Just in, Confluence databases have landed 🚀

[#1]

Hey everyone,

We are so excited to announce that we’ve started rolling out Confluence databases to all Confluence customers! Databases are your team’s central source of information that can be easily structured and referenced across Confluence, driving consistency and visibility across teams.

Confluence databases will be progressively rolled out to customers in the coming weeks. Customers requiring import/export functionality will receive Confluence databases at a later date as we build out functionality to support these requirements.

Why use databases?

Centrally organize knowledge

Aggregate and organize information in the tools you use most, including Jira, Confluence, and third-party apps within databases.

Import your data

Get started quickly by importing data directly from Jira, Confluence, CSV or HTML into your database.

Set field types

Every column in a database has a specific field type assigned to maintain consistency across all data within that column.

Create pages without leaving your databases

With the page link field type, users can seamlessly create and edit Confluence pages directly from databases. Pages generated from a database entry showcase the database fields as a page header, ensuring uniformity in content.

Keep knowledge in sync

Increase team alignment with real-time syncing and automatic updates across databases in Confluence, ensuring your team always sees the most up-to-date information.

Confluence & Jira syncing

Confluence page metadata entries can be manipulated straight from the database. Meanwhile, Jira entries will sync and display the selected metadata straight from the source.

Embed a database

Embed databases anywhere in Confluence to reduce duplicate work and ensure your team always references the latest information. Use /embed to embed Confluence databases as Smart Links.

Templated page creation

Pages created from a database entry are automatically populated with the database fields on the page, resulting in more consistent content creation.

Visualize your work, your way

Tailor information to your audience with personalized views for different teams, stakeholders, or leadership.

Change layouts

Configure how information is displayed by converting your database into tables, cards, or boards.

Filter and sort entries

You can easily sift through information using filters, sorting, and searching to highlight the information you want to see.

What’s new since our Beta?

Based on your feedback, we’ve introduced a new UI and made it easier to create and save views with specific filters and sorting.

• Configure a new view in the right rail

• See all your database views in tabs

• Update cells using the new contextual menu

We’ve also introduced changes with Jira and Confluence data importing

• You can now bulk import Jira issues and Confluence content

• See details the same way they are displayed in Jira and Confluence

Level up your productivity with Confluence databases today!

Let us know what you think in the comments.

Thanks,

Christina | Confluence databases Product Manager

[Tomislav Tobijas]

Great news! I know many orgs already using databases since global beta announcement. Bet even more customers will try it out once this is rolled out to their instance. 🙂

[Tami Dubi]

Hi,

Thanks for the update. 
Does the new rollout include the ability to add a database in templates so that it can replace the page property report (since it is "smarter" than the page property report)?

[Andy Gladstone]

I've started using Databases to replace monster tables. Database pages load and scroll much faster than a large table does!

I'm interested in learning more about how to use Databases to their fullest. Are there any recommended training modules for this feature yet?

[Karin Kennergren]

Awesome work, already some features that are better than Sharepoint Lists. Still awaits including it in cross-product automations and we will have a stellar product!

[Matt Reiner _K15t_]

Seems like the right time to share all the best practices my team has learned about using Confluence databases for ALL of our internal processes.
We're the team that came up with databases in the first place, so we've figured a lot of things out.

Hope this is helpful to others!

[Terry Meissner]

@Christina Ristevski 

I really love the new Database functionality...however...

When importing Jira issues using JQL, is there any way of refreshing the database based on the query without blowing the whole database away (i.e. like when we simply use the Jira Issue macro)? Re-importing kills the views that are set up and you need to start from scratch.

An example of what I mean...

I created a database and imported a selection of Epics based on a JQL query. I then created other fields to capture information such as RAG and Comments for each Epic. I need to be able to refresh the database to the query is re-run in order to bring in any new epics that may have been created since the last import...whilst maintaining the database structure.

I looked for alternatives such as using automation to add an entry but the Database automation is pretty light on at present.

