Top 7 Confluence Alternatives to Explore in 2024

Companies are in dire need of a centralized internal knowledge base in order to help them organize information and streamline communications between team members. More and more teams are working remotely and they need collaborative software to allow members to work better together.

They need to find a way to share knowledge freely within the organization and prevent knowledge from getting lost in random documents and team chats or emails.
As a result, many businesses rely on Confluence for Knowledge Management. It is a feature-rich software solution that can supercharge your team’s efforts, and best of all it’s available for free (for up to ten users).

What is Confluence?

Confluence has features for internal knowledge management and collaboration. You can create and organize your work in a single place so knowledge never gets lost again. It enables teams to work better together by allowing them to create “spaces” that are home to many documents called “pages”.

Spaces enable your team to structure, organize, and share work, meaning that every team member has insight into company knowledge, and the information they need to work more productively is made available.

Each space has its own blog where you can publish articles that will inspire your team and keep them updated on progress. One of the best features of Confluence is its ability to integrate with hundreds of third-party apps that are available in the Confluence marketplace, so you can extend the functionality of the software and keep all your data together.

Confluence comes with dozens of templates that get you started with creating your pages. You can co-edit your pages in real time and benefit from version history which means you never run the risk of losing your past versions.

What does Confluence Offer?

Confluence has analytics to measure the interactions that users are having with your pages – you can get engagement analytics on page views, user views, and comments.
It’s easy to control the administration privileges of individual pages so you can manage who has edit and view access. Set space or page permissions for individual users, groups, or anonymous users.

The pro version of Confluence can also be shared with individuals outside your organization. You can also archive and unarchive content whenever you feel like it, so you can always keep your content fresh and relevant.

Limitations of Confluence

Some users have noticed limitations of Confluence when it comes to multiple users editing a document. It is possible for multiple users to access the page and save it, but they cannot view the edits being made by another user until they refresh the page.

Another limitation of Confluence is being forced to use the system’s organizational structure. Information can only be stored as pages or spaces, and you have to manage your information within these parameters.

What are the Top 7 Confluence Alternatives?

1. Knowledge base alternative -Document360
2. Workflow and task management alternative – Asana
3. Collaboration and communication alternative -Microsoft Teams
4. Ticket management alternative – Jira
5. File storage alternative – Google Drive
6. Productivity alternative – Clickup
7. Project management alternative – Monday.com
8. Project management & collaboration alternative – Proofhub

1. Knowledge base alternative to Confluence

You can use Confluence to create an internal knowledge base for your team – organize and find pages easily with advanced search, labels, and an intuitive page hierarchy. Confluence supports the creation of lots of content and comes with a default space template for a knowledge base. You simply create a new space and choose the knowledge base option and you’ll be provided with outlines for creating your new content.

In contrast to Confluence, Document360 is robust knowledge base software right out of the box. The system is entirely focused on letting you create a knowledge base and it’s much easier to create and rearrange your content. In Confluence, you create child pages for the content you already have and you can move pages around with the drag-and-drop editor.

One limitation of Confluence is that it doesn’t save your work as you’re going along so it’s easy to lose changes if the system crashes. You have to click “publish” to save any edits that you might have made. In Document360, the page you’re working on is automatically saved as you go so there is no risk of losing your work.

With a wide range of applications to integrate and improve productivity, Document360 has extensive 3rd party integrations and extensions. You call integrate Document360 with your daily tools that support customer service like Zendesk, Freshdesk, Intercom, drift, Olark, and more, the team collaborative tools like Slack, Microsoft Team, analytical tools like Google Analytics, Heat, Hotjar, Segment, etc. and marketing automation tools like VWO, Freshmarketer, GoSquared, Zoho page sense, etc.

Other prominent features like:

• Knowledge base assistance to provide contextual help for the users/ visitors without moving away from the current page,
• It supports Markdown and WYSIWYG editors for structured writing.
• With ease, you can roll back an article to a previous version.
• You can match your brand criteria with customization features,
• Ensure restricted workflow management,
• Enhance collaborations,
• Organized file storage capacity,
• Deep analytics and insights on knowledge base health, stale articles, failed searches, and team member performance.

Help customers help themselves instantly with a Knowledge Base!

Book a Demo

Read more: Document360 Vs Confluence: Which is a better Knowledge Base?

2. Workflow and task management alternative to Confluence

Confluence offers users the ability to collaborate on projects by assigning tasks to individuals. All you do is press the forward slash button (/) and you will be presented with the option to ‘Action item’. This creates a list of tasks with a checklist, and you can tag your colleagues using the @ button.

In contrast to Confluence, Asana is a dedicated task management app that you can use to keep track of everything you have to do. It does one thing, and does it very well. You can bring your team’s work together in one shared space and you can choose a unique project view that suits your style.

The most common way to use Asana is in the list view, which you can use to organize and assign tasks. Teams see immediately which tasks they need to complete, which tasks to prioritize, and when work is due. You can also use Asana’s timeline view so you can see how work maps out over time. Boards make it simple for your team to focus on tasks currently at hand.

And that’s not all Asana does. Asana allows you to automate routine work so you can get back to the important stuff. Asana uses Rules to automate tasks and you can create custom Rules in seconds with the Asana Builder.

3. Collaboration and communication alternative to Confluence

Confluence allows users to collaborate and communicate with one another using comments on the individual pages, and you can mention your colleagues with the @ symbol. When you create inline comments on the document pages it’s possible to resolve them if the task has been completed.

Confluence allows you to show your team some appreciation with likes, and visual elements such as images, GIFs, and emojis.

