Turn Drive and Docs on or off for users

This article is for administrators who manage Drive and Docs editors for an organization. For help managing your own files, go to the Learning Center.

As an administrator, you can turn Google Drive on or off for people in your organization. This setting also controls access to Google Docs editors, such as Google Docs, Sites, and Apps Script. In most cases, the Drive and Docs service is on for your organization by default.

When Drive and Docs is turned off

Users can't do the following:

• Access or create files in Drive, Docs, Sheets, Slides, Forms, Sites, or Apps Script. Existing Apps Script scripts still execute. When Drive and Docs is turned off for a file owner, other users who have Drive and Docs turned on and who had the file shared with them can still access it.
• Submit Google Forms that require them to share documents outside your organization.
• Upload files to spaces in the integrated Gmail experience. Learn more about integrated Gmail.
• Use custom email layouts in Gmail.

Admins are limited in how they can manage file sharing settings:

• You can’t change file-sharing permissions in your Admin console.
• If you have trust rules turned on and set up, the rules still apply to users' files. For details about trust rules, go to Create and manage trust rules for Drive sharing.

If you want to let users use Drive but not create files with Docs, Sheets, and other Docs editors, set the Drive and Docs service to on and turn off Docs creation.

Control who uses Drive and Docs editors in your organization

Before you begin: To turn a service on or off for certain users, put their accounts in an organizational unit (to control access by department) or add them to an access group (to allow access for users across or within departments).

1. Sign in to your Google Admin console.

   Sign in using your administrator account (does not end in @gmail.com).

2. In the Admin console, go to Menu  AppsGoogle WorkspaceDrive and Docs.
   
3. Click Service status.

4. To turn a service on or off for everyone in your organization, click On for everyone or Off for everyone, and then click Save.

5. (Optional) To turn a service on or off for an organizational unit:

   1. At the left, select the organizational unit.
   2. To change the Service status, select On or Off.
   3. Choose one:
      • If the Service status is set to Inherited and you want to keep the updated setting, even if the parent setting changes, click Override.
      • If the Service status is set to Overridden, either click Inherit to revert to the same setting as its parent, or click Save to keep the new setting, even if the parent setting changes.
        Note: Learn more about organizational structure.
6. To turn on a service for a set of users across or within organizational units, select an access group. For details, go to Use groups to customize service access.

Changes can take up to 24 hours but typically happen more quickly. Learn more

Related topics

• Turn a service on or off for Google Workspace users
• Manage access to services that aren't controlled individually
• Turn on or off new services by default
• Google Workspace for Education Core and Additional services
• Google Vault supported services and data types

• Turn Docs creation on or off
• Manage users' access in Sites
• Turn Google Forms on or off for users
• Turn Apps Script on or off for users