Viewtracker – Analytics for Confluence vs. Confluence’s built-in Analytics: A comparison

The aim of this post is to compare the features of “Analytics for Confluence” and “Viewtracker – Analytics for Confluence”. Both options have unique features and benefits, and it can be challenging to determine which one best fits your needs. In this article, we’ll compare the two analytics tools in depth to help you make an informed decision.

• Analytics for Confluence is a built-in feature for Confluence (Data Center and Cloud Premium & and Enterprise).
• Viewtracker – Analytics for Confluence is a paid app developed by Gold Marketplace Partner bitvoodoo.

❓Why even bother comparing the built-in analytics features to a 3rd-party app like Viewtracker, you might ask yourself? While the built-in features from Analytics for Confluence may be sufficient for some companies, heavy Confluence users and administrators with specific analytics requirements have contacted bitvoodoo for more granular reports and additional features. Since 2010, bitvoodoo has developed many Viewtracker analytics features that differentiate the app from competitors and Confluence’s built-in analytics.

The following article will highlight the differences and similarities between the two Confluence analytics tools, displaying the features in tables structured by topic.

🌰 Summary: Viewtracker vs. Analytics for Confluence

Both Viewtracker and Analytics for Confluence track a wide range of metrics and generate reports to gain visibility into Confluence usage patterns. However, they have key differences that will be explained in depth later in this article. Here’s a quick summary:

• 🌐 Availability: Analytics for Confluence works for Confluence Data Center, Cloud Premium, and Cloud Enterprise plans and can be used at no additional cost. These plans may not be affordable for small to medium-sized organizations with few Confluence users. In contrast, Viewtracker is available on the Atlassian Marketplace for companies of any size, but has to be paid for annually or monthly, depending on the deployment.
• 📊 Reports & KPIs: Both tools track Confluence views, page & space interactions and searches and create visually appealing reports with the data. Viewtracker offers more built-in filters to customize the built-in reports, allowing users to use CQL, look for content with no interactions, filter by the source, etc. Viewtracker can also track specific Confluence components and 3rd-party app output, which is something the built-in analytics is not capable of.
• 🔒 Data privacy: Both Viewtracker and Analytics for Confluence can restrict access to analytics reports. Viewtracker has various data privacy levels that can be adapted at all times. By using these levels and excluding sensitive user groups and spaces from tracking, Viewtracker admins can decide which data to collect in the first place.
• 📤 Data export: The tracked Confluence data can be accessed via API and exported in both solutions. In Viewtracker Data Center, the collected view data can also be imported into other Confluence instances.
• 📎 Attachment tracking: Both tools track attachment views and display the data on a content level. Additionally, Viewtracker has a space and global overview of attachment usage and also tracks attachment creations and modifications.
• 🔎 Search tracking: Both Viewtracker and Analytics for Confluence track Confluence searches. While Analytics for Confluence also displays the click-through rate and the most-clicked content and spaces, Viewtracker tracks the number of search results for each search term.
• 🧩 Macros: Viewtracker comes with analytics macros that can be inserted on any Confluence page to visualize page and space usage. There are no macros for Analytics for Confluence.

🌐 Confluence Analytics availability

• Analytics for Confluence is a built-in feature for users on Confluence Data Center, Cloud Premium, and Cloud Enterprise. These options may not appeal to small to medium-sized organizations with few Confluence users.
• In contrast, Viewtracker is available on the Atlassian Marketplace for companies of any size and Confluence plan (see table).

Confusion alert: There is also a product called Atlassian Analytics, an analytics suite presented by Atlassian in 2022. This tool gathers insights from multiple Atlassian tools, mainly Jira and Bitbucket, and will also include Confluence insights in the future. However, the Atlassian Analytics suite is only available for Cloud Enterprise customers, and this post will not cover it further.

Confluence Plan	bitvoodoo’s Viewtracker	Analytics for Confluence	Atlassian Analytics
Confluence Server (until EOL)	✅	❌	❌
Confluence Data Center	✅	✅	❌
Confluence Cloud Standard	✅	❌	❌
Confluence Cloud Premium	✅	✅	❌
Confluence Cloud Enterprise	✅	✅	✅

Feature comparison Viewtracker vs. Atlassian’s Analytics for Confluence

Here’s an overview of Viewtracker vs. Analytics for Confluence features to give you the key information you need. Keep scrolling down for a detailed breakdown of each analytics tool, divided by topic.

We will write “Viewtracker” instead of “Viewtracker – Analytics for Confluence” and “Analytics for Confluence” instead of “Atlassian’s Analytics for Confluence” in the following texts and tables for readability reasons. If there are differences between the products’ Cloud and On-Premise/Data Center versions, these will be visible in the features table.

