Share and manage access to files and folders in Google Drive

Important:

• Work or school accounts: If you use a Google Account through work or school, your organization may limit how you can share files externally.
• Shared drives: If you are sharing files for a team or organization, learn how to store & share files or folders with shared drives.
• Drive policies: To keep Drive safe for everyone, all shared content is subject to the Google Drive program policies.

This article covers the following topics:

• Understand sharing permissions and limits
• Share and manage access
• Advanced collaboration & troubleshooting

Understand sharing permissions and limits

You can share the files and folders you store in Google Drive with other people and choose whether they can view, comment on, or edit your items.

Understand access levels and roles

• Viewer: People can view the file or folder and open all files within a shared folder. They cannot make changes, add comments, or share the item.
• Commenter: People can make comments and suggestions on files. For shared folders, commenters can view and add comments to individual files inside, but cannot modify folder structure or share items.
• Editor: People can open, edit, delete, or move any files within the folder, as well as add new files. Editors can also change permissions and share items with others by default.

Note: If you use shared drives, learn more about how file access works in shared drives.

Before sharing files or folders, learn how Google Drive manages access and inheritance.

Understand how folder inheritance works

When you share a folder, all files and subfolders inside it inherit those same sharing permissions.

• You cannot give someone less access to a specific file than they have to its parent folder.
  • For example, if someone is an Editor on a folder, you cannot make them a Viewer of a single file inside it.
  • If you try to reduce their access for a single file, Google Drive will prompt you to change their permissions at the folder level instead.
• If a specific file needs more restrictive permissions, you have two options:
  • You can move the file to a new or different folder. When you move the file to a folder that you own, you can control its sharing settings.
  • You can move the file to a dedicated, limited-access folder. Learn how to limit access to folders.

  Tip: Create a shortcut to the file in its original location so others can still easily find it.

Sharing limits

• You can share a single file with up to 600 individual email addresses.
• A Google file can only be actively edited on up to 100 open tabs or devices at the same time. If this limit is exceeded, only the owner and some users with edit permissions can make changes.

Share and manage access

Share with specific people or groups

1. Go to Google Drive, Docs, Sheets, Slides, or Vids.
   1. Tip: If you see a dot next to "Share +", you have a pending share request.
2. Select the item. To share multiple items, hold Shift and select them.
3. Click Share +.
4. Enter the email address or Google Group. If you use a work or school account, you may see suggested recipients. To turn this off, go to your Drive Settings.
5. Select Viewer, Commenter, or Editor.
6. Check Notify people to send an email alert, or uncheck it if you do not want to notify them.
7. Click Send or Share.

Allow general access (Share with a link)

1. Select the item and click Share +.
2. Under "General access," click the Down arrow.
3. Choose who can access the link:
   1. Restricted: Only people who have been given access can open the file.
   2. Anyone with the link: Anyone on the internet who has the link can open the file without signing in to a Google Account. Anyone with the link can view it.

      Tips:

      • If you use a work or school account, your administrator may restrict external link sharing.
      • People who aren't signed in to a Google Account will show up as anonymous animals. Learn more about anonymous or unknown people in a file.
   3. Your Organization (Work or school accounts only): Anyone in your organization can access the file, based on sharing levels allowed by your administrator.
4. Select the role, click Copy link, and click Done.

Stop, limit, or change sharing

Find who has access

1. Right-click the item

2. Select More File Information Details.
3. In the details panel on the right, click Manage access.
4. Click Manage access.

Stop sharing

1. Open the Share menu.
2. Find the person click the Down arrow next to their name
3. Select Remove access.
4. Click Save.

Limit access to a folder

When you limit access to a folder, only people you give permission to can open it.

1. Right-click the folder and click Share Settings .
2. Turn on Limit access.
3. Click Back to add or remove specific people who should have access. Learn about limited access to files and folders in Google Drive.

Add an expiration date

1. In the Share menu, click the Down arrow next to a person's name
2. Select Add expiration.
3. Select a date within one year.
4. Click Save.

Tip: This is available for work and school accounts. For folders, this is only available for Viewer roles.

Prevent downloading or copying

1. Open the Share menu
2. Click Settings .
3. Uncheck Editors, Commenters and Viewers or both under the People who can download, copy, print, and access option.

Prevent Editors from sharing

1. Go to Settings
2. Uncheck Allow editors to change permissions and share.
   1. Tip: If your file is inside a shared folder, the folder’s permissions override any settings you choose for the file.

Transfer ownership

1. In the Share menu, click the Down arrow next to the person's name,
2. Select Transfer ownership
3. Click Yes. Learn how to make someone else the owner of your file

Share with Chat spaces or Meetings

Chat spaces

1. Go to Google Chat.
2. Select the space.
3. Click the Integration menu Drive and select the item.
4. Click Insert.
5. Alternatively, copy the link from Drive, go to Google Chat, and paste it into the message field.
6. People who join the space later will automatically gain access to files and folders shared with the space.

Meeting attendees

1. Open the file.
2. Click Share
3. Enter the meeting name and choose the role
4. Click Send.

Advanced collaboration & troubleshooting

Learn what happens when you delete or remove shared files

If you own the file:

• It goes to your trash.
• Collaborators can still view, comment, or make a copy of it until you permanently delete it.
• You can transfer ownership if you want someone else to be the owner. Learn how to Make someone else the owner of your file

If you don't own the file:

• You cannot delete files you do not own.
• If you remove a file from a shared folder, it moves to the owner's My Drive.
• Only the owner of the file will be able to undo the move.

Learn about external file alerts

If you use a Google Workspace account (such as a Workspace Business, Enterprise, or Education account), Drive may display an "External" alert badge on files accessible to people outside your organization.

You may see this badge on files that are:

• Owned by or shared with people outside your organization.
• Shared with an external Google Group.
• Shared in a Google Chat space with external members.
• Published to the web or made publicly accessible.

This feature helps identify potentially harmful files and prompts caution when sharing confidential information. Administrators have the option to turn this off.

Google Forms sharing options

Google Forms have distinct sharing options compared to standard files.

• If you need to gather a lot of information, create a Google Form.
  • Responses will be recorded in a Google Sheet.
  • Give edit access only to people who need to work with the responses.
• To let over 100 people open the responses, publish the spreadsheet to the web, then create a link to share it with those who have access. Learn how to publish a file.

Share a Vids file as MP4

You can share your video as an MP4 file. This is useful because Google Vids does not have a "Publish to web" option. To share a Vids file:

1. Open the file on your computer
2. Click Share Quick sharing actions Export to Drive to save and then share it as an MP4.

Email collaborators (Computer)

You can send an email directly to collaborators from a file. On a computer,

1. Open the file
2. Click More actions Share Email people on this file to select groups and send a message.

This is useful for informing collaborators about major revisions or sharing updates.

Troubleshoot heavily shared documents

If a document is shared with a large number of people and is crashing or updating slowly, apply these troubleshooting steps:

• Create a Google Form to collect feedback instead of allowing users to comment directly on the document.
• Delete older information, or publish the document to the web. Shorter, published documents load faster.
• Reduce the number of users with edit access, or create a new, access-only document to share broadly.
• When making a copy of a document, do not include resolved comments and suggestions.
• Ask users to close the document when they are not actively using it.

Related resources

• Store & share files or folders with shared drives
• Learn about limited access to files and folders in Google Drive
• Request access to the eSignature feature in Google Workspace