This page last changed on Dec 17, 2009 by ggaskell.
Use the Children Display Macro to display the child pages of a page and the descendents (childrens' children). Links to the children are displayed as in the screenshot below:
Screenshot: The Children Display Macro in Confluence

Note that only pages to which you have 'View' permission will be displayed.
On this page:
Usage with the Macro Browser
To insert the children display macro into a page using the Macro Browser,
- Open the Confluence page or blog post that you want to edit, then click the 'Edit' button.
- Click the Macro Browser icon
on the toolbar. The macro browser window will open.
- Scroll through the list of macros to find the one you want. Alternatively, start typing the macro name into the search box at the top right of the macro browser. Macros with a matching name will appear in the main pane.
- Click the desired macro.
- Set the macro parameters to your requirements. If desired, you can preview these changes by clicking 'Refresh'.
- Click 'Insert' to add the macro onto the page.
You can also insert macros via autocomplete. For more information, see Using Autocomplete in the Rich Text Editor.
Once you've found the children display macro, click ' insert' to add it to your page.
Usage with the Wiki Markup Editor
What you need to type |
What you will get |
{children:all=true}
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Parameters
Parameters are options that you can include in Confluence macros to control the content or format of the macro output. The table below lists relevant parameters for this macro.
Parameter names are different in the macro browser and in wiki markup. Below we show the macro browser parameter names in bold text, and the equivalent wiki markup parameters in (bracketed) text. If we do not show any parameter name for the wiki markup, then you should leave out the parameter name and simply include the parameter value as the first parameter, immediately after the colon (:).
Parameter |
Default |
Description |
Show Descendants
(all) |
false |
Display all descendents |
Parent Page
(page) |
current |
Specify which page to display children for in a current space or in a different space.
If the page parameter is '/', then the macro will list all the current space's top-level pages i.e. those without parents. If the page parameter is a space key followed by a
colon (e.g {children:page=DOC:}), then the top-level pages of that space will be listed. |
Depth of Descendants
(depth) |
none |
Specify the depth of descendents to display. 
If your {children} macro includes both 'all=true' and 'depth=X' parameter-value combinations where X is a number, 'all=true' takes precedence. If an 'all=false' and 'depth=X' parameter-value combination is used, 'depth=X' takes precedence. |
Number of Children
(first) |
none |
Restrict the number of children displayed at the top level |
Heading Style
(style) |
none |
Specify the style in which descendents are displayed |
Include Excerpts
(excerpt) |
false |
Display the child pages' excerpts, if they exist |
Sort Children By
(sort=creation)
(sort=title)
(sort=modified) |
Manual if manually ordered, otherwise alphabetical |
The 'sort' attribute is an optional attribute that allows you to configure how the children are sorted. Specify 'creation' to sort by content creation date, 'title' to sort alphabetically on title and 'modified' to sort of last modification date. |
Reverse Sort
(reverse) |
false |
Use this parameter in conjunction with the 'sort' parameter described above. Set 'reverse=true' to change the sort from ascending to descending order. |
Examples
1. Display all descendents of the page
2a. Specify which page to display children for
{children:page=page-name}
2b. Specify which page in a different space to display children for
{children:page=space-key:page-name}
3. Specify the depth of descendents
4. Restrict the number of children displayed at the top level
5. Specify the style in which descendents are displayed
Choose from heading levels h1 to h6.
{children:depth=1|style=h3}
6. Display the child pages' excerpts, if they exist
{children:depth=2|excerpt=true}
7. Sort children by modification date
{children:sort=creation|reverse=true}
RELATED TOPICS
Working with Page Families
Working with Macros
Take me back to the Confluence User's Guide.
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