diff --git a/src/main/java/com/atlassian/plugins/confluence/markdown/MarkdownMacro.java b/src/main/java/com/atlassian/plugins/confluence/markdown/MarkdownMacro.java
index a57e830..7d2e350 100644
--- a/src/main/java/com/atlassian/plugins/confluence/markdown/MarkdownMacro.java
+++ b/src/main/java/com/atlassian/plugins/confluence/markdown/MarkdownMacro.java
@@ -65,7 +65,7 @@ public class MarkdownMacro extends BaseMacro implements Macro {
                 .set(HtmlRenderer.PERCENT_ENCODE_URLS, true)
                 // for full GFM table compatibility add the following table extension options:
 
-                .set(TablesExtension.COLUMN_SPANS, false)
+                .set(TablesExtension.COLUMN_SPANS, true)
                 .set(TablesExtension.APPEND_MISSING_COLUMNS, true)
                 .set(TablesExtension.DISCARD_EXTRA_COLUMNS, true)
                 .set(TablesExtension.HEADER_SEPARATOR_COLUMN_MATCH, true)