select-backlog-navigation-levels.md

title	titleSuffix	description	ms.technology	ms.prod	ms.assetid	ms.manager	ms.author	author	ms.topic	monikerRange	ms.date
Select backlog navigation levels	VSTS & TFS	Choose which backlog and portfolio backlogs are active for your team in Visual Studio Team Services & Team Foundation Server	devops-agile	devops	BB1E56B6-988A-4D0A-AA56-560F2DF681DD	douge	kaelli	KathrynEE	conceptual	>= tfs-2015	03/20/2018

Select backlog navigation levels for your team

VSTS | TFS 2018 | TFS 2017 | TFS 2015

Each team can determine the backlog levels that they use. For example, feature teams may want to only focus on their product backlog, while a management team may choose to only show feature and epics (the two default portfolio backlogs). You configure which backlog levels appear from your team settings dialog.

::: moniker range="vsts" If you want additional portfolio backlogs, see the following topics based on the process model you use:

• Inheritance: Customize your backlogs or boards for a process
• Hosted XML: Add portfolio backlogs.

For an overview of process models, see Customize your work tracking experience.

::: moniker-end

::: moniker range="tfs-2015 <= tfs-2018" If you want additional portfolio backlogs, see Add portfolio backlogs.
::: moniker-end

Note

Feature availability: The team setting for choosing which backlog levels are available is available from TFS 2015 and later versions. For TFS 2013, the Feature portfolio backlog level is enabled for all teams.

Set your team's preferences for backlog levels

Because this setting affects all team members' view of the team backlogs and boards, you must be a team administrator to change the setting. Changing the setting is disabled if you're not a team administrator. Go here to get added as a team administrator.

::: moniker range="vsts || >= tfs-2018"

1. From your team's backlog page, click the (gear icon) to open the common configuration team settings.

   

2. Click the Backlogs tab and check the boxes of those backlog levels you want your team to manage.

   

3. To see the changes, open or refresh your team's backlog web page.

::: moniker-end ::: moniker range="tfs-2017"

1. From your team's backlog page, click the (gear icon) to open the common configuration team settings.

   

2. Click the Backlogs tab and check the boxes of those backlog levels you want your team to manage.

   

3. To see the changes, open or refresh your team's backlog web page. ::: moniker-end ::: moniker range="tfs-2015"

Requires TFS 2015.1 or later version.

1. From your web portal, click the , (gear icon) to open the administration page.

   

2. From the Overview tab, choose the team whose settings you want to configure, and then click Settings.

   

3. Click the Backlogs tab and check the boxes of those backlog levels you want your team to manage.

   

4. To see the changes, open or refresh your team's backlog web page. ::: moniker-end

Related articles

• Get started with Agile tools to plan and track work
• Backlogs, boards, and plans
• Create your backlog
• Define features and epics
• Organize your backlog
• Portfolio management, setup a team hierarchy
• Work with multi-team ownership of backlog items
• Visibility across teams