups to support continuous improvement with data insights.

5. Export Time in State Data for Deeper Analysis

Time in State allows you to export report results for further analysis and reporting outside Azure DevOps. This gives teams greater flexibility in evaluating workflow performance and building custom insights.

• Export to Excel (.XLSX) or CSV
• Calculate Cycle Time, Lead Time, and other metrics
• Use data in BI tools, reports, or custom dashboards

Use Case: Track Work Item Time in Each State During a Sprint

John, a project manager, needs to track how long each user story spends in various workflow states — from development to testing to production — throughout a sprint.

Steps to gain insights with Time in State:

1. Open Boards in your Azure DevOps sprint project.
2. Select a report — choose from Time in State, Average Time, State Count, or Transition Count (available in grid or chart format).
3. Use Time in State to measure time spent in each state, and run a Query to retrieve relevant work items.
4. Set the Work Item range and Time range for accurate calculation.
5. Enable Smart View for a clear, structured layout.
6. Apply your team’s working calendar to exclude non-working hours.
7. Customize Columns to display only the data that matters.
8. Export the report to analyze cycle time, lead time, and SLA performance.

Result

John receives a clear report showing how long each user story stayed in every state during the sprint. This enables better sprint planning, highlights workflow bottlenecks, and helps prevent delivery delays.

Related Use Cases:

• How to calculate Work Item age in Azure DevOps
• Tracking Cycle Time in Azure DevOps
• Monitoring individual assignees’ Work Items

Support & Security You Can Count On

🛠 Support — First response time ≤ 4 hours For assistance, visit our Support Center or contact us at support@saasjet.com

🔒 SOC 2 Type II Compliant — Built with security and transparency in mind

🛡 We don’t store your confidential data — All data stays within your Azure DevOps environment

Need help getting started? Our team can assist with onboarding, configuration, and best practices tailored to your process. 👉 Book a personalized onboarding call

Resources & Next Steps

📘 Explore our Docs — Step-by-step guides to configure and use Time in State efficiently

🎓 Get Started Guide — Practical instructions to onboard your team

💻 Book a Demo — Personalized walkthrough tailored to your use case

Feature requests

We love to hear from you! Is there a feature you’ve been waiting for? Send us a Feature Request in our support center.

SaaSJet Blog

Tips, updates, and best practices. 🔗 Read more