Atlassian’s Confluence is a wiki-style knowledge management system that lets you create and share content with your team while helping you manage projects.
It has been around since 2004.
And as you may have guessed, much has changed since then.
For one, it’s no longer the complete project management tool it once promised to be.
Guess that’s why Confluence is losing its influence over its loyal users. 😬
If you’re looking for the best Confluence alternatives, we have a few recommendations in this department.
In this article, we’ll give you the top 11 Confluence alternatives to help solve your project document management and collaboration needs.
Let’s get started!
Summarize this article for me pleaseLimitations of Confluence
Most companies are familiar with the Confluence Cloud, Atlassian’s wiki collaborative tool. It allows your team to build a knowledge base that’s available to everyone in your organization.
However, Confluence isn’t perfect.
It becomes bloated, and several Confluence users have mentioned that it isn’t very user-friendly. Add a steep price tag for big teams, and you have a collaboration tool that’s hard to justify for most users and businesses.
Additionally, Confluence is another separate work tool that doesn’t allow you to share docs publicly!
So move the Confluence page aside and explore the other options available today…
Summarize this article for me pleaseBest 11 Confluence Alternatives
Here are some great alternatives to Confluence to help you overcome its limitations:
1. ClickUp
ClickUp is the highest-rated productivity tool on the market today used by productive teams worldwide.
Its powerful Docs make it the perfect knowledge management collaboration software for your remote team.
What’s more?
You can always get started on its Forever Free plan to see for yourself!
Here’s why ClickUp’s Docs should be your number one choice for your docs or wiki needs and why it’s the best Confluence alternative.
A) Docs are in the same place as your work
ClickUp allows you to connect your documents to everything else you work on!
You can create Docs for each project or group of tasks to keep everything organized.
Each document lives with its relevant tasks at any level of your organization and can include Doc tags for easy categorization and searchability. This keeps Docs from crowding up your screen or becoming cluttered.
Assign tasks, projects, and other docs via relationships to easily access all related resources, and add views widgets to docs to update workflows instantly.
It’s organization at its finest! 😎
B) Nested pages
Nested pages are essentially sub-sections in your Docs. You’re no longer working with one endless document.
You’ve broken it down into bite-sized chunks!
Additionally, with Collaborative Editing, you can work on these Docs alongside your team members. No more waiting for someone to finish up before adding your thoughts.
You can also nest documents inside other larger ones to create separations in your Docs. This makes your docs way more organized and easier to manage. It also allows you to create a project plan Doc and store other documents within it as nested pages!
Sure, most wiki collaborative tools allow you to create nested pages for your Docs.
But they make it ridiculously hard to do. So instead, you just end up creating a separate Doc. 😅
You wouldn’t have to deal with that ClickUp. It makes it effortless to manage nested Docs.
Users can add as many nested sub-sections to a document as they want to add a level of organization.
For example, if you want to move a sub-section to a different page, just drag and drop it to wherever you want!
And that’s not all.
You can label them and they’ll show up in your sidebar under each document!
This would help you identify and manage these sub-sections directly!
C) Rich editing
Take it from anyone who’s had to read through long, monotonous passages, poor formatting is the easiest way to make your docs un-memorable.
You need rich text formatting to call the readers’ attention to important points in the doc.
Sadly, you won’t get that with most Confluence alternatives.
It lacks text formatting options and you’ll be stuck with a rigid, impractical doc.
But with ClickUp? Format away!
Here are just some of the formatting options you get with ClickUp Docs:
- Multiple text style options such as Heading 1, Heading 2, and so on
- Text Alignment options
- Ability to choose the doc style that best represents your document and work—Knowledge-based style, Classic, or Blog style
- Ability to add a cover image from the gallery, your desktop, a link, or the Unsplash library
- Ability to add a subtitle to include context for extra clarity for your audience
- Ability to add images to your text
- Ability to add links to your text
- Ability to include numbered or bulleted lists, and checklists
- Ability to add dividers to your document to separate sections
- A WYSIWYG editor that can create printable documents
Page formatting options in the ClickUp Docs toolbar
Yup, everything you can do on a Google Doc!
