FAQ

Getting started

Do I need more than one workspace? Almost certainly not. A workspace is your company. Data never crosses between workspaces, so a second one means duplicated people and duplicated settings. Use projects to separate work, and folders to group them.

Can I change a project key later? Plan on choosing it once. Keys number every task in the project — WEB-1, WEB-2 — and those numbers end up in commits, chat, and pull request titles. Short and obvious beats clever.

Do I have to use sprints? No. Plenty of teams pull continuously from a board and never open the sprints tab. Use them when you want a recurring “what did we commit to, and did we do it?”.

What is the difference between a folder and an initiative? A folder organizes the Projects page. An initiative answers “is this outcome on track?” with a lead, a health trail, and a projected finish date. They are independent, and plenty of teams use both.

Billing

What exactly is a seat? One paid member — an admin, manager, or member. $7 per seat per month on Pro. Guests never take a seat. A pending invite holds a seat until it is accepted or revoked.

Are guests really free? Yes. Viewer guests are read-only, unlimited, free on every plan. Editor guests can comment and edit; you get 5 per seat on Pro, 1 per seat on Free.

Is the free plan a trial? No. Free is free forever for up to 6 people. Separately, any workspace can try Pro free for 14 days with no credit card.

What happens to my data if I downgrade? Nothing is deleted. You keep what you made, you just cannot create more while you are over a Free cap, and Pro-only surfaces stop being reachable until you upgrade again. See Plans and billing.

Access

Can an admin see a private project? Not unless they add themselves — and that is written to the audit log. Private means private, including from whoever holds the admin role this quarter.

How do I let someone see hours without making them an admin? Grant the time.viewAll capability from their row in the member roster. Money is a separate grant, pay.viewAll, because “HR sees hours, finance sees money” is the usual split. See Roles and permissions.

What happens when someone leaves? Deactivate them. Access stops immediately; their comments, time entries, and authored tasks stay intact and correctly attributed.

Can I hide pay rates from my team? Yes, for the whole workspace or one person at a time. The amounts do not reach the browser at all — there is nothing hidden in the page to inspect.

Working in dotby

Can two projects share a task? Yes — add the task to a second project and it appears on both boards. One task, two boards, each with its own column and sprint. See One task, many boards.

Does deleting a status lose the tasks in it? No. You are asked where they go — moved to a status you pick, or archived — and told how many before you commit.

How do I clean up a cluttered board without deleting anything? Three tools, in increasing strength: fold the column, hide closed work, or turn on auto-archive.

Can I import from Linear, Jira, or ClickUp? Not with a one-click importer yet. Today the practical routes are smart paste — paste a list and get one task per line — and the REST API for anything larger.

Why does search find things in another language? Because your team writes in more than one. Typing erro finds Error handling; accents and language are not a barrier.

Integrations

Which AI assistants work with dotby? Anything that speaks MCP — Claude, ChatGPT, Cursor, VS Code, Windsurf, Zed, Gemini CLI, Codex CLI, and about fifteen more. Settings → MCP gives you the exact snippet. See Connect an AI agent.

Can an agent do more than my account can? No. Ever. An agent signs in as you and inherits your role and your projects. There are no super-tokens.

Why does the API say “issue” when the app says “task”? The interface uses the words teams say out loud; the API uses identifiers that are part of a public contract and cannot be renamed without breaking every existing script. They are the same object — see the glossary.

Data

How do I get my data out? The REST API or the CLI, both of which reach every task, project, page, sprint, and initiative. On Free, email hello@dotby.app.

Can I recover a deleted project? For 7 days. A deleted workspace, for 30 — and billing pauses meanwhile.

Do Office files get sent somewhere to be previewed? No. Word, Excel, and PowerPoint render inside your workspace.

Next

• Troubleshooting — when something is actually broken.
• Getting started — five minutes, start to finish.