This functionality would be an absolute game changer.

Thanks.

[mcziomer]

Looks like a nice feature but is there detailed documentation how to select the import of data i.e. just import all pages from a specific space? 

[Paul Topping]

What's the easiest way to see if we have access to this Database feature?

[Marina Triebe-Gravel]

Other than the integration with Atlassian products (ie metadata synching, being able to edit fields in the UI), honest user question; why is this better than a spreadsheet? 

[Daniel Ferreira]

Is this available for all Confluence Cloud users, with no limitations,
or is it an extra feature that needs to be paid for separately?

Edit: should be available for all plans according to the FAQ here:

https://www.atlassian.com/software/confluence/databases

[Mike Schweitzer]

@Marina Triebe-Gravel Because it seems they're trying to compete directly with Notion. I wrote a blog post breaking down how Notion works from a Confluence/GDoc user's perspective. Here's a direct link in case you're interested: https://www.mikeschweitzer.com/posts/what-is-notion/#how-is-notion-different-from-confluence-google-docs-etc

[Andres Oss]

All seems great. But...

For instance In JQL, ORDER BY duedate DESC should not prioritize NULL or Empty values. I have learned this issue has been unsolved for a very long time (7 years).

https://jira.atlassian.com/browse/JRASERVER-65848

One dev request for "Insert Issues List": can there be a setting that switches this list view into a structured list, like Epic->Task->Sub-Task "tree view". I know of paid plugin, but perhaps Atlassian can have something like this as a core feature?

[Kuzma Fesenko]

Happy this is out of beta now, I've enjoyed the functionality to far. A little disappointed that there haven't been any updates to the Confluence Database API. The ability to view and modify database items programmatically would be a killer feature and immensely improve the usefulness of Databases.

[ChristineA]

Atlassian is adding more and more features... increasing the cost of their tools..., and hence, potentially, the prices, even for users who do not need these new features. While plugins are always for all subscribed users, even if only a fraction of them need each of these.

Hence all these nice-to-have features become a break to adoption.

Time to start stoping growth? (or to find other business models)...

[Terry Meissner]

@Marina Triebe-Gravel 
I found an article mentioning two-way synch between databases in confluence and Jira.
This is going to be quite powerful once released, having tha ability to update Jira fields in Confluence.

[Thomas Pleli]

I would appreciate the possibility in the text format fields, to enable them to accept just a certain amount of digits.

The same for number fields, where I wish to be able to adjust the number of digits before a comma, not only behind it.

Thanks

[Daniel Ferreira]

@Paul Topping when you click the CREATE button on top, instead of simply creating a page, it should first show a dropdown list of options - Database should be there.

[Michal Ciesielski]

Are you planning to extend confluence page query? I'd like to create database of pages that contain give tag, right now only owner or creation date can be used.

[Matthew Hargreaves]

Needs 2 way sync ASAP for this to become really powerful

[Vicker Leung]

The loading time is unexpectedly long for the database table to come up, even when there are just a few rows of data. It seems the function is served by another region compared with the regular Confluence content.

[Karin Kennergren]

Agreeing with Vicker, a selling point is that it is quicker than gigantious tables. EVen though it is in the extreme it is still tooo slow. 

[Karin Kennergren]

Dynamic linking to database source
I might have missed something here, but if not this is a hinder for us to use it to the full: You can start a database from an JQL/jira but there is not sync - I miss dynamic adding (or removing when needed) of entries. Then I can add information in additional database residing fields for new entries. 

Via automation is ok as well, but today it is quite an advanced use of webhooks/scripting to enable this. 

[Gilles Lesire]

Correct me if I'm wrong. But this just seems a more dynamic way of what we were already doing with Page Properties. I don't see much added value of overhauling our page properties system to databases yet.

The main difference seems to be that you can edit the properties directly from the lists itself.

I'm very interested in this being integrated with Jira though.