But there’s also something we have that Google Docs doesn’t.
If you’re on Google Docs and want to embed a YouTube video into your doc, you’re out of luck. With ClickUp, you can easily embed videos from sites like YouTube into your Doc to make it as comprehensive as possible.
👉 Check out these Google Doc alternatives!
D) Customizable Access Rights
Wiki tools are great places to store sensitive information, provided it’s in the right hands.
You can’t just let anyone see these Docs, right?
ClickUp gives you customizable access rights to help keep your Docs safe. You can share a document with everyone in your organization or share it with only a few team members.
This means you get complete control over who gets to see these documents!
Choose who has access to your documents and how to share them in ClickUp
ClickUp gives you numerous knowledge sharing options:
1. Shareable links (anyone with the link can access)
You can create a public URL to your document that allows anyone to access your Doc. As this is a public link, anyone can access your Doc, even those who aren’t part of your Workspace.
Note: creating a public link doesn’t mean Google can index your document. You’ll have to choose that option separately.
2. Private sharing
Alternatively, you can choose to share your document only with select individuals in your business. This helps when your document contains sensitive information that you don’t want everyone to see.
Keep your documents private or share them publicly via links or export in ClickUp
👉 Compare Google Docs Vs Confluence!
3. Public with search engines (anyone can access your docs)
ClickUp also allows you to share a business doc with search engines like Google. This allows Google to index your Doc, and it’ll show up in Google searches!
Cool, right?
4. Private documents
You can make a Doc completely private. This helps when you’re drafting a strategy or idea, and you don’t want anyone seeing it yet.
You can also protect your pages from unwanted edits by controlling who has the ability to make updates to the page.
Once you feel your drafts are ready, you can easily share files with everyone in your organization!
E) Conversations
Most wiki tools are a mess when it comes to collaboration on Docs. There’s no organization to it, and you’ll have comments strewn all over your page.
We’re all for team member communication. But there’s got to be some order!
Luckily, ClickUp keeps conversations organized and straightforward. Your team can add Comments to your Docs to share files, update team members, and even tag people for a revision needed!
This way, your comments are in relevant places, and you’re not scratching your head trying to figure out what’s going on.
ClickUp pros:
- User-friendly interface with search functionality
- Supports real-time content collaboration on documents
- Multiple integrations such as with Dropbox and Google Docs
- Notepad to take down quick notes
- Annotation for various file formats like PDF, JPEG, PNG, etc.
- Fully functional mobile app for iOS, Android, and desktop app for Apple, Microsoft, or Linux
ClickUp limitations:
- No Table view in the mobile app (yet)
Check out ClickUp’s roadmap to see how we’re overcoming such drawbacks.
ClickUp offers a Free Forever Plan with unlimited tasks and members. Its paid plans start at as low as $7/user per month.
ClickUp customer ratings:
- Capterra: 4.7/5 (3,200+ reviews)
- G2: 4.7/5 (5,000+ reviews)
Compare Confluence Vs SharePoint!
2. Nuclino
Nuclino is an excellent Confluence alternative that serves as an internal knowledge base and wiki software.
Let’s look at Nuclino’s features that can help your team organize information and collaborate in real-time.
A) Boards and graphs
If you like to visualize your work, Nuclino is a fantastic collaboration tool to have.
Nuclino lets you organize your team’s information using kanban boards and mind map graphs.
This feature makes Nucluno a great choice for several use cases, including knowledge sharing, employee onboarding, process documentation, sprint planning, etc.
B) Internal links
Another great selling point of Nuclino is that it lets you create internal links, so everything can be organized instantly.
Users simply need to type @ inside an item to link it to another item or document. It’s quite similar to creating a website with internal links.
