draw.io vs Mermaid in Confluence: Which Fits Your Docs?
draw.io supports Mermaid now — so "does draw.io do Mermaid?" is no longer the question. The question is what the source becomes. In Mermaid Plus Diagrams & AI Agent for Confluence, the Mermaid text stays the diagram: page history shows a text diff, an update is one line, and a Rovo agent can create, read, update or convert diagrams from chat. In draw.io, Mermaid is an import step that turns the diagram into native draw.io shapes, so you get full styling and shape-library freedom but the page holds shape data instead of reviewable text. On the AI side the difference is where the processing happens: Mermaid Plus runs on Atlassian Forge with Atlassian's own Rovo agent, so the diagram and the AI both stay inside the Atlassian trust boundary, covered by your existing Atlassian agreement. Text-first docs → Mermaid Plus. Visual-first, icon-heavy or migration-heavy work → draw.io.
- What changed when draw.io added Mermaid support in 2026
- Where the two tools genuinely differ, and where they do not
- How the AI features compare — canvas generation vs a Rovo agent on the page
- Where the diagram and the AI data live, and why that decides it for enterprise teams
- A decision framework for Confluence and Jira teams
Every Confluence team ends up choosing a diagram tool, and most start by asking the wrong question: does it support Mermaid? These days, two answers exist. Mermaid Plus Diagrams & AI Agent for Confluence is built around Mermaid — all 30 Mermaid v12 diagram types, a code editor with live preview, one-click templates for every type, and a Rovo AI agent that works on the page. draw.io is the most-installed diagramming app on the Atlassian Marketplace, with deep shape libraries, whiteboarding, and a Mermaid importer added to its editor.
Both are good tools. This guide compares how they behave in Confluence specifically — how a diagram is created, what is stored on the page, what happens when you need to change it six months later, and what it costs.
draw.io added Mermaid in 2026 — here is what actually changed
draw.io ships Mermaid support in its editor: Arrange > Insert > Mermaid, or the + button in the toolbar. The diagram type is detected from the first keyword of your source, and draw.io's documentation lists 29 supported Mermaid keywords — flowcharts, swimlanes, class, state, sequence, ZenUML, ER, requirement, C4, Gantt, journey, kanban, timeline, gitGraph, pie, XY, quadrant, radar, Sankey, treemap, mindmap, block, packet, architecture, Venn, Ishikawa, treeView, Wardley and event modeling. A type outside that list comes back as unsupported diagram type; a broken body comes back as a parse error pointing at the problem.
The significant change landed in July 2026. Previously, inserting Mermaid flattened the diagram into an image — you could see it and nothing more. Now, by default, the Mermaid source is rendered with native draw.io shapes inside a Mermaid container group, with the source attached to that group. That means:
- You can restyle it with draw.io's Style tools — fill and line colours, text colours, fonts, labels. Your edits override Mermaid styling and survive regeneration.
- You can move and resize shapes and repath connectors inside the group.
- You can re-edit the source — select a shape in the group, click the pen icon, change the Mermaid, click Apply to regenerate.
- You can lock it with the padlock icon, or insert it as a single uneditable SVG image if you want a read-only diagram.
- You can pick the layout engine — Dagre by default, with an ELK option for neater orthogonal connectors on large graphs.
This is a real capability, and any comparison that still claims "draw.io cannot do Mermaid" is out of date. It also narrows the gap: draw.io can now hand you a Mermaid diagram and let you finish it as a polished visual artefact.
The real difference: what the source becomes
Here is the honest core of the comparison. Both tools accept the same text:
sequenceDiagram
participant Docs as Confluence
participant CI as CI pipeline
participant Reg as Registry
CI->>Reg: push image
Reg-->>Docs: webhook updates page
Docs->>Docs: rerender Mermaid diagram
What each tool does with it next is the whole story.
In Mermaid Plus, the text is the diagram. The Mermaid source is stored as the macro's source. Page history shows a readable text diff, so you can see that someone added a Docs->>Docs: rerender arrow on a given date. Changing the diagram means changing a line and saving. The source is greppable, reviewable, and copy-pasteable into a pull request, a code review, or a chat with an AI assistant.
