Story points abstract work estimates away from units of time.

rS3

People are bad at estimating timelines for specific groups of tasks, so story points attempt to create an abstraction between time and work. Story points originally referred to “ideal days”, but relatedly sometimes use a smallest task as the foundational unit.


  1. Jeff Sutherland, Scrum: The Art of Doing Twice the Work in Half the Time, First Edition (New York: Crown Business, 2014). (See notes.)