Labels and Search in Confluence: Find Any Page Fast
Tag your Confluence pages with labels, then find them in seconds with search. Add two labels to a requirements page, search the space for a phrase, and filter the results by label.
Step by step
Find pages fast
- Labels and search. As a Confluence space grows, pages get hard to find. Labels tag pages by topic, and search finds pages by the words in them. Here we use both in an online shop space to find the page about discount codes.
Add labels
- Add labels. A label is a short tag on a page. Open the Business requirements page and scroll to the bottom. Add labels sits next to the place where you add a comment. Click Add labels. A small window opens.
- One word. Type requirements and press Enter. Confluence saves the label straight away. Keep labels in lower case so everyone types them the same way. A label can't contain spaces. For 2 words, join them with a dash: type online-shop and press Enter. Click Close.
- On the page. Both labels, requirements and online-shop, now show at the bottom of the page. Put the same labels on every requirements page, and they become one group you can find together.
Search
- Search. Now for search. Click the search box at the top of the screen. Type discount code. Confluence checks page titles and the words inside pages, and shows the best matches as you type. Press Enter to see the full list of results.
- Results. Every page that mentions discount codes is listed. Each result shows the page, its space, when it last changed and the matching words in bold.
Filter by label
- Filter by label. If there are too many results, filter them. Click Labels. Type requirements, the label you added earlier. Then tick it.
- The right page. Only Business requirements is left, because it is the page with that label. Search finds the words, and the label filter narrows the results down to the right group of pages.
Recap
- Label, search, filter. There are 2 habits to build. Put short labels on every page, in lower case, with dashes instead of spaces, and reuse the same ones. Then search for the words you need and filter by label.
Common mistakes
- Typing a space inside a label. A label can't contain spaces, so online shop will not stay as one label. Join the words with a dash, like online-shop.
- Using slightly different labels for the same topic. requirements, requirement and reqs are 3 separate labels, and the filter only matches the one you tick. Agree on a short list of labels with your team and reuse them exactly.
- Labelling only some pages. The label filter hides every page that doesn't have the label, even if its words match your search. Add the label to every page in the group, or the right page can drop out of your results.
When a business analyst uses this
On a project space, tag every requirements page with requirements and the project name, like online-shop. Before a sign-off workshop, search for a topic such as discount code and filter by requirements. That shows only the requirement pages, not every meeting note that also mentions it.
Questions people ask
How do I add a label to a Confluence page?
Scroll to the bottom of the page, click Add labels, type the label and press Enter. Add as many as you need, then click Close, and the labels show at the bottom of the page.
How do I search by label in Confluence?
Type your words in the search box at the top and press Enter to see all results. Then click the Labels filter, type the label and tick it, and only pages with that label stay in the list.