A viable alternative collaboration tool is Microsoft Teams. You can schedule online meetings in advance or instantly that can be joined by people inside or outside your company.

Teams allow you to share documents with your colleagues and instant message them. Chats and files shared before, during, and after meetings are always available, so people can refer to them at any time.
Confluence doesn’t include the option for video conferencing and it only has very limited chat functionality.

4. Ticket management alternative to Confluence

As powerful as Confluence is, it doesn’t offer ticket management capabilities – unlike Jira Service Management. Jira includes ticketing software that enables your team to get going in minutes. There’s no setup time or installation required. Jira comes with purpose-built templates, time-saving tools like ticket views and automations, all out-of-the-box.

Using Jira Service Management means you never lose track of a conversation with your customer. You can move the conversation from the inbox to one queue in Jira Service Management so nothing gets missed.

You can integrate Jira Service Management with the rest of the Atlassian suite, connecting requests across a comprehensive digital pipeline. You can use Jira Software and Trello for product development, Bitbucket for continuous delivery, and link to Confluence for knowledge management.

Jira also allows you to set up automation that can lighten the workload for your team. Jira reporting gives you visibility into the metrics that matter and improves performance by preventing bottlenecks before they happen.

5. File storage alternative to Confluence

Google Drive is a file storage system that allows its users to share and collaborate on any files. In Confluence, there is currently a limited file storage system and the only files you can share are documents or images that you upload to your pages or spaces. There’s no way to get an overview of all the files that you have uploaded, since they only exist on the space or page and you can click on them to view.

Google Drive, on the other hand, offers a robust storage system with easy and secure access to all of your content. Store, share and collaborate on files and folders on any mobile device, tablet or computer. Drive offers encrypted and secure access to your files. Any files shared with you are proactively scanned and removed when malware, spam, ransomware or phishing are detected. And Drive is native to the cloud, which removes the need for local files and minimizes risk to your devices.

On the bright side, Confluence has an integration with Google Drive so you can embed and edit your Drive files directly in the interface. Make your Google documents, spreadsheets, and slides available in your team’s Confluence pages.

Also Read: Confluence VS Google Docs : A Detailed Review

Help customers help themselves instantly with a Knowledge Base!

Book a Demo

6. Productivity alternative to Confluence

Confluence can be used as a productivity tool that helps you keep track of all your tasks and projects. Like Confluence, ClickUp allows you to organize your workflows so you have insight into everything that is going on in your company, and as a result, you are more productive. ClickUp is an incredibly feature-rich productivity tool that allows you to manage a huge number of tasks organized into folders and lists.

It comes with hundreds of features that are all brought together in one platform and customizable for every work need. ClickUp has what’s known as a Hierarchy which helps you to create the perfect structure that scales with your needs. ClickUp has much more power than Confluence, and you can use the Everything view to easily find everything you’re looking for, no matter where it lives in the Hierarchy.

All tasks across every level of your organization can be filtered, sorted and saved for any need. ClickUp has the ability to manage teams and departments into Spaces, group big projects or initiatives into Folders, and break out tasks into Lists. Confluence, on the other hand, is limited to Pages and Spaces, and there’s no ability to set up an overview of all your tasks.

7. Project management alternative to Confluence

Confluence allows you to manage projects within its interface. You create projects as pages or spaces and then you set up your project’s homepage. Sometimes, your departments will have many projects running at the same time and some projects will involve multiple departments. Confluence allows you to choose how you organize your projects so they can accurately reflect the department that is working on them.

As a project management app, monday.com offers many benefits to its users. Its platform is called Work OS and you use it to plan, organize and track all of your team’s work in one place. Monday.com is so visual, simple, and intuitive, that you don’t need the training to be able to use it. Easily build your ideal workflow in minutes or choose from 200+ ready-made templates based on how real teams use monday.com.
Anything you do on monday.com begins with a board, or what they call a visual super table.

You can begin by using a template or drag and drop 30+ column types to customize the workflow that you’re aiming for. Groups, items, sub-items, and updates are synced in real-time to keep everything within the context of your actual project, workflow, process, or anything else. Status buttons mirror your team’s real work, so all your updates are in one place. Alert team members, upload files, and connect boards to one another so it’s effortless to stay on top of what’s going on in Monday.com.

8. Project management & collaboration alternative

Confluence is a project management software that allows you to create and manage projects, collaborate with team members, manage your tasks and deadlines, and store all the necessary files. Which is awesome!

But what if you don’t have time to manage your projects? Or what if you’re looking for an alternative tool that can simplify your life even further?

That’s where ProofHub comes in. It’s an online project management tool that helps teams collaborate and plan their work collaboratively. It’s easy to use, and it works well with other tools —but it also offers some big benefits over Confluence as a tool for managing your projects.

For example, if you are an agile team and need to have time tracking or Kanban boards, then Confluence may not be the best solution for you. You can try ProofHub that’s got all the features you’d expect from a top-of-the-line project management app: timesheets kanban boards, Gantt charts, milestones, task lists along with her essential features like file sharing, document management etc.

ProofHub has an intuitive interface that makes it easy to navigate and use for both new users and experienced project managers. It’s also available on mobile devices so you can stay connected at all times.

Over to You

Confluence is powerful software intended for knowledge management and team collaboration. It comes in-built with many useful features that users find helpful in their workflows. Nevertheless, there are some appealing Confluence alternatives out there that offer more functionality and specialism than Confluence does.

If you’re looking to create a team or customer knowledge base, then you should definitely consider Document360 as dedicated knowledge base software that will make creating your own help site a breeze.