In draw.io, the text becomes shapes. The Mermaid source is used to generate native draw.io shapes inside a container group. The source is still attached (that is the July 2026 improvement), but the diagram in the page is now shape and XML data. Your restyling, manual resizing and repathed connectors live alongside the generated geometry, and regenerating from source overrides geometry changes. Practically: you can style it freely, and you can still regenerate — but the page is no longer a text document, and a page-history diff is not a readable description of what changed.
This is why the two tools attract different teams. If your diagrams are artifacts of your documentation, text-native wins. If your diagrams are designs you will present and iterate on visually, draw.io's model wins.
Mermaid Plus Diagrams & AI Agent for Confluence
Mermaid Plus Diagrams & AI Agent for Confluence is a Mermaid editor, not a general-purpose canvas. Everything about it follows from that.
- All 30 Mermaid v12 diagram types — flowcharts, sequence, class, state, ER, Gantt, pie, C4, mindmaps, ZenUML, use case, journey, requirement, gitGraph, and the rest — each with a one-click Quick Template, so you start from working code instead of a blank canvas.
- Live preview beside the code — syntax errors surface while you type rather than when a reader opens the page.
- Text-native storage — the source is the document. Page history, diffs, copy-paste and "edit one line" all work the way your team expects from code.
- A Rovo AI agent that works on the page — see the next section.
- Themes, custom colors and fonts, and automatic dark mode so diagrams follow the reader's Confluence theme.
- Free for up to 10 users, running on Atlassian Forge with no external rendering server.
The Rovo agent: AI on the page, not just in the canvas
The agent shipped with the current version of the app and it is the part that has no draw.io equivalent. Four capabilities, all operating on the page you are looking at:
- Create — describe what you want ("make a flowchart of our deployment process") and the diagram renders in place on the page.
- Read — ask for the source and version of a diagram and get it back in chat, so you can diff, copy or paste it into a repository.
- Update — say "make this better" and the agent revises the diagram in place, preserving the macro's settings.
- Convert — turn code blocks that are already on the page into rendered diagrams. This is the fix for the most common Confluence Mermaid failure: an AI assistant or a colleague pasted a Mermaid code block into the page and it stayed dead text.
Privacy: the diagram and the AI both stay inside Atlassian
This is the part that decides the question for a lot of enterprise teams, so it is worth being precise rather than reassuring.
The diagram is Atlassian data, not vendor data. Mermaid Plus runs on Atlassian Forge and stores the Mermaid source as native content on the Confluence page. It is searchable, permissioned by Confluence's own rules, and versioned by page history. There is no second copy in a vendor account, because there is no vendor account.
The agent is Atlassian's, not a bolted-on third-party AI. Rovo is part of Atlassian Cloud and ships inside the platform, included with Standard, Premium and Enterprise plans. You do not sign a separate DPA with an AI vendor, create an account with one, or add one to your app inventory. The vendor whose AI you are evaluating is us — the app vendor — and the AI itself is Atlassian's.
Your inputs are not used to train anyone else's models. Atlassian states that Rovo inputs and outputs are not used to train, fine-tune or improve third-party LLM models or services, that its third-party-hosted LLM partners operate under strict zero data retention agreements, and that no provider retains the data you submit or the responses you receive. Requests are sent per-request over an SSL-encrypted connection, processed for the response, and returned.
The agent inherits Confluence's permissions. Rovo honours existing permissions, so it cannot read a page or act on content the person asking does not already have access to. Page restrictions apply to the agent exactly as they apply to the reader.
Admins keep the controls. AI features are managed from Atlassian Administration, Rovo activity is visible in the audit log, and Rovo data can be pinned to the same region as your Jira and Confluence data. Cloud Enterprise organisations can go further and elect to use only Atlassian-hosted LLMs, which keeps inference inside the Atlassian Cloud boundary rather than routing it to an external provider.
Two honest caveats, because a privacy section without them is just marketing. By default, Rovo routes requests to third-party-hosted model providers to generate the response — under the zero data retention terms above, and listed in Atlassian's public sub-processor list, so your security team can review exactly who is in the path. And Rovo retains chat and agent inputs and outputs for 30 days for safety and security purposes, while Atlassian may use de-identified, aggregated metadata to fine-tune open-source models that run inside Atlassian's own infrastructure — controllable through your organisation's data contribution settings.
