Atlassian’s Forge platform has always been about simplifying cloud app development. When Forge first launched, it delivered on a promise of simplicity a serverless architecture and a set of declarative UI components that made it faster and easier to build apps. Developers no longer needed to worry about hosting, scaling, or maintaining servers; Forge handled the heavy lifting behind the scenes, letting teams focus on functionality and business needs.
The kind of positive developer experience is exactly what Forge was designed for. However, early versions of Forge’s UI capabilities came with some trade-offs. Atlassian’s emphasis on simplicity meant the initial Forge UI had limitations that made it challenging to create more sophisticated app interfaces. In this blog, we’ll explore how Atlassian addressed those challenges with the new Forge UI kit, which introduces a wealth of new features and a more flexible, robust experience for building Atlassian apps.
From the outset, Forge set out to streamline Atlassian app development. It provided a declarative UI kit essentially a collection of ready-made UI components and a fully managed, cloud-hosted runtime. This meant that even developers with limited frontend experience could create integrations or extensions for Atlassian products like Jira and Confluence without worrying about infrastructure. Forge automatically handled deployment, scaling, and security, allowing creators to concentrate on their app’s logic and user experience.
The result was a shorter development cycle and less DevOps overhead. Forge empowered teams to build custom solutions and integrations faster, making Atlassian’s ecosystem more accessible. Forge allows a person to “focus on the business” logic rather than server setups. This promise of agility and ease attracted many early adopters. Yet, simplicity came at a price. The first iteration of Forge’s UI toolkit wasn’t as comprehensive or flexible as some developers needed. Let’s look at a couple of key challenges that surfaced for those early Forge app builders.
Limited UI Kit components: The initial Forge UI Kit offered only a small set of basic UI components. Developers aiming to build complex or highly interactive apps often found the options insufficient. Without ready-made components for advanced functionality (for example, charts or rich text editors), it was difficult to create feature-rich, polished user interfaces within Forge. This limited component library meant some app ideas were hard to implement or required creative workarounds.
UI Kit vs. Custom UI dilemma: Forge historically provided two approaches for building app interfaces. One could use the simple declarative UI Kit (easy to use but constrained to provided components), or opt for Custom UI, which allowed using any front-end framework or library for total flexibility. Each approach had benefits, but developers had to choose one or the other. This “either/or” decision was a dilemma: UI Kit made development quick and simple, whereas Custom UI offered unlimited design possibilities at the cost of more complexity and the need to manage frontend code. There was no seamless way to get the best of both worlds in a single Forge app.
These early challenges meant that while Forge was great for simplicity, building truly dynamic or sophisticated apps sometimes felt out of reach. Atlassian listened closely to developer feedback on these pain points. The Forge team’s mission became clear: keep the simplicity, but introduce more flexibility and power into Forge’s UI capabilities.
To address those limitations, Atlassian introduced the new Forge UI Kit a major evolution of Forge’s user interface framework. This new UI kit represents a significant leap forward in Forge’s journey, bringing flexibility and richness to the Forge app development experience while preserving the platform’s trademark simplicity. In essence, Atlassian has unified the development experience and expanded the toolkit available to Forge developers.
One of the standout changes in the new UI kit is the focus on eliminating the old “either/or” choice between UI Kit and Custom UI. The Forge team wanted to make sure developers can have both simplicity and customization within one app. To achieve this, they added a special component (aptly named the Frame component) that acts as a bridge between the two worlds of Forge UI. Now, a single Forge app can mix and match declarative UI components with fully custom UI elements as needed. In practical terms, this means you can build most of your interface with easy Forge UI Kit components, and in places where you need something more custom or advanced, you can embed a custom UI seamlessly. There’s no more trade-off the new Forge UI Kit blends flexibility with simplicity in one unified approach.
At the same time, Atlassian vastly expanded the Forge UI component library and added new layout capabilities. The new UI Kit comes with more pre-built components and layout containers that let you arrange content in more complex ways. Forge apps can now look and feel more like first-class Atlassian product features, because the UI building blocks are more powerful and diverse.
Crucially, these improvements maintain Forge’s ease-of-use. Developers still don’t need to worry about the backend or hosting they just have many more tools at their fingertips to create a great user experience. The result is that Forge apps can now be as beautiful and functional as apps built with Custom UI, but with far less hassle.