C) Quick formatting
Whether it’s a personal document or employee information, users want documents and text to look a certain way.
In Nuclino, you can use markdown commands to format content quickly via your keyboard.
You can work with text, images, videos, code blocks, embeds, and much more to make your knowledge base highly comprehensive.
But if you want to work on these documents in offline mode, you can’t lean on Nuclino.
Nuclino pros:
- Allows collaboration in real-time
- Faster search functions
- Easy-to-use editor
Nuclino limitations:
- Limited options for integration
- No option to add widgets
- Limited font and color options for text formatting
Nuclino pricing:
This collaboration tool has a free plan. Its paid version starts at $5/user per month.
Nuclino customer ratings:
- Capterra: 4.6/5 (30+ reviews)
- G2: 4.7 (15+ reviews)
Bonus: Checkout the top 10 Nuclino Alternatives and Competitors
3. Document360
Document360 is a powerful knowledge base software and one of the top alternatives to Confluence. The platform is built to ensure easy article authoring for technical writers and also comes loaded with features to ensure the best experience for external viewers.
The following features make it a great alternative to Confluence:
A) Private hosting & custom domain mapping
Unlike Confluence, Document360 provides dedicated private hosting for total isolation, control, and security for mission-critical content delivery. And also offers a custom domain mapping option to “map” your existing domain to your documentation website.
B) Rich editor
Document360’s WYSIWYG editor or Markdown editor makes it simple to produce help documentation. Markdown allows you to write in a simple, easy-to-read plain text style. It is useful when major text and mild media are used in the documentation. The find and replace function allows you to search for and replace text within your article.
C) AI-powered Search
Full portal search with native language processing helps the system to read the keyword terms without precodes.It can search all project material, files, categories, users, and settings. Concurrently perform a combined search across all versions and languages.
Document360 Pros:
- Rich set of analytics – Geography, Performance, Search, Team accounts, Links status, & Page not found.
- Able to design workflow as per your internal process.
- Multiple Integrations & Can be integrated with any product with a JavaScript snippet.
Document360 limitations:
- Expensive for small business.
- Not a complete customer support solution.
- Free version supports limited feature.
Document360 Customer Rating
- G2: 4.7/5 (250+ reviews)
- Capterra: 4.7/5 (100+ reviews)
4. Friyay.io
Friyay.io is another knowledge management and collaboration software that you can consider as a Confluence alternative. Here are a few reasons why it’s on this list:
A) Beautiful interface
The best thing about the Friyay app is how good it looks. It adopts a clean, minimalist approach to display notes.
Each document is stored as a card on your dashboard that’s easily accessible. This eliminates any navigation difficulties in finding your notes.
B) Smart cards
Another great thing about the Friyay platform is how powerful each card can be.
Unlike many other tools that require you to store information on a standard blank page, Friyay gives you multiple templates to choose from.
You have over 25 different templates to choose from to help you find the perfect template for your information.
C) Customized views
Whether it’s a cup of coffee or knowledge databases, we all like stuff tailored to our needs.
That’s why Friyay allows you to customize your dashboard and cards to suit your preferences.
You can move the cards around and create your own sub-sections to change how you view your dashboard.
But when it comes to handling complex tasks, this tool can quickly turn from Fri-yay to Fri-nay. 🥳 ➡️ 😟
Friyay pros:
- Customized views to suit personal preferences
- Multiple card templates for different notes
- Flexible pricing
Friyay limitations:
- Not built for higher-order tasks
- Not many categorization options
- More features than an average user needs
Friyay pricing:
Friyay is a free knowledge management tool. Its paid plan starts at $4/user per month.
Friyay customer ratings:
- Capterra: N/A
- G2: N/A
5. Slite
Slite is a good knowledge base software geared towards collaborative editing.
Here’s why it’s on our list:
A) Easy setup
One of the best things about Slite is that it’s easy to set up. No complicated setup procedures or manual adjustments. You’ll be up and running in no time!
