Functional differences in Confluence Cloud
Administration in Confluence Cloud varies from administration in Confluence Server. The features listed below either function differently or are not applicable in Confluence Cloud.
| Server functionality | Details |
|---|---|
System Administrator permissions | The closest equivalent to a system administrator is an Atlassian Cloud site admin, who has all the rights of a server system admin plus extra user management and site admin rights, such as managing billing details. For more information on Atlassian Cloud site administration, refer to Managed accounts. For more information on administration and how to manage roles or groups in Atlassian Cloud, check out Create and update groups. |
Server base URL | Atlassian provides cloud subscribers with a secure, authenticated domain name. Your cloud site is accessible at example.atlassian.net, where example is a unique word that you specify when signing up for Atlassian Cloud. Choose wisely, because your Atlassian Cloud domain name can't be changed after your cloud site is created. For more information or to vote on the status of this feature, view updates on or follow CLOUD-6999. |
External user management | You can't link Atlassian Cloud products to another cloud or server site for user management. Instead, integrate your existing G Suite user directory with your Atlassian Cloud site, which makes domain and user management more flexible and manageable. For more information, refer to Integrate with G Suite. Atlassian Access allows for single sign-on (SSO) and can help you manage authentication and security policies across your Atlassian Cloud users. For more details on Atlassian Access, refer to the Atlassian Access for Cloud FAQs. |
Content indexing | General access to content indexing is disabled by default, and can only be done by the System Administrator. To enable content indexing, contact Atlassian Cloud Technical Support at https://support.atlassian.com. |
Daily backup administration | Backups on your Atlassian Cloud site are managed globally. See our data storage FAQs for more information. |
| Editing improvements | All new pages are now created using the new editor which has loads of great improvements. We also we redesigned other features to:
Learn more about Confluence cloud editing improvements. |
Apps | Some apps are only supported in self-hosted instances of Jira products and Confluence; however, Atlassian Cloud contains a number of popular apps (and the list just keeps on growing). Refer to the Marketplace apps for the list of supported apps. |
Mail servers (POP/IMAP/SMTP) | Atlassian Cloud comes with an internal SMTP server configured to send notifications. The internal SMTP server is not configurable, but you can configure Jira Cloud to send emails on behalf of your domain. For more information on how to use a custom 'Project Email Address' with your domain, refer to Enable Jira Cloud to send emails on behalf of your domain. |
| Mail accounts | The Mail to Page functionality is disabled in Atlassian Cloud. |
User macros | User macros allow HTML and JavaScript to run in Confluence Cloud, which can affect performance. To see what custom macros can be added to Confluence Cloud, check out the Atlassian Marketplace. Note: To install any of the Confluence Cloud macro apps, you must be the administrator for the Atlassian Cloud site. |
Attachment storage | Attachments are enabled by default, maximum size set to 100MB. |
Look and feel
| On Atlassian Cloud, Confluence uses a custom theme that can't be modified or updated using custom HTML or CSS. For more information on custom themes in Confluence Cloud, refer to Working with Themes. Confluence Cloud Developer community: You can also create your own theme for Confluence Cloud. Check out the Theme page in our Confluence Cloud Developer page. |
Backup and restore | Confluence exports can be created manually from the Backup Manager. For more details or if you have any questions, contact Atlassian Cloud Technical Support. |
| Importing pages from disk | Importing a Text File requires access to the Confluence server, which is not possible for Cloud customers. |
Remote API (REST, XML-RPC, SOAP) | The XML-RPC and SOAP APIs have been deprecated since Confluence 5.5, and may not work as expected. Confluence has a new REST API that is progressively replacing our existing APIs. We recommend plugin developers use the new REST APIs where possible. Note that for Confluence Cloud, API tokens do not support the XML-RPC and SOAP APIs. |
| Spam prevention / CAPTCHA | By default, Captcha is disabled. When enabled, the default is that only anonymous users will have to perform the Captcha test when creating comments or editing pages. You can also choose to enforce Captcha for all users or members of particular groups. You can raise a support request to have Captcha turned on in your instance if you have allowed anonymous users to comment or create content in Confluence. |
| Hide the People directory | See ' |
| PDF export language support | Confluence Cloud only supports one font at a time. Installing a new font will replace the default (or current) font. For more information on installing a font to support another language, refer to Create a PDF in Another Language. |
| Custom database configuration | Changes like this can adversely affect the performance ofConfluenceCloud. |
| Linking to anchorsin appmacros | In Confluence Server, you can link to an anchor macro that's embedded within a macro provided by an add-on. This isn't possible in Confluence Cloud. Any links to anchors within macros will take the user to the relevant page rather than the specific location of the anchor macro. |
| Copy and delete page hierarchies | In Confluence Server you can copy a page and all its child pages, and also delete a page and all its child pages. This option is not available in Confluence Cloud. Pages can only be copied and deleted individually. |
| Read-only mode | In Confluence Data Center you can make your entire site read-only, while you perform maintenance or prepare to consolidate sites or move to another server. Users can read pages, but can't create, edit, or comment. Most administrative functions are still available. Read-only mode is only available in Confluence Data Center. |
Upcoming and deprecated features
When improvements are made, you replace things and get rid of others. Many familiar features are available in the new editor, some are being worked on, and others won't be available. Go here for more details on planned and deprecated features.