Legend for all tables

• ✅ Feature is available
• ❌ Feature is not available

👣 Confluence tracking

Feature	bitvoodoo’s Viewtracker	Analytics for Confluence
Tracking of page, blog post, and attachment views	✅	✅
Tracking of content creations, edits and deletions	✅	✅
Tracking of Confluence searches	✅	✅
Tracking of mentions	❌	✅ Cloud ❌ Data Center
Tracking of likes on content	✅	❌
Tracking of likes on comments	✅	❌
Tracking of visit sources	✅	❌
Tracking of Space Directory, Calendars, Team Pages, etc.	✅	❌
Tracking of 3rd-party apps (Scroll Viewport, Cosmos, Linchpin, Refined etc.)	✅	❌
Tracking of Confluence content viewed through Jira Service Management help desks (knowledge base)	✅	❌
Tracking of Confluence content viewed through the Mobile app	✅ Data Center ❌ Cloud	❌
Support external reporting with apps like Reporting for Confluence	✅ Data Center ❌ Cloud	❌

Summary of main differences in Confluence tracking options:

• Both tools offer robust tracking of page, blog post, and attachment views. They also support tracking of content creations, edits, deletions, and Confluence searches.
• Viewtracker offers more comprehensive tracking capabilities. It uniquely offers tracking of likes on content and comments, visit sources, and even special Confluence elements like Space Directory, Calendars, and Team Pages. Additionally, it supports tracking 3rd-party apps and content viewed through Jira Service Management help desks.
• Analytics for Confluence Cloud is the only tool to offer tracking of mentions within Confluence.
• Viewtracker for Data Center supports tracking of Confluence content viewed through the Mobile app and offers external reporting.

🔒 Data Privacy: protection and retention

Feature	bitvoodoo’s Viewtracker	Analytics for Confluence
Track views from Confluence users and anonymous visitors for publicly available content	✅	✅
Access control of reports	✅	✅
Limit access to Confluence user analytics data for specific user groups	✅	❌
Track Confluence views without exact user information	✅	✅ Data Center ❌ Cloud
Track the number of views only (without user information or unique viewers count)	✅ Data Center ❌ Cloud	❌
Exclude specific user groups or users from tracking	✅	❌
Exclude specific spaces from tracking	✅	❌
Set a data retention period	✅ Data Center ❌ Cloud	✅ Data Center ❌ Cloud
Audit log for changes in data privacy & settings	✅ Data Center ❌ Cloud	❌

Summary of the main differences in data privacy settings:

• Viewtracker strongly focuses on data privacy and offers various data privacy levels. For example, it can remove all user-specific information and only display the number of views, which is especially important for GDPR compliance. The built-in Confluence analytics feature does not cover this. However, both solutions allow admins to control which users can view the analytics of the Confluence site or individual spaces.
• Viewtracker allows admins to exclude specific user groups and spaces from tracking, which helps gather only relevant data and complies with stricter data regulations. The built-in analytics has no comparable feature.
• Viewtracker for Data Center also logs changes in the data privacy or other tracking settings, allowing administrators to monitor when each change was carried out and by whom.

📊 Standard reports and KPIs

Feature	bitvoodoo’s Viewtracker	Analytics for Confluence
Popular Spaces	✅	✅
Popular Content	✅	On space level only
Most active readers/viewers	✅	✅
Most active contributors	✅	✅
Summary of most important metrics: all views, viewers, new content, edits etc.	✅	❌
Report on global (instance) level	✅	✅
Report on a space level	✅	✅
Report of individual content pieces	✅	✅
Line chart with views, creations and edits	✅	✅
Line chart with viewers, contributors, comments and content versions	✅	❌
Line chart with engaged users, likes on content, likes on comments	✅ Data Center ❌ Cloud	❌
List report of all spaces	✅	✅
List report of all contents	✅	✅
List report of all users	✅	✅
User audit	✅	❌
Actions (delete, archive, access page history etc. directly from the reports)	✅	❌

Summary of the main differences in reports and KPIs:

• User activity: This feature provides information on the number of pages created, edits, and comments posted by each user. Both tools provide these metrics.
• Understanding how users interact with Confluence is crucial for admins. Viewtracker provides a comprehensive list of pages with which a specific user has interacted, including views, creations, edits, and comments.
• Viewtracker offers a robust set of standard reports and KPIs, including a summary of the most important metrics in the reports. Analytics for Confluence covers essential reporting features but lacks some advanced metrics.
• Viewtracker Data Center uniquely offers a line chart with engaged users, likes on content, and likes on comments, providing a more nuanced view of user engagement.
• Viewtracker allows admins to take direct actions on content displayed in reports: accessing the page history, seeing attachment details, and deleting unused content, among others. Analytics for Confluence offers no such shortcuts.

