Tabs content not exporting to PDF or Word

Question

I have a few Confluence pages that utilize the native Tabs element. When exporting these pages to PDF however, the text within the tabs do not render.

Images are preserved, as are tables (though the text within the tables is missing). Content in Expand elements is not impacted at all; those render all their contained content.

When I switch to export to Word, all of the Tabs content is replaced with "native extension" - I get neither text nor images. Again, Expand element is not impacted.

I've seen suggestions to edit the PDF Stylesheet for the space, but there are presently no customizations added to the PDF Stylesheet.

Does anyone have some troubleshooting steps I can try? Preferred behavior is to be able to export to PDF and see all of the content from within the Tabs element.

Numeric Oasis · Answer

The JAC ticket for the PDF half does exist, it is just hard to find because the summary leads with the exporter rather than the macro: CONFCLOUD-84964, "Native Export to PDF does not export all tabs from the 1st party macro Tabs", filed 25 August 2026. The reported behaviour is that only the first tab makes it into the export.

There is better news in its comments than the status suggests. An update on 11 September says the fix has been implemented and validated in staging, and that once it reaches production PDF exports will contain all tabs and their content in a linear sequence. It is sitting behind a feature gate while rollout planning finishes, so it is not on every site yet. That is why this currently looks like a permanent design gap when it is actually a release in progress.

The Word behaviour you describe, where tab content is replaced by "native extension", is not covered by that ticket. If Word specifically is what you need, that is worth raising as its own report. Atlassian does track Word export gaps separately for other macro types, CONFCLOUD-84743 being one for Forge macro images, so a Tabs equivalent would be a reasonable thing to ask for.

Given the PDF fix is gated rather than unreleased, asking for a rollout timeline on CONFCLOUD-84964 will probably get you further than a fresh support ticket.

Tomislav Tobijas · Answer

@Justin Riddler they most likely didn't consider exporting when they released "Tabs" 🫤

I've tried checking JAC to see if anyone reported this already, but haven't found anything. What I'd suggest here is to reach out to Atlassian Support and show this to them. I mean, it won't get fixed immediately, but they'll probably create a new feature request that will land in the product team backlog. 👈

Cheers,

Tobi

Clara Mae · Answer

Since Expand content exports correctly on your pages, I’d try a small comparison page before changing the space’s PDF stylesheet. Put the same short paragraph in a Tab, an Expand block, and a normal section, then export it to both PDF and Word.

If only the Tab version loses its text, that gives support a much clearer example to investigate. Keep the original pages unchanged and include the comparison page with your report.