The revamped Forge UI Kit introduces several important enhancements that unlock new possibilities for app developers:
Frame Component for unified UI: The new Frame component allows developers to seamlessly integrate Custom UI content within a Forge UI Kit app. In the past, you had to decide between using the out-of-the-box UI Kit or building your interface from scratch with Custom UI. The Frame component removes that barrier by letting you embed a custom frontend (built with React or any web technology) inside a UI Kit interface. This unified approach means you get the best of both worlds you can start with simple declarative components and drop in custom elements only where you need them. Whether you’re building a straightforward form or a complex, data-rich dashboard, the UI Kit + Frame combination has you covered.
Expanded component library: Atlassian has significantly grown the set of UI components available to Forge developers. Many new UI elements have been added, making it easier to build rich and interactive interfaces. Notably, there are now built-in Visualisation Chart components for graphs and data visualization, a Comment component for incorporating inline comments or discussions, and a Pressable component which simplifies creating clickable or tappable elements. With a larger library of ready-to-use components, Forge apps can deliver more functionality and a polished, native feel without developers having to reinvent the wheel.
Flexible layout options: The new UI Kit introduces layout components like Stack, Inline, and Box that give developers control over how content is arranged on the screen. These layout components act as containers that help structure your app’s UI for example, stacking elements vertically or placing them inline horizontally with consistent spacing. This makes it possible to design more complex layouts and responsive interfaces within Forge apps. Essentially, developers can now fine-tune their app’s look and feel to a much greater degree, ensuring the app UI fits the use case perfectly and looks professional.
With these enhancements, the Forge UI Kit has grown from a basic set of building blocks into a comprehensive toolkit. Developers can craft interfaces that are both powerful and user-friendly, without stepping outside the Forge platform. Next, let’s look at some brand-new Forge features that take app capabilities even further.
Forge is continuously evolving, and along with the UI kit overhaul, Atlassian has rolled out additional features that make Forge apps smarter, more efficient, and better integrated into the user’s workflow. Here are some of the exciting new features now available to Forge developers (and by extension, to Atlassian customers using Forge-powered apps):
Visualisation Charts: One of the most eye-catching additions is the ability to include rich data visualization directly in Forge apps. Atlassian has introduced a suite of interactive chart components including bar charts, pie charts, line charts, and more that developers can easily drop into their apps. These Visualisation Charts were first showcased at Atlassian’s recent Team '25 conference, and they’re already used in Atlassian’s own products (for example, within Atlassian’s home dashboard). Now generally available to all Forge users, these chart components enable apps to present data in a visually engaging way. Whether it’s a Jira app displaying project metrics or a Confluence macro showing survey results, Forge apps can provide stunning graphs and charts that help users interpret information at a glance.
Internationalization support: Forge now supports localizing apps in 26 different languages, allowing developers to deliver a native experience to users around the globe. This is a big step toward inclusivity and professionalism an app can dynamically display text in the user’s preferred language, making it feel like a natural part of their Atlassian product. For organizations with multilingual teams or customer bases, Forge apps can adapt to each locale effortlessly. Building an app that feels at home in English, French, Japanese, or any other supported language has never been easier on the Atlassian platform. This internationalization feature means Forge apps can truly serve worldwide audiences with less effort on the developer’s part.
Macro auto-conversion: If you’ve ever pasted a link into a Confluence page and seen it transform into a smart content card, you’ve experienced Atlassian’s macro auto-conversion in action. Now Forge apps can leverage Macro auto-conversion to handle URLs in a smarter way. Essentially, when a user enters or pastes certain links (for instance, a link to a Jira issue, a YouTube video, etc.), the Forge app can automatically convert that URL into a more useful embedded content or “macro.” This feature enables more seamless user experiences for example, a Forge app could recognize a link and display a preview or perform an automated action, rather than treating it as a plain hyperlink. It’s another way Forge apps are becoming more intelligent and user-friendly.