⚙️ Report filters

Feature	bitvoodoo’s Viewtracker	Analytics for Confluence
Filter by content type	✅	✅
Filter views by source (JSM, Confluence App, Scroll Viewport etc.)	✅	❌
Filter by CQL queries	✅ Data Center ❌ Cloud	❌
Filter for Confluence users vs anonymous users	✅	❌
Filter for space type (exclude personal spaces)	✅	✅
Filter for only spaces/content with or without views, etc.	✅	❌

Summary of the main differences in filters:

• Viewtracker offers a wide range of filtering options, making it more versatile for detailed analytics. For example, users can filter for spaces/content with or without views, with or without edits, newly created etc. They can also filter for the source of a visitor to give more insights into how users access Confluence content. Sources include Jira Service Management (knowledge base), the Confluence mobile app and Scroll Viewport, among others. Viewtracker also has a filter for a user’s login state, allowing you to differentiate between anonymous and logged-in Confluence users.
• Analytics for Confluence offers basic filtering by content type (page, blog, attachment) and space type (general vs. personal space) but lacks more advanced options.
• Viewtracker for Data Center stands out for its ability to filter using CQL queries, offering more customization for users.

📥 Data Export and import

Feature	bitvoodoo’s Viewtracker	Analytics for Confluence
Export reports	✅ (CSV)	✅ (Excel)
API	✅	✅
Import existing views with Cloud Migration Assistant	✅ Cloud	❌
Manual import of views for on-premise to on-premise migration	✅ Data Center	❌

Summary of main differences in export and import:

• Export data: It is crucial to share relevant Confluence analytics insights with stakeholders and export data into other company-specific tools. For this, both Viewtracker and Analytics for Confluence offer an export option. Analytics for Confluence has an Excel export, which might not be suitable for customers not using Microsoft software. Viewtracker offers a CSV export suitable for any 3rd-party software.
  Both solutions have an API to transfer analytics data to other software directly.
• Import data: When migrating Confluence Server or Data Center to Cloud, existing view data from Viewtracker is automatically imported to the Cloud with the Cloud Migration Assistant. When migrating from one on-premise instance to another (e.g., Server to Data Center), Viewtracker offers a manual export/import of the view data. Analytics for Confluence does not have the option to migrate existing data.

📎 Attachment tracking

Feature	bitvoodoo’s Viewtracker	Analytics for Confluence
Report for attachment views	✅	✅
Report for attachment creations, edits and deletions	✅	❌
Report on a global level	✅	❌
Report on a space level	✅	❌
Report on a content level	✅	✅
Exclude file formats from tracking	✅	❌

Summary of the main differences in attachment tracking:

• While both solutions track attachment views and downloads, Viewtracker also tracks who created, edited, or deleted an attachment and when these actions happened.
• Viewtracker reports on page, space, and global attachment interactions, while Analytics for Confluence only lists attachment views per page.
• Viewtracker allows administrators to disable tracking of specific file types, such as images.

🔎 Search tracking

Summary of the main differences in search analytics:

• Both solutions track user search queries, enabling you to understand what users are searching for and identify potential problems.
• The reports list the search terms, how often they were searched for, and how many users used the query. This allows you to identify the most popular searches.
• Analytics for Confluence also indicates the click-through rate of the search term and the most clicked content and spaces.
• In contrast, Viewtracker displays the number of results for each search term, allowing you to find searches that uncover no Confluence content. This can point you to potential content gaps.

🧩 Report Macros

It is often helpful to display analytics data on a Confluence page instead of accessing and filtering the Space or Global Report. For this, Viewtracker Data Center offers a selection of analytics macros that can be inserted on any Confluence page:

• Viewtracker Report Macro (displays a specific page’s view count and viewer list)
• Page Analytics Macro (displays a specific page’s line chart graph)
• Space Analytics Macro (displays a specific space’s line chart graph)

Viewtracker Cloud has one analytics macro: The Popular Content Macro, which displays the top content viewed within a space.

The built-in Analytics for Confluence has no report macros.

Summary and recommendations

Both Confluence’s built-in analytics and Viewtracker – Analytics for Confluence are powerful analytics solutions. Far beyond simply tracking Confluence page views, the tools help Confluence administrators gather and analyze usage data and statistics about their Confluence instance. They track Confluence user activity for individual users or entire organizations, providing valuable insights into user behavior and content engagement.

Which solution best fits each organization is a matter of Confluence plan and personal preference. While larger organizations who are already using Confluence Data Center, Cloud Premium or Enterprise might stick with the built-in analytics options, smaller companies might also want to dig deep into their Confluence usage data and consider Viewtracker. Companies of any size with specific analytics requirements who are not satisfied with the built-in analytics options might also be drawn to Viewtracker with its more granular features.

Whatever your company size and Confluence deployment, Viewtracker is an affordable Confluence analytics app that benefits everyone. We would love you to try Viewtracker and start analyzing your Confluence data today.

To learn about each Viewtracker feature in more detail, access the Viewtracker Data Center or the Viewtracker Cloud documentation.