What’s an Epic in Scrum? Let’s Break It Down
Welcome to another bite-sized Agile concept!
If you’re just starting to learn about Scrum, you’ve probably heard the term epic thrown around — but what exactly is it?
Let’s simplify it.
🍕 From Pizza to Product Features: What’s an Epic?
In Scrum, an epic is a big piece of work. Think of it as a major feature or a broad goal for the product. It’s usually too large to be completed in a single sprint, so we break it down into smaller, manageable chunks called user stories.
Example:
Let’s say you’re building a food delivery app.
An epic could be “Order Payment Functionality”.
That might sound like a user story too, right?
Something like: “As a user, I want to pay online so I don’t need to exchange cash with the delivery person.”
But actually, that’s too big to be just one story. It includes several smaller stories, such as:
- Pay with debit or credit card
- Pay with PayPal
- Pay with Bitcoin
- Pay in cash
Each of these is a user story under the epic of “Order Payment”.
🧩 How Epics and User Stories Work Together
The relationship between epics and user stories is hierarchical:
- An epic is the big picture.
- User stories are the small, detailed tasks that bring it to life.
✅ Quick Tip:
- If it can be done in one sprint, it’s a user story.
- If it needs multiple sprints, it’s an epic.
⚠️ Keep in mind: different teams might use slightly different definitions. What matters most is clarity within your team.
🛠️ Why It Matters
Understanding the difference helps teams:
- Organize work more clearly
- Plan and estimate effort better
- Build the product story by story, epic by epic
This structure helps define the full product scope — all the features and functionalities your app or system should include.
🧠 Visual Summary