Background scripts: Forge has introduced the ability to run background scripts, which are functions that execute behind the scenes without blocking the user interface. In earlier Forge versions, almost all app logic ran in response to user actions (like clicking a button) and had to complete while the user waited. Now, developers can offload certain tasks to run asynchronously in the background. This means Forge apps can handle heavy computations, long-running processes, or periodic jobs without making the user wait or disrupting the UI. For end-users, apps feel snappier and more responsive, because things like data syncs or complex calculations happen transparently in the background. For developers, background scripts open up possibilities to build smarter apps ones that can do work independently, resulting in more efficient and seamless app behavior.
The Forge platform is not standing still. Atlassian has a roadmap of upcoming Forge UI features that will push the platform even further and continue to support the innovation of developers. Here’s a sneak peek at what’s on the horizon for Forge UI:
Editor component: A rich text editor component is one of the most anticipated features in development. Soon, Forge apps will be able to embed a full-fledged text editor inside their interface, allowing users to input and format content. This means apps could let users draft and style documents or comments with formatting, much like they would in Confluence or other Atlassian products, all within the Forge app. It will unlock use cases like note-taking apps, formatted descriptions, or any functionality requiring text editing, making Forge apps even more powerful and interactive.
Full-page app experiences: Atlassian is working on enabling full-page experiences for Forge apps. Currently, many Forge apps exist as sections or modules within an Atlassian product’s UI (for example, a panel on a Jira issue or a glance in Confluence). Full-page experiences would allow a Forge app to occupy an entire page within the host product’s interface essentially giving your app a bigger canvas and more prominence. This will let developers create more comprehensive and immersive interfaces, such as complete dashboards or multi-step workflows, directly inside Atlassian products. Forge apps will be able to feel as robust as native Atlassian features, because they’ll have comparable screen space and navigation capabilities.
Deeper platform integrations: Expect Forge to offer even tighter integration points with Atlassian’s product suite in the near future. Atlassian plans to enable more ways for Forge apps to hook into product functionalities, data, and even emerging technologies like AI. These deeper platform integrations could mean Forge apps can automate more complex tasks across Jira, Confluence, and other tools, or leverage Atlassian’s artificial intelligence services for features like smart recommendations or data analysis. Essentially, Forge apps will become even more capable and versatile, interacting with Atlassian products at a level that was previously only possible for Atlassian’s own features. This opens the door to highly customized solutions tailored to specific industry or team needs, built on top of the Atlassian cloud.
All of these upcoming enhancements illustrate Atlassian’s commitment to continuously improving Forge. Each new feature is aimed at empowering developers to create better apps, which in turn benefits Atlassian customers who use those apps. The roadmap ahead ensures that Forge will remain a cutting-edge platform for extending and customizing the Atlassian experience.
It’s worth noting that Forge’s evolution is a collaborative journey. The developer community has been instrumental in shaping Forge UI’s direction. Atlassian’s engineers have worked closely with app developers, partners, and early adopters, whose feedback and creative ideas have guided many of the improvements we see today. From identifying gaps in the UI component library to suggesting new features like background scripts, the community’s input has helped Forge mature into a more robust development platform.
Testimonies like the one above underscore how Forge has improved in response to real-world needs. As of now, there are already over 1,400 apps built with the new Forge UI Kit, with many more in development. This rapid adoption shows that developers are embracing Forge’s new capabilities. For Atlassian users and customers, this thriving app ecosystem means a growing selection of Marketplace apps and custom solutions that can enhance your Atlassian tools. In other words, the investments Atlassian is making in Forge UI are delivering value to teams everywhere enabling new integrations, more tailored functionalities, and smarter automation that extend what Jira, Confluence, and other products can do out-of-the-box.
The Forge community continues to grow, and Atlassian actively supports it through documentation, examples, and an open roadmap. Whether a developer is migrating an existing app from the older Atlassian Connect framework or building something brand new, Forge now provides a solid, future-ready foundation. By joining this community and leveraging Forge, organizations can innovate faster on the Atlassian platform, with confidence that the tooling is backed by Atlassian’s security and scalability.
Atlassian’s new Forge UI brings more features and flexibility to the table, empowering developers to build apps that are more powerful, user-friendly, and deeply integrated than ever. It reinforces the message that Atlassian is committed to supporting not just its direct customers, but also the ecosystem of partners and developers who create solutions for those customers. It’s an exciting time for Atlassian cloud users: the apps you rely on can now be realized with greater speed and sophistication, thanks to Forge.