B) Active team collaboration
Slite’s team collaboration capabilities are its main calling card. Your team can easily communicate and share ideas on your docs.
You can:
- Add comments to any part of your document in a designated comment section to share ideas and information
- Tag team members using their ‘mentions’ feature to notify them of something important
- See who’s active and collaborate with them on the document in real-time
C) Custom permissions
Another great thing about Slite is that it allows you to choose who gets access to what.
You can control who has edit and view access to each of your documents. You can keep a document private or keep it entirely public. It’s up to you!
Slite can’t let Google index your documents, though. So you won’t be able to rank on Google as a result.
We know you’re slite-ly disappointed.
Slite pros:
- Easy to set up
- User-friendly interface
- Active collaboration capabilities
Slite limitations:
- Limited number of integrations
- Limited offline support
- No Google indexation
Slite pricing:
Slite is a free tool. Its paid plan starts at $8/user per month.
Slite customer ratings:
- Capterra: 4.7/5 (30+ reviews)
- G2: 4.8/5 (50+ reviews)
6. Helpjuice
Helpjuice is a popular knowledge management solution and an Atlassian Confluence alternative.
With advanced features like branding and analytics, it’s no surprise that Helpjuice is one of the best-known tools on the market.
Let’s take a closer look at it.
A) Branding
Helpjuice is one of the few wiki tools that allow you to brand your documents. You can add your company name and logo to each doc. This makes your docs look far more professional!
Branding is important when your docs are publicly available. When your docs are branded, people will instantly recognize your company when they open any of your documents.
B) Analytics
Helpjuice offers you tons of helpful analytics to understand how your docs are being used.
You can analyze who’s viewing your docs, who’s contributing to them, which docs are being viewed more often…The list goes on!
C) Organizational capabilities
Helpjuice does a great job of organizing all your docs. You can easily label and find them using the search feature.
No more squinting at folders to find the doc you were looking for!
One of the best things about Helpjuice is that you can keep a document in multiple folders simultaneously. For example, you can place a document on social media marketing in your marketing and PR folders!
You won’t have to keep shuffling between folders to find relevant docs!
On the downside, Helpjuice isn’t the most pocket-friendly option out there.
Better help yourself with a cheaper Confluence alternative.
Helpjuice pros:
- User-friendly interface
- Powerful analytics
- Branding options
Helpjuice limitations:
- Expensive paid plans
- Limited integrations
- Initial setup is complicated
Helpjuice pricing:
Its paid plan starts at $120/month (up to 4 users.)
Helpjuice customer ratings:
- Capterra: 4.7/5 (70+ reviews)
- G2: N/A
7. Notion
Notion is a sleek knowledge management software that lets you write, plan, collaborate, and get organized altogether. It makes using a wiki fun and engaging.
Here’re a few features that have earned it a place on our list.
A) Strong knowledge base
One of the strong points of Notion is its team wiki. It gives you features to centralize and customize your company’s most important information.
With Notion, users can document company policies, goals, employ data, etc. You can also ensure that your team can easily access up-to-date information from a central location.
B) Customized workflows
Notion allows you to customize your workflows by assigning tasks and creating projects for your team.
If you prefer the Get Things Done (GTD) approach to productivity, Notion offers a to-do list view to keep stock of what’s on your plate.
C) Pre-built templates
Another powerful Notion feature is templates.
You can create templates that make it easier to replicate pages in your database and save time. Select from templates for HR, startups, non-profits, and more.
You can also create new pages in seconds instead of working on them from scratch.
However, Notions tends to get confusing for users who like to keep things simple.
Sometimes too much of anything is bad, right?
Notion pros:
- Access across all devices
- Powerful note-taking capabilities
- Option to add any type of content like images, checklists, etc.
