Delega vs Linear vs Jira: Which Task System Works for AI Agents?

The question

You're building a multi-agent system. Agent A needs to create tasks for Agent B. You need delegation, tracking, and webhooks. What do you use?

Three options:

• Linear/Jira — human PM tools with APIs
• Delega — purpose-built task API for agents
• Roll your own — custom task table in your DB

Let's compare.

Quick comparison

Feature	Linear	Jira	Delega
Agent identity	Shared API key	Service account	Per-agent keys
Delegation chains	Manual	Subtasks only	Native delegate endpoint
MCP integration	Community	Community	Official, 14 tools
Self-hostable	No	Yes (expensive)	Yes, MIT + Docker
Webhooks	Yes	Yes	Yes, HMAC-SHA256 signed
API latency	~200ms	~500ms	~50ms (edge)
Free tier	250 issues	10 users	1,000 tasks/month
Built for	Human teams	Enterprise teams	AI agents

Where Linear and Jira fall short for agents

No agent identity. Every agent uses the same API key or service account. You can't tell which agent created or completed a task without parsing descriptions.

No delegation primitive. Agent A can assign to Agent B, but there's no delegation chain. When Agent B sub-delegates to Agent C, you lose the thread.

Human-centric data model. Sprints, story points, epics — concepts that mean nothing to an agent. You pay for complexity you don't use.

Rate limits designed for humans. Linear's API allows 1,500 requests per hour. An agent orchestrating 50 sub-agents will hit that in minutes.

Where Delega fits

Delega isn't replacing your project management tool. Your human team should keep using Linear, Jira, or whatever works for them.

Delega is the agent-to-agent coordination layer. The task primitive that agents use to talk to each other. Think of it as the message bus for agent work, not the dashboard for human sprints.

Human creates goal in Linear
  → Orchestrator agent reads Linear issue
  → Creates Delega tasks for sub-agents
  → Sub-agents delegate, track, complete
  → Orchestrator reports back to Linear

Here's what that looks like in practice — an orchestrator creating a task and delegating it:

# Orchestrator creates a task
curl -X POST https://api.delega.dev/v1/tasks \
  -H "X-Agent-Key: dlg_orchestrator_key" \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -d '{
    "content": "Research competitor pricing pages",
    "priority": 2,
    "metadata": {"source": "LINEAR-1234"}
  }'

# Orchestrator delegates to research agent
curl -X POST https://api.delega.dev/v1/tasks/<task_id>/delegate \
  -H "X-Agent-Key: dlg_orchestrator_key" \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -d '{"agent_id": "research-agent"}'

Or via MCP tools inside Claude Code or Cursor:

delega_create_task(content="Research competitor pricing pages", priority=2)
delega_delegate_task(task_id="<id>", agent_id="research-agent")

When to roll your own

If you have 1–2 agents and simple workflows, a tasks table in Postgres is fine. Delega makes sense when:

• You need delegation chains (agent → agent → agent)
• You want webhooks for real-time coordination
• You're using MCP and want native tool support
• You want to self-host without building auth, rate limiting, and webhook delivery yourself

Try it

npx @delega-dev/mcp   # MCP server with 14 tools
# or
pip install delega    # Python SDK
# or
npm i -g delega-cli   # CLI

Free at delega.dev. MIT licensed. Self-host with Docker.

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