Edit and monitor Drive labels for your organization

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As an administrator, you can review, edit, and delete the Drive labels used by your organization. Be cautious about changing a published label. Changes affect all files the label is applied to.

On this page

• Review all Drive labels in your organization
• Edit a Drive label and its fields
• Unlock a Drive label for editing
• Disable a Drive label
• Delete a Drive label
• Audit Drive label activity

Review all Drive labels in your organization

1. On your computer, go to the labels manager at https://drive.google.com/labels.

   Requires having the Manage Labels privilege.

2. (Optional) To filter the list, click Search for label name and enter search text.
3. (Optional) To sort the list, click the Label, Last modified, or Status table headers.

Edit a Drive label

To edit Drive labels applied to your files, go here instead.

As an administrator, you can change a label’s name, field names, or options. The changes are propagated everywhere the label is applied. You can’t change the field type or multi-selection option. You also can’t edit a label that’s used in a data classification rule, data loss prevention (DLP) rule, or Vault retention rule.

1. On your computer, go to the labels manager at https://drive.google.com/labels.

   Requires having the Manage Labels privilege.

2. Click the label that you want to edit.
3. Edit the label. Besides renaming fields and options, you can disable and delete them:
   • To disable a field: Find the field then click MoreDisable. Note: When a field is disabled, users can't apply values to it anymore. However, it will continue to show up anywhere it already has values applied, and in search results.
   • To delete a field: First disable it and publish. Then, click MoreDelete. For files where the field was applied, the field is removed.
   • To disable a field option:
     1. Click the field to expand it.
     2. For the field option you want to disable, click More and choose how to disable it:
        • To keep the option visible but block users from choosing it, click Show and don’t allow selection.
        • To hide the option completely, click Hide and disable.
   • To delete a field option: First disable it and publish. Then, click MoreDelete. For files with labels where the deleted option was applied, the field is unset.
4. Click Publish changes.

Unlock a Drive label for editing

Labels are locked for destructive editing (disabling or deleting fields, field options, or the labels themselves) when they’re used in a DLP or retention rule. To unlock a label, you must remove it from all rules. For DLP rules, the label can’t be used as a condition or action.

Disable a Drive label

Disable a label when you no longer want users to apply a label, but you want to keep the label where it’s already applied and in search results.

1. On your computer, go to the labels manager at https://drive.google.com/labels.

   Requires having the Manage Labels privilege.

2. For the label you want to disable, click MoreDisable. You can’t disable a label if it hasn’t been published or if it’s used in a data classification rule, data loss prevention (DLP) rule, or Vault retention rule.
3. Confirm you want to disable the label by clicking Disable and show.

You can re-enable a Drive label by finding the disabled label and clicking MoreEnable.

Delete a Drive label

Delete a label when you want all instances where that label was applied, including any field values entered by users, to be permanently deleted and removed from files.

1. On your computer, go to the labels manager at https://drive.google.com/labels.

   Requires having the Manage Labels privilege.

2. If the label’s status is Published, disable the label first:
   1. For the label you want to disable, click MoreDisable.
   2. Confirm you want to disable the label.
3. For the label you want to delete, click MoreDelete. You can’t delete a label if it’s used in a data classification rule, data loss prevention (DLP) rule, or Vault retention rule.
4. Confirm you want to delete the label by clicking Delete permanently.

Audit Drive label activity

When a user or rule applies or updates a label on a file, that activity is recorded in admin audit logs. The log entry includes the previous and new label values, and which user or system made the change.

Admin audit logs for other file events don’t report file labels.

Learn more about reviewing admin log events and reporting logs and BigQuery.