The measurement of Z bosons in heavy ion collisions is an excellent tool for probing the nucleus at the partonic level. The inclusive yield provides a stringent test of binary collision scaling. Recent ATLAS results demonstrate such scaling in Pb+Pb collisions. The 2013 p+Pb physics run at the LHC providing more than 30 nb−1 of collisions at an energy of sNN=5.02 TeV has made a detailed study of Z boson production in proton+nucleus interactions possible for the first time. These data may confirm binary scaling in the p+Pb system and help to clarify the present ambiguity of centrality classifications in proton+nucleus collisions. Furthermore, the momentum and rapidity differential yields of Z bosons allow the detection of modification of the initial state present in such collisions.