Notion limitations:
- Doesn’t integrate with Google Calendar
- Can’t compete with dedicated project management tools
- Extreme customization makes it complicated
Notion pricing:
Notion has a free version. Its paid plan starts at $4/user per month.
Notion customer ratings:
- Capterra: 4.7/5 (300+ reviews)
- G2: 4.6 (200+ reviews)
Compare Notion to Confluence!
8. Documize
Documize is an excellent knowledge base platform for your team.
Here are a few collaboration features that make it a great open source Confluence alternative:
A) Good organizational capabilities
The Documize platform gives you loads of functionality to categorize your documents.
Users can file each document into its category and group related files together easily. This means, if you’re looking for resources on a particular topic, they’ll all be stored together.
B) Customizable access rights
Like ClickUp, Documize allows you to customize access rights every time you share files.
This solution has two benefits:
- You won’t have to worry about everyone in your company having access to sensitive business documents and any unauthorized file-sharing taking place
- By limiting what each employee can see, you’re giving them a cleaner interface to work with. Documents that are irrelevant to them will be hidden
C) Usage insights
Another powerful Documize feature are the insights you get about documents you’ve uploaded.
Users have access to data about which documents are used most often, which ones are barely touched, and who’s been contributing to these documents.
If several team members keep revisiting a training doc, it indicates they’re struggling with the process, and you might need to find a solution to make the process clearer.
Or change the project management software!
However, be ready to pay a hefty price for Documize. 💰
Documize pros:
- Support for real-time content collaboration on documents
- Detailed document insights
- Open source software, unlike Confluence, which is proprietary software
Documize limitations:
- Paid plan starts at $75/month
- Initial walkthroughs need work as onboarding is difficult
- Developers may find it slightly hard to add a plugin to this open source framework
Documize pricing:
The paid plans of this tool start at $75/month (up to 25 users).
Documize customer ratings:
- Capterra: 4.6/5 (5+ reviews)
- G2: 4.4/5 (10+ reviews)
9. Google Drive
Google Drive is a highly popular cloud-based file storage and collaboration platform that’s easy to use. Best of all, it integrates well with other Google products.
A) Simple organization structure
Google Drive is a favorite of many for its simplicity. Compared to Confluence, it’s far more user-friendly.
Google Drive mimics the structure of traditional file storage systems but with options for collaboration.
This tool also eliminates the need to email different document versions as everything happens within the interface.
B) Flexible storage options
With Google Drive, you can access files without using your disk space.
A few reasons that make Google Drive worthy are its centralized administration and data loss prevention. The Vault for Drive (an information governance tool) helps you retain, hold, search, and export users’ Google Workspace data.
C) Google AI support
Another remarkable feature of Google Drive is its Google AI support that helps predict and surface important data in real-time.
The AI can recognize important content, events, and collaborators with Machine Learning-based search enhancements. This way, Google connects each user with files that require their attention.
However, Google Drive still falls to drive your projects as a project management tool.
Google Drive pros:
- Easy onboarding of new users
- Simple and intuitive interface
- File back-up and version control
Google Drive limitations:
- Difficult to bulk-upload files
- Works only as a storage tool
- Limited storage space
Google Drive pricing:
Google Drive is a free file sharing tool.
Google Drive customer ratings:
- Capterra: 4.8/5 (22000+ reviews)
- G2: 4.7/5 (2500+ reviews)
10. You need a wiki (YNAW)
If you love working with Google Docs, You Need a Wiki!
Though this tool is comparatively new to the market, it has quickly made a place for itself. YNAW helps you connect all your Google Docs and build an organized wiki out of them.
Here’s what makes it a good Atlassian Confluence alternative.
A) Google Drive API
YNAW is designed to integrate with Google Drive API.
What does it mean for you?
You don’t need to spend hours onboarding a new tool.
With YNAW, anyone with access to your Google Docs can edit or update your wiki-style website in seconds. The process of inviting anyone to your wiki is similar to inviting a user to a shared file or folder on Google Drive.
