Archiving a Confluence Page - Purpose and Impact

[Arul Subramaniam]

Hello Experts.

I'd like to know what is the effect of archiving a Confluence Page. In the portal I am allowed to archive the pages and not delete. Will the archived pages be removed from all users' visibility? In case I want to retrieve an archived page, can I do that? Please let me know where I can see the archived pages and their versions.

[Tomislav Tobijas]

Hey @Arul Subramaniam ,

In short, archived pages (or any other content type) are removed from the content tree and do not appear in global or space-level search results. However, anyone with access to the space can view the archived content by navigating to the space’s archive section.
More about archiving and finding archived items here: Archive content items 

So, users can find those pages but cannot edit, comment or like them. Although you can still view and export those pages.

If you've linked this page somewhere else (for example, another page or Jira item), the links will still show just with the "Archived" label next to the title within the smart link.

As for versions, you can view the version history of an archived page, but you cannot revert or compare versions until the page is restored. 👀

In general, it's recommended to archive content rather than completely delete it, as you preserve your work history, but if the content is outdated, it won't affect current work. 

Hope this helps.

Cheers,
Tobi

[Kris Klima _K15t_]

Hello @Arul Subramaniam 

From the product documentation perspective, archiving may serve the following scenarios:

• old version of a page
• documentation for a deprecated feature
• unused post-migration content 
  example: you import a large chunk of content to Confluence, you separate useful and not useful, but the criteria of usefulness might change
• unused drafts - you begin documenting a feature which gets stopped as priorities change, you don't want that content to be in your space, so you archive it and resurrect when/if the feature is under development again.

You can apply the same attitude to any other content:

• old onboarding guides
• old policies
• etc.

The idea is that you don't want people to mistakenly read the outdated content, as an author you don't want to be tripping over it every time you navigate your space.

Another thing to consider that compliance requirement may force you to archive documents / older version of documents, for a certain amount of time. Confluence Archive feature allows you to do just that, while at the same time decluter your everyday experience.