Contrast that with draw.io, where AI generation (Smart Templates and a Generate tool that can call OpenAI, Claude or Gemini) is a feature of a third-party vendor's editor. draw.io does offer a zero egress option on its Forge app, which is a genuinely strong control — but it is an Advanced edition feature, so it is an enterprise-tier purchase rather than the default posture.
draw.io for Confluence
draw.io for Confluence is the most-installed and highest-rated diagramming app on the Atlassian Marketplace — rated 4.8/5 across more than 1,200 reviews — run by JGraph as a Platinum Marketplace Partner. It is a mature, general-purpose diagramming suite, and for a lot of work it is the right tool. Its strengths:
- Shape library depth — AWS, Azure, Google Cloud, Cisco, IBM and other network and cloud icon sets, plus UML 2.5 and BPMN 2.0 libraries that Mermaid has no equivalent for.
- Whiteboarding in the same app — a whiteboard editor for meetings and brainstorming alongside the diagram editor.
- Migration paths — import from Visio (
.vsdx), Gliffy and draw.io XML; export to XML, PDF, SVG, PNG, HTML and CSV. - Layout tooling — auto-layout plus advanced layout containers, and an ELK option for Mermaid-generated graphs.
- AI generation inside the canvas — Smart Templates and a Generate tool that can use OpenAI, Claude or Gemini to produce a starting diagram you then edit as shapes.
- Enterprise governance — Standard and Advanced editions, a dedicated account manager, custom security reviews, and a zero-egress option on Advanced; the app is Atlassian Cloud Fortified.
- Broad platform support — Confluence Cloud plus Server and Data Center, and an equivalent app for Jira.
Where it costs you: it is a commercial license with per-user pricing from the first seat, the diagram is stored as XML shape data rather than text, and "make the diagram match the schema" is a manual re-import rather than a one-line edit.
Side-by-side comparison
| Dimension | Mermaid Plus Diagrams & AI Agent | draw.io for Confluence |
|---|---|---|
| What the source becomes | The canonical text of the diagram, stored as-is | Native draw.io shapes in a Mermaid container group |
| Diagram types | All 30 Mermaid v12 types | draw.io's own shape libraries plus 29 Mermaid keywords |
| Page history | Readable text diffs | Shape/XML change history |
| Editing model | Type code, live preview, save | Draw, drag, restyle; regenerate from source when needed |
| AI | Rovo agent: create, read, update, convert on the page | Smart Templates and a Generate tool inside the canvas |
| Where the AI runs | Atlassian Rovo, inside the platform; no third-party AI account, inputs not used to train third-party models, admin controls and audit logs | Vendor feature in a third-party app; zero egress available on the Advanced edition only |
| Templates | One-click per diagram type | Smart Templates, AI-generated starters |
| Shape libraries | Mermaid diagram types, themed and colorable | Deep cloud, network, UML 2.5, BPMN 2.0, org chart, floorplan |
| Whiteboarding | No | Yes, separate whiteboard editor |
| Migration | Paste Mermaid text | Visio .vsdx, Gliffy, XML import and export |
| Dark mode | Automatic | Yes, selectable |
| Confluence / Jira | Confluence and Jira apps | Confluence Cloud, Server, Data Center, and Jira |
| Pricing | Free for up to 10 users | Commercial, per user, Standard and Advanced editions, free trial |
| Best for | Text-first docs, doc-as-code, AI-generated diagrams | Visual-first diagrams, icon-heavy architecture, enterprise rollout |
Decision framework: pick in 60 seconds
- Do your diagrams need to diff, review, or live in a repository? → Yes: Mermaid Plus. Text-native is the only one of the two that gives you that.
- Do you need cloud provider icons, BPMN 2.0, or Visio migration? → Yes: draw.io. No Mermaid tool covers those stencil libraries.
- Do you want an agent to draft and revise diagrams from a sentence, in the page? → Yes: Mermaid Plus (Rovo agent). draw.io's AI works inside the canvas instead.
- Are you a team of 10 or fewer, or standardizing on one tool across thousands of users? → 10 or fewer: Mermaid Plus, free. Thousands: compare total cost — draw.io's per-user license against the tools you would otherwise buy for whiteboarding and diagrams.
Many teams run both — and that is fine
The two tools do not conflict; they are separate macros and can sit on the same page. The common pattern is a split by kind of diagram: Mermaid Plus for the diagrams that are generated or versioned — schemas, API sequences, CI/CD pipelines, state machines, Gantt timelines — and draw.io for the diagrams that are designed — network topologies with vendor icons, BPMN process models, org charts, whiteboard sessions.