B) Speedy interface
With YNAW, you can get started with your wiki software in less than 30 seconds. Enjoy all the perks of a wiki software minus the confusing and clunky interface.
YNAW allows you to create a nested tree-style menu for your documents and lets you find files faster. You can access the menu of documents on the left and the content of a selected file on the right.
C) Easy document linking
YNAW allows you to set up a table of contents and link documents to one another. This way, all the ambiguous documents are organized and stored in the form of a clean website.
However, this tool lacks task management features.
Bottom line: You (may) need a wiki, but you also need a tool that can help you improve workflows.
YNAW pros:
- Faster document search
- Editing, live collaboration, advanced formatting
- Read-only mode to prevent accidental updates
YNAW limitations:
- Difficult to handle non-Google docs
- Lacks project management features
- Free version supports one user
YNAW pricing:
YNAW is a free tool. Its paid plan starts at $10/month (up to 10 users).
YNAW customer ratings:
- Capterra: N/A
- G2: N/A
11. Gitbook
GitBook is another popular knowledge base platform that helps create an internal wiki and works as a personal note-taking app.
Let’s look at the key features that make it one of the best Confluence alternatives.
A) Real-time collaboration
With GitBook, you can collaborate with other team members to edit and review drafts before publishing them.
This way, GitBook helps you create beautiful docs for your users and maintains a centralized knowledge base for your team.
B) Selective knowledge sharing
You need to keep certain company documents private while you want to share others with your stakeholders.
GitBook lets you share your knowledge base both publicly and privately with anyone. You can also create a secret link to give access to your private content to non-GitBook users.
C) Rich editing options
Users can bring their documents to life using GitBook’s rich content and rich-text editing capabilities.
You can use its elegant WYSIWYG* (what you see is what you get) editor to add value to your documents by branding and customizing them as per users’ needs.
However, it’s difficult to embed videos in your Gitbook documents.
GitBook pros:
- No design or code required to create or publish docs
- Easy to use interface
- Free for open-source projects and non-profit organizations
GitBook limitations:
- Difficult to add embedded video with a thumbnail
- Limited design options
- Difficult to add markdown sometimes
GitBook pricing:
GitBook is free for open source projects. Its paid version starts at $8/user per month (up to 5 users.)
GitBook customer ratings:
- Capterra: 4.8/5 (5+ reviews)
- G2: 4.9 (30+ reviews)
Summarize this article for me pleaseA Better Project Management Solution than Confluence
Many companies use dedicated online collaboration tools like Atlassian Confluence for action plans like project planning, product launches, taking meeting notes, and file sharing.
The problem with this strategy is that your team can’t map these action plans within Confluence alone.
Confluence only serves as a reference point. They’ll have to use another dedicated project management and collaboration software to map out these actions.
Think about it…
- Project management is a complex process that involves lots of overlaps. No single document can handle everything a modern team needs. Your team will have to switch between multiple docs on your wiki to try and piece things together
- You’ll have tons of reference docs stored on your knowledge management software that will be useless once you’ve finished a project or product launch
- All these project and product docs will add up and eat into your storage space, creating large, stagnant content silos
- They’ll clog up your collaboration tool’s interface, making it harder for people to reach any other project documentation they need
Summarize this article for me pleaseClickUp: A Wiki Tool and a Welcome Change
Tools like Documize, Friyay, Helpjuice, YNAW, or Jira are all great Atlassian Confluence alternatives for a small team.
However, only ClickUp can offer the perfect project management solution for teams of all sizes.
It’s a powerful wiki tool, a bonafide project management software, and undoubtedly the best Confluence alternative. This way, you won’t have to use other tools like Jira for project management.
ClickUp has everything you need!
In case you’re still not influenced by this Confluence alternative, why not get ClickUp for free today and experience the project management magic yourself?
Questions? Comments? Visit our Help Center for support.