Atlassian Confluence

Overview

Atlassian Confluence is an enterprise wiki and knowledge management platform designed to centralize information and facilitate team collaboration. Established in 2002, Confluence provides a structured environment for creating, sharing, and organizing various types of content, including project plans, technical specifications, meeting notes, and internal policies Confluence resources page. It is primarily used by development teams, IT departments, and business units seeking a common repository for their collective knowledge.

The platform supports real-time editing, version control, and commenting, allowing multiple users to contribute to and review content concurrently. Confluence's page hierarchy and search capabilities aim to make information discoverable, reducing the time spent searching for details across disparate systems. It integrates with other Atlassian products like Jira for issue tracking and Trello for project management, creating a connected workflow for teams Atlassian Confluence homepage. Teams can use Confluence to:

• Document projects: Create and maintain detailed project documentation, including requirements, design specifications, and user guides.
• Manage internal wikis: Build comprehensive internal knowledge bases for company policies, HR information, and operational procedures.
• Facilitate meeting notes: Record meeting discussions, decisions, and action items, linking them to relevant projects or tasks.
• Centralize team knowledge: Serve as a single source of truth for shared information, reducing information silos.

Confluence offers both a cloud-hosted version, Confluence Cloud, and a self-managed option, Confluence Data Center, catering to different deployment preferences and compliance requirements Confluence pricing page. The platform's extensibility through its API and app ecosystem allows for customization and integration with a broad range of third-party tools, enabling organizations to tailor Confluence to their specific operational needs.

Key features

• Collaborative Editing: Real-time co-authoring of pages, allowing multiple users to edit the same content simultaneously Confluence page editing documentation.
• Version History: Automatic tracking of all changes to pages, enabling users to view previous versions and revert to them if necessary Confluence page history support.
• Spaces and Pages: Content is organized into hierarchical spaces for different teams or projects, with individual pages for specific topics Confluence space creation guide.
• Templates: Pre-built templates for meeting notes, project plans, retrospectives, and more, to standardize content creation Confluence template usage information.
• Powerful Search: Comprehensive search functionality to quickly find content across all spaces and pages.
• Comments and Mentions: In-line comments and @mentions for direct feedback and communication within content.
• Macros: Extend page functionality with dynamic content like tables of contents, Jira issue lists, and embedded media Confluence macro guide.
• Permissions and Security: Granular control over who can view, edit, and administer spaces and pages.
• Mobile Access: Access and edit Confluence content from mobile devices through dedicated apps.

Pricing

Atlassian Confluence offers a free tier for small teams and scales its pricing based on the number of users for its paid plans. Pricing is available for both monthly and annual billing cycles, with discounts typically applied for annual commitments. The two main product offerings are Confluence Cloud and Confluence Data Center.

As of May 2026, the pricing structure for Confluence Cloud is as follows Confluence pricing details:

Confluence Data Center pricing is typically quoted directly from Atlassian and is based on user tiers and server infrastructure requirements, offering self-managed deployment for larger organizations with specific compliance or control needs.

Common integrations

Confluence integrates with a range of tools, primarily within the Atlassian ecosystem and through its REST API and Atlassian Connect framework. Key integrations include:

• Jira Software: Link Confluence pages to Jira issues, display Jira reports, and embed issue lists directly into Confluence Jira integration with Confluence.
• Trello: Embed Trello boards and cards into Confluence pages to visualize project progress and tasks Trello and Confluence linking.
• Slack: Receive notifications about Confluence page updates and comments directly in Slack channels Confluence Slack integration guide.
• Microsoft Teams: Share Confluence content and collaborate on pages within Microsoft Teams.
• Bitbucket: Link Confluence documentation to source code repositories in Bitbucket Bitbucket Confluence integration.
• Google Drive/Microsoft OneDrive: Embed files and folders from cloud storage services directly into Confluence pages.
• Atlassian Marketplace Apps: Access a wide variety of third-party apps and plugins to extend Confluence functionality, such as diagramming tools, advanced reporting, or specialized content types Atlassian Marketplace for Confluence.

Alternatives

Organizations evaluating Confluence may consider several alternative knowledge management and collaboration platforms:

• Notion: A versatile workspace combining notes, tasks, wikis, and databases for individual and team use. Notion provides flexible page structures and database views for various content types, often appealing to users who prefer a highly customizable and less rigid structure for content organization compared to Confluence.
• Wiki.js: An open-source wiki platform built with Node.js, Git, and Markdown. Wiki.js offers strong version control and supports various storage backends, making it suitable for technical teams requiring self-hosted, highly configurable wiki solutions.
• Slab: A knowledge base platform designed for modern teams, focusing on ease of use and seamless integration with existing tools. Slab emphasizes a clean interface and searchability, aiming to reduce knowledge silos across an organization.
• Microsoft SharePoint: A document management and collaboration platform, often used by enterprises already within the Microsoft ecosystem for internal websites, intranets, and document libraries.
• Zendesk Guide: Primarily a customer-facing knowledge base, but also capable of serving as an internal knowledge hub, particularly for support teams.

Getting started

To interact with Atlassian Confluence programmatically, you can use its REST API. This API allows for operations such as creating pages, updating content, and managing attachments. Below is a basic example using Python and the requests library to create a new Confluence page.

First, ensure you have an Atlassian API token generated from your Atlassian account settings Atlassian API token generation. You will also need your Confluence Cloud URL and the space key where you want to create the page.

import requests
import json

# --- Configuration --- 
CONFLUENCE_URL = "https://your-domain.atlassian.net/wiki"
API_USERNAME = "[email protected]"
API_TOKEN = "YOUR_API_TOKEN"
SPACE_KEY = "DEMO"
PAGE_TITLE = "My First API Page"

# --- Page Content (Confluence Storage Format) ---
# The body content is in Confluence Storage Format, a proprietary XML-based format.
# For simple text, you can embed it directly. For rich content, 
# it's often generated by the Confluence editor or converted from Markdown.
PAGE_BODY = "<h1>Hello from the API!</h1><p>This page was created using the Confluence REST API.</p>"

# --- API Endpoint --- 
create_page_url = f"{CONFLUENCE_URL}/rest/api/content"

# --- Request Headers ---
headers = {
    "Accept": "application/json",
    "Content-Type": "application/json"
}

# --- Payload for creating a page ---
payload = json.dumps({
    "type": "page",
    "title": PAGE_TITLE,
    "space": {
        "key": SPACE_KEY
    },
    "body": {
        "storage": {
            "value": PAGE_BODY,
            "representation": "storage"
        }
    }
})

# --- Send the request ---
try:
    response = requests.post(
        create_page_url,
        data=payload,
        headers=headers,
        auth=(API_USERNAME, API_TOKEN)
    )
    response.raise_for_status() # Raise an exception for HTTP errors (4xx or 5xx)

    page_data = response.json()
    print(f"Successfully created page: {page_data['title']}")
    print(f"View it at: {CONFLUENCE_URL}{page_data['_links']['webui']}")

except requests.exceptions.RequestException as e:
    print(f"An error occurred: {e}")
    if response is not None:
        print(f"Response status code: {response.status_code}")
        print(f"Response body: {response.text}")

This script authenticates using basic authentication with an API token and sends a POST request to the /rest/api/content endpoint with a JSON payload defining the new page's title, space, and content. The content is specified in Confluence Storage Format. For more advanced interactions, consult the Confluence Cloud REST API documentation.