If you want one tool that covers both modes instead of two apps, Excalidraw plus Whiteboards for Confluence gives you a freeform canvas with 220+ shape libraries plus Mermaid import.
Frequently asked questions
Can draw.io do Mermaid diagrams in Confluence?
Yes — Arrange > Insert > Mermaid, or + then Mermaid. draw.io documents 29 supported Mermaid keywords, and since July 2026 the diagram is generated as native draw.io shapes inside a Mermaid container group with the source attached, so you can restyle it, resize it, lock it, and re-open the source to regenerate.
So what is the real difference between Mermaid and draw.io in Confluence?
What happens to the source. Mermaid Plus keeps the text as the diagram — text diffs in page history, one-line updates, greppable source. draw.io converts Mermaid into native shapes, which buys styling and library freedom but makes the page shape data rather than a reviewable text document.
Which one should a Confluence team choose in 2026?
Text-first teams — doc-as-code, AI-generated diagrams, standard types like flowcharts, sequence, ER, Gantt and C4 — should use Mermaid Plus. Visual-first teams that need cloud icon sets, BPMN 2.0, UML 2.5, Visio migration, whiteboarding, or enterprise zero-egress support should use draw.io. Plenty of teams install both and split by diagram type.
Is Mermaid or draw.io cheaper for Confluence?
Mermaid Plus Diagrams & AI Agent for Confluence is free for up to 10 users. draw.io for Confluence is a paid Marketplace app with Standard and Advanced editions and a free trial, priced per user from the first seat. Small teams pay nothing for Mermaid Plus; a large rollout is a real line item for draw.io.
Can I move my draw.io diagrams to Mermaid Plus?
Not automatically — a draw.io diagram is XML, not text, so there is no reliable reverse conversion. The practical route is to regenerate diagrams as Mermaid source from whatever you already have (your schema, your OpenAPI spec, your pipeline config) and paste that in.
Which has the better AI story for Confluence diagrams?
draw.io generates inside the canvas: Smart Templates and a Generate tool using OpenAI, Claude or Gemini, producing editable shapes. Mermaid Plus ships a Rovo agent that acts on the page — it creates a diagram from a sentence, reads the source back, revises it in place, and converts Mermaid code blocks already on the page into rendered diagrams. If your diagrams are generated by AI assistants, the convert capability is the one that matters most.
Where does the diagram and the AI data actually live?
Both inside Atlassian. Mermaid Plus is a Forge app that stores the Mermaid source as native content on the Confluence page — searchable, permissioned, and versioned like the rest of the page, with no copy sitting in a vendor account. The agent is Atlassian Rovo, part of the platform rather than a separate AI vendor you have to contract with.
On the AI side, Atlassian states that Rovo inputs and outputs are not used to train, fine-tune or improve third-party LLM models or services; that its third-party-hosted LLM partners operate under strict zero data retention agreements; and that no provider retains the data you submit or the responses you receive. Rovo honours existing Confluence permissions, its activity shows up in the admin audit log, and Rovo data can be pinned to the same region as your Jira and Confluence data. Cloud Enterprise organisations can elect to use only Atlassian-hosted LLMs, which keeps inference inside the Atlassian Cloud boundary instead of routing it to an external provider.
Two caveats worth knowing: by default requests are routed to third-party-hosted providers to generate the response, under those zero data retention terms and listed in Atlassian's public sub-processor list, so your security team can audit exactly who sits in the path. And Rovo retains chat and agent inputs and outputs for 30 days for safety and security, while Atlassian may use de-identified, aggregated metadata to fine-tune open-source models running inside Atlassian's own infrastructure — switchable through your organisation's data contribution settings.
draw.io's equivalent AI is a feature of a third-party vendor's editor. It does offer a zero egress option on its Forge app, which is a strong control, but only on the Advanced edition.
Compare the full set of Confluence diagram apps in the app catalog, or see how Mermaid, Excalidraw and Graphviz divide the work in Confluence diagram tools compared.
Try Mermaid Plus Diagrams & AI Agent for Confluence
All 30 Mermaid diagram types plus a Rovo AI agent, with live preview and one-click templates — free for up to 10 users.
Get it on the Atlassian Marketplace