Atlassian Forge in a nutshell

In today’s fast-evolving digital landscape, organizations are searching for smarter ways to optimize operations and enhance collaboration. Atlassian’s suite of powerful tools, like Jira, Confluence, and Trello, supports over 300,000 customers worldwide. Still all challenges cannot be addressed by standard solutions. That’s where Atlassian Forge steps in.

Launched in 2021, Forge is a dynamic platform designed for building and deploying custom cloud applications within the Atlassian ecosystem. So, what is Atlassian Forge, and how can it benefit your organization? Let’s explore its key features.

What is Atlassian Forge?

Atlassian Forge is a cloud-based platform that empowers developers to create custom applications that seamlessly integrate with a variety of Atlassian tools, including Jira, Confluence, Jira Service Management, Bitbucket, Rovo, and Compass. Forge provides a serverless execution environment built on AWS Lambda, abstracted and fully managed by Atlassian, along with integrated storage and hosting. This infrastructure simplifies the application development process, making it more accessible for businesses.

Forge offers UI Kit, a lightweight, component-based framework suited for simple interfaces within Atlassian products. For more advanced use cases, developers can use Custom UI, which allows front-end development with React. Additionally, the Forge CLI simplifies the process of deploying, installing, and distributing your app through a streamlined CLI-based workflow.

What are the benefits of using Atlassian Forge?

No infrastructure management

One of Forge’s primary advantages is the removal of direct infrastructure management responsibilities. As a cloud-based platform, it allows Atlassian to manage hosting, scaling, and security, enabling teams to focus on innovation instead of server issues. Preparing apps for enterprise deployment can be challenging, but Forge apps run on the same infrastructure as Atlassian’s cloud products, so they are ready to meet the demands of large customers from the start.

Security and compliance

As part of the Atlassian Cloud platform, Forge inherits the security protocols and compliance features that Atlassian already has. You can be assured that your data benefits from Atlassian’s existing cloud security and compliance controls. This helps your team feel confident when using these custom apps.

Simplified app development

Forge simplifies custom application creation for Atlassian tools. Its user-friendly interface and pre-built templates enable developers to build applications more efficiently by reducing boilerplate and operational overhead. Whether automating tasks or creating custom integrations, Forge provides an accessible development pathway.

With Forge, developers can build applications that integrate with their Atlassian tools without having to develop authentication and authorization systems from scratch. These features make Forge a powerful solution, easing the development process and addressing common challenges.

Flexibility and customization

Forge lets you build highly specific apps that fit your business’s unique needs. Whether you're looking for custom dashboards, automations, or specialized workflows, Forge gives you the tools to create exactly what you need.

What are the drawbacks of using Atlassian Forge?

Building large-scale complex solutions

Applications built on the Forge platform operate within Atlassian's framework, which can restrict customization and optimization. This limitation is particularly pronounced for highly complex applications that need to handle large data volumes or execute long-running tasks that may take several minutes to complete as it is subject to platform quotas and tier restrictions. Additionally, Forge functions run within strict execution time and resource limits, which can further constrain compute-heavy or long-running operations.

Moreover, the development of intricate enterprise solutions that demand considerable computing power, storage, or data transfer often encounters significant challenges due to the inherent limitations of the Forge platform. This ultimately restricts the full potential of these applications.

Inability to extend your app via APIs

Atlassian Forge's platform security represents a crucial advantage; however, it also introduces specific challenges. Currently, it restricts the ability to offer APIs accessible from the internet, limiting various custom use cases within organizations. As a result, the development of application APIs is not supported by Atlassian Forge currently. Forge also restricts outbound network calls unless domains are explicitly allowlisted, which can limit certain external integrations.

Dependency on Atlassian's ecosystem

Updates or modifications to Atlassian's Forge platform can significantly affect application performance and functionality, requiring developers to make prompt adaptations. This reliance on Atlassian's infrastructure implies adherence to their service level agreements (SLAs) and the possibility of experiencing potential downtimes.

At Nagarro we are equipped to support customers by developing tailored solutions leveraging Atlassian Forge. We assist in designing, developing, and deploying custom Forge applications that meet specific business needs, ensuring seamless compatibility with existing Jira, JSM and Confluence environments. Furthermore, Nagarro's ongoing support and maintenance services help customers maximize the value of their Atlassian tools, adapt to evolving needs, and stay ahead in their digital transformation journey.

Nagarro’s success story:

A leading US healthcare and management consulting firm sought a single, structured platform for analytics demand intake, replacing fragmented, manual processes with guided requests, upfront cost and effort transparency, and predictable planning at scale.

We designed and implemented a custom demand management platform on Jira Cloud using Atlassian Forge. Key capabilities included guided request intake with recommendation models powered by predefined templates and historical data, and a service catalog showcasing available analytics and visualization offerings with associated effort and cost.

The Demand Management module enabled end-to-end planning and tracking across timelines, dynamic team and individual capacity management (including vacation awareness), and a roadmap-style view with real-time capacity visibility. Automated workflows were implemented using ScriptRunner, with advanced reporting delivered through eazyBI.

The platform became the single source of truth for AI and analytics demand intake and execution, reducing rework and accelerating turnaround through structured intake. As a result, the client achieved improved capacity utilization and budget control. The client was able to productize the solution and offer it as a service to their own customers, creating additional business value.

Conclusion

Atlassian Forge is a game-changer for businesses looking for a simple and secure way to get more from their Atlassian products. With Forge, you can build custom apps to automate tasks, improve teamwork, and make your operations run more smoothly. Whether you need a simple automation tool or a more complex integration, Forge makes it easier and faster than ever to bring your ideas to life, while Atlassian handles the technical complexity and infrastructure.

So, if you’re working within the Atlassian ecosystem and looking for a way to enhance your tools without the hassle of traditional app development, Atlassian Forge is the solution you’ve been waiting for.