With Atlassian recently expanding Confluence Automation to the Free and Standard tiers of Confluence Cloud, it’s the perfect time to explore what this feature offers, how to use it, and whether it’s worth integrating into your daily workflows.
In this article, I’ll go over how automation could significantly reduce repetitive tasks and improve your team’s efficiency.
Key Insights on Confluence Automations
- Atlassian has rolled out Confluence Automation to Free and Standard Cloud tiers, making powerful no-code workflow capabilities available to a much broader user base (with some rule execution limits to keep in mind).
- Users can easily set up automation rules using triggers, conditions, and actions to reduce repetitive tasks like archiving old pages, notifying reviewers, or generating recurring meeting notes.
- Whether you’re a site admin or space owner, automation can clean up content, enforce consistency, and integrate with tools like Jira or Slack, helping teams collaborate more efficiently and maintain organized Confluence spaces.
What is Automation for Confluence?
Automation for Confluence allows users to create rules that automatically perform actions when certain conditions are met with no manual input needed. Much like its sibling feature in Jira, these automations are built using a no-code interface where you select:
- Triggers (e.g. page published, label added)
- Conditions (e.g. if the page contains a specific label)
- Actions (e.g. move a page, send a notification, archive content)
You can use automation rules globally across your Confluence site or tailor them to individual spaces.
Smarter Workflows, Seamless Approvals—While Confluence Automation handles the “when,” Aura Workflows will help you master the “who” and “how.” Get ready for customizable multi-step approvals that take the guesswork out of content governance by downloading Aura Workflows on Atlassian’s Marketplace.
How Do You Set Up Automations for Confluence?
Creating a rule is a simple three-step process:
- Choose a Trigger: Select from events like “Page Created”, “Label Added”, or “Task Completed”.
- Set a Condition (This one’s optional): Narrow the trigger’s scope using logic like label filters or page hierarchy.
- Define an Action: Tell Confluence what to do—add a label, notify a user, archive a page.
You can use pre-built templates to get started quickly or build custom rules from scratch. The automation builder also supports smart values and Confluence Query Language (CQL) for advanced configurations.
Who Can Use Automations for Confluence?
Permissions are role-based for automations, ensuring flexibility without compromising governance. Site admins and Confluence admins can create global rules that apply across all spaces. Space admins can create and manage space-specific rules, tailored to their team’s needs.
What Are The Pros and Cons of Automations for Confluence?
| Pros | Cons |
|---|---|
| Easy to use with no coding required | Strict rule execution limits on Free and Standard tiers |
| Supports both simple and advanced rules (CQL, smart values, webhooks) | Rule actor identity cannot be changed |
| Enhances productivity by automating tedious tasks | Only available for Confluence Cloud (not Data Center or Server) |
| Available on all cloud plans | Limited enforcement capabilities for rigid workflows |
| Helps maintain clean and structured content spaces |
How Can Confluence Automations Help Your Team?
Content Management
Confluence Automation simplifies content management by automatically labeling pages based on triggers like page creation or template use. It helps maintain an up-to-date knowledge base by archiving outdated content according to age or label criteria. You can also automate permission updates to ensure the right people have access to sensitive or evolving documentation.
Real life example: If you’re part of larger marketing team, you know how much documentation can get out of hand in terms of the amount of projects getting managed, and the tons of content getting written. For example, a product marketing manager can set up an automation that archives pages tagged as “outdated” after 90 days, keeping their space clutter-free. Or, a content manager might use automation to auto-label new campaign pages and apply view-only restrictions to ensure consistency and control before publication.
Notifications
Confluence Automation can streamline team communication by sending real-time notifications when important events occur such as page creation, label changes, or task completion. Teams can automatically receive Slack messages, task reminders, or even AI-generated emails triggered by specific conditions. This ensures no critical update is missed, improving accountability and response times across the organization.
Real-Life Example: In a faced-paced legal team that handles sensitive information, a compliance officer can set up automated Slack alerts when new policy documents are published or modified, keeping the legal team immediately informed. Additionally, automated task reminders can be sent via email to ensure required compliance reviews are completed on schedule and nothing falls through the cracks.
Standardizing Processes
Confluence Automation helps teams establish consistency by auto-creating pages from templates, initiating approval workflows, and ensuring newly created spaces follow a uniform structure. This reduces ambiguity and ensures that every team, regardless of location, operates from the same playbook.
Real-Life Example: If you’re working remotely, and so if the rest of your team, you know how difficult it is to get people on the same page. Confluence automations can make things so much easier when it comes to standardizing processes. For example, a distributed product team can use automation to generate a standardized project kickoff page whenever a new Jira epic is created, complete with required sections and a built-in approval checklist, ensuring alignment across time zones without the need for real-time coordination.
Automation is great for reducing repetition, but what about accountability? Aura Workflows is an app that brings built-in review and approval processes directly into Confluence, so your team can move fast without losing control. Learn more about Aura Workflows with a personalized demo with Seibert’s experts.
Connecting Work
Confluence Automation bridges gaps between tools and teams by allowing you to create Jira issues directly from Confluence, update issue statuses, or generate reports that reflect live project data. This helps ensure that information flows smoothly from documentation to task tracking, reducing duplicated efforts and missed handoffs. For teams working across platforms, it keeps everyone aligned without switching contexts.
Real-Life Example: A customer success manager can use automation to automatically create a Jira issue when a Confluence page is tagged with “customer feedback,” ensuring that product and engineering teams are looped in instantly. As the issue progresses, the Confluence page can be updated with the Jira status keeping support agents informed without needing to chase updates across tools.
What’s Different Than Before?
Previously, Confluence Automation was only available for Premium and Enterprise customers. As of the most recent update, Atlassian has extended automation support to Free and Standard plans.
However, there’s a caveat: execution limits.
- Free tier: 10 rule runs per month
- Standard tier: 100 rule runs per month
- Premium tier: 1,000 rule runs per user/month
Also, unlike Jira, Confluence doesn’t have a generic “Automation” user. The rule actor is always the person who created the rule, so every automated action looks like it’s performed by them.
What’s The Difference Between Confluence Automation and Confluence Workflow Automations?
While the terms may seem interchangeable, there’s a subtle difference:
- Confluence Automation is a technical feature for building rules triggered by events and conditions.
- Confluence Workflow Automation refers to using these rules to simulate content workflows like drafts, reviews, and approvals.
Note: Confluence Automation can notify reviewers or update page statuses, but cannot enforce a workflow (e.g. block publishing without approval). For stricter controls, additional apps or integrations might be needed.
Bottom Line
Confluence Automation is a major step forward in making content collaboration faster and smarter even for teams on the Free and Standard tiers. While execution limits may be a bottleneck for high-volume teams, the feature offers tremendous value out of the box.
For space admins, site admins, and content managers, automating repetitive processes like notifications, archiving, or page creation can free up hours each month and let you focus on more strategic work.
Give it a try. Let the boring tasks go to the machines.