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Atlassian Confluence vs Slack comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive Summary

Review summaries and opinions

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:
 

Categories and Ranking

Atlassian Confluence
Ranking in Enterprise Social Software
2nd
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
7.3
Number of Reviews
103
Ranking in other categories
Corporate Portals (Enterprise Information Portals) (2nd), Knowledge Management Software (1st)
Slack
Ranking in Enterprise Social Software
3rd
Average Rating
8.4
Number of Reviews
73
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of January 2025, in the Enterprise Social Software category, the mindshare of Atlassian Confluence is 10.4%, down from 17.8% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Slack is 12.3%, up from 9.3% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Enterprise Social Software
 

Featured Reviews

Massimo Banzi - PeerSpot reviewer
Flexible, efficient, allows the concurrent development of documentation and lets you add comments offline
An area for improvement in Atlassian Confluence is encouraging more vital interaction among the project members or users involved. I was researching a tool, but I forgot the exact name of the tool, and that tool could be used for better interactions offline among users on a specific topic, development, or discussion. I want that feature to be present in Atlassian Confluence. If there's a possibility to integrate Atlassian Confluence, Jira, and that other tool, that will make Atlassian Confluence better. My team had problems accessing Atlassian Confluence a couple of times, but I wonder if that was due to a network, server, or tool issue. I have to say that I've been working with Atlassian Confluence for years, and it has been improving its functionalities, so I feel that as a tool, it's working very well, but some features could still be improved. For example, the search engine should allow you to define some keywords you could use when searching, though I wonder if it's staff-related or setup-related, or lacking in the search engine function itself. I also want artificial intelligence added to Atlassian Confluence where you're working on a specific issue or argument, and Atlassian Confluence, through its AI, can propose some improvements based on what has been done on the same topic by different teams or different projects within the same infrastructure, similar to an internal reference, which can be helpful. Through AI, it would also be great if Atlassian Confluence could advise you on what has been done outside your specific project, and maybe there's the possibility of an installation where you have several projects installed and working together. Another feature that would be good to have in the next release of Atlassian Confluence is the tool recognizing a keyword or two that's fully developed in project B, which you can use in project A, for example.
PaulButticaz - PeerSpot reviewer
A competitive solution that improves collaboration and productivity
Slack has been around for a long time, and it's an industry leader. Of course, Salesforce owns Slack now and is starting to integrate into it. I have attended Slack conferences and met with product and support managers. They're an excellent organization. Choosing Slack depends on the organization's size, so you need to plan your deployment and make sure you put some controls and standards in place and not just turn it on. If you're a Slack shop, you will have to have something like a Zoom or Microsoft Teams platform for when you need to do video conferencing internally or externally. Many shops have both products, but they use Slack for collaboration, chat, and so on, and use Teams for video and audio conferences. At the end of the day, Slack is missing those capabilities, so either you're going to be a Slack/Zoom shop or you're going to be a Microsoft Teams shop. I rate Slack an eight out of ten.

Quotes from Members

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:
 

Pros

"I think that it is one of the best products on the market from my experience."
"We value the way we can tag documentation to Jira because we can cross-reference a Jira ticket to a Confluence page, and we can also add a Confluence page to a Jira ticket."
"Confluence can link any ticket or task from JIRA to be included on the Confluence page."
"It's extremely intuitive."
"It integrates well with other Atlassian products"
"I like the documentation. It's a central platform, and there are many things that I can do with it. I'm very pleased about it."
"It is stable and reliable."
"What I find the most valuable about Confluence is how easy it is to use."
"Nowadays, we don't need to visit an HR portal. Our marketing and human resources teams directly share details about birthdays, upcoming events, and important dates in Slack. Whether it's a training event, a company-wide gathering, or a social event, all the information is shared there. This keeps us all updated."
"The most valuable features of Slack are basic chatting, file sharing, and screen sharing."
"The most valuable feature is that we can easily integrate different workloads and the alerts are reliable. Also because it allows us to use it as a monitoring tool sometimes."
"It offers customization options for various applications, including integrations with Zoom for video calls and a wide range of other integration plugins."
"I use Slack for communication with my colleagues."
"I am impressed with the product's calls and screen share features which are very useful."
"The feature that I have found most valuable is communication between team members."
"Slack is a very stable product."
 

