The Confluence Server and Data Center 6.13 Enterprise release has arrived!

[Ada Chen]

Enterprise releases are now called Long Term Support releases

As of June 29th, 2020, Enterprise releases are now called Long Term Support releases. The security bug fix policy for these releases was also updated - we will continue to backport critical security bug fixes and now when architecturally possible, all other security bug fixes are backported to the release for 24 months. To learn more about this change, view our Community post.

Upgrading to a new Confluence release is a process that might seem like routine housekeeping, but, as many of you know, can have a number of complexities and require plenty of strategy and planning. Although many customers go for the latest and greatest Confluence release, many of our biggest customers choose to upgrade to Enterprise releases.

Organizations choose Enterprise releases for different reasons. For some, its the chance schedule regular minor version upgrades throughout the year, and for others it's the ability to react quickly to a serious issue or vulnerability, without the overhead of upgrading to a new feature release. 

Today, we're excited to share that Confluence Server & Data Center 6.13 is our latest Enterprise release line. 

How is an Enterprise release different from other release types?

An Enterprise release receives additional backported bug fixes and security updates from later feature releases throughout its two-year support window. If you manage a large, complex deployment of Confluence and require significant effort to upgrade, an Enterprise release ensures you can remain on the release for longer if you prefer. 

Which features have been introduced since Confluence 6.6? 

We introduced Enterprise releases for Jira Software and Confluence in early 2018. Since then, we've seen that our large customers on Enterprise releases have around 50% fewer high severity support tickets than customers on earlier versions of our products.  

Here's an overview of features delivered between Confluence 6.6 and 6.13: 

• Faster at-mentions (6.7)
• Refreshed look and feel (6.7)
• Confluence Server & Data Center mobile apps for Android and iOS (6.8) 
• Simpler options for publishing pages or discarding changes (6.9)
• Read-only mode (6.10 - Data Center only)
• An external process pool for resource-intensive tasks (6.10 - Data Center only)
• Edit files with the Atlassian Companion App and distribute the app with an MSI installer (6.11 and 6.12)
• Simpler Synchrony set up (6.12 - Data Center only)
• PDF export improvements (6.13)
• Delete user accounts (6.13)
• Support for AdoptOpenJDK 8 (6.13)

Always upgrade to the latest bug fix release

The Enterprise release designation applies to the entire feature release. So if you're planning to upgrade to Confluence 6.13, always upgrade to its latest available bug fix release. 

Check out the Confluence 6.13 release notes to get the latest version.

[Qiyong Zhang]

Hi @Ada Chen , 

When will be the next enterprise version for Confluence server? we need to evaluate if we should wait or we should upgrade to 6.13 if we can wait so long, thank you.

[Ada Chen]

Hi @Qiyong Zhang  - We will be posting an update on our next Enterprise release within the next 2 weeks. Please stay tuned!

[Qiyong Zhang]

Hi @Ada Chen

Any update for this topic? thank you.

[Ada Chen]

Hi @Qiyong Zhang - Please see our latest post: https://community.atlassian.com/t5/Confluence-articles/Announcing-Confluence-7-4-as-the-next-Enterprise-release/ba-p/1247021