Cons

"The flexibility and simplicity of this solution could be improved. We would also like the ability to add plugins."
"I'd like to see some improved reporting on usage."
"There could be an option to collaborate with other users while editing the documents."
"I would like Confluence to include the ability to draw flowcharts and diagrams."
"Atlassian Confluence should improve the interface, it needs to be more user-friendly. It is easy to use, but it could be more intuitive."
"Space maintenance could be made a little more user-friendly."
"We have to use other applications that make Atlassian Confluence more customized for what you want. They should improve by adding the ability to make more customizations."
"It would be good if they can continue working towards making documentation and editing as quick and easy as possible. It has got a lot of capability, but I don't know how to use it. I don't find some of the things that intuitive. Sometimes, it doesn't seem obvious to me how to use it, but it is like learning any new tool. You actually need to get trained on the tool to get maximum out of it."
"It is difficult to navigate the tool when I log in to two devices and start a video call."
"I have found it cumbersome to create and set up groups, or channels."
"The tool has stability issues that need to be improved. We are not native English speakers and Slack needs to integrate grammar checks."
"For me, the only thing I can say is that every time somebody sent me an attachment, the attachment was listed somewhere, and then I had to open the conversation and go to the individual to open it. So there is no handy repository or an easy way to quickly look at attachments. For me, that was a bit difficult."
"The solution should have less frequent updates."
"The notifications on the phone are delayed."
"Slack could add additional and better integrations."
"Customization is something that Slack is lacking."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The Confluence pricing is good. The only challenge we have experienced is with Jira and the add ons we use that need to be paid for separately."
"For us, it's free to use. We don't pay any licensing."
"There is an annual license."
"Pricing wise, it ends up being an expensive solution. In the beginning it's cheap, but by the time you have all the functions you need, it turns out to be expensive."
"The price of the on-premises data center version is too expensive."
"We have a site license for Atlassian Confluence and there are some limitations on external users."
"This is a very expensive solution."
"The product is neither cheap nor expensive, meaning its price falls somewhere in the mid-range zone."
"The solution’s pricing is cheap."
"It is an affordable solution."
"It is an expensive tool. We pay 15 to 20 USD monthly per user."
"The solution is cheap in my country."
"The solution is expensive."
"I would rate the tool's pricing a four out of ten."
"It's on the more expensive side."
"When it comes to pricing, it is on the expensive side."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Educational Organization
73%
Financial Services Firm
4%
Computer Software Company
4%
Manufacturing Company
3%
Educational Organization
85%
Computer Software Company
4%
Financial Services Firm
2%
University
1%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about Atlassian Confluence?
The most valuable feature of the solution stems from its document-controlling feature. In Atlassian Confluence, controlled documents cannot be edited by anyone else.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Atlassian Confluence?
Atlassian products, including Confluence, have yearly price increases of approximately five to twenty percent.
What needs improvement with Atlassian Confluence?
There is a significant difference between the data center version and the cloud version of Confluence. Providing the same features in both versions would be beneficial. Additionally, there is no fu...
What do you like most about Slack?
Nowadays, we don't need to visit an HR portal. Our marketing and human resources teams directly share details about birthdays, upcoming events, and important dates in Slack. Whether it's a training...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Slack?
The pricing is reasonable. While cheaper would be better, we are generally satisfied with the current pricing model.
What needs improvement with Slack?
Slack's Canvas feature could be improved in terms of its user experience. While they are trying to integrate something like Notion, it doesn't work well, which is why we still use Notion for offici...
 

Comparisons

 

Also Known As

Confluence
No data available
 

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Overview

 

Sample Customers

Facebook, Skype, Microsoft, NASA, Netflix, Adobe, Bonobos, LinkedIn, Pfizer, Citi.
Strava, The New York Times, Spotify, Blue Bottle Coffee Company, Eventbrite, Box, Circa, Stripe
Find out what your peers are saying about Atlassian Confluence vs. Slack and other solutions. Updated: December 2024.
830,455 professionals have used our research since 2012.