Share Sheets, Reports, and Dashboards

Begin collaborating with others by sharing a Smartsheet item (sheet, report, or dashboard) or by confirming a sharing request from someone on your team.

The best method to use for sharing will depend on the number of items you want to share and how many people you want to share with:

  • To share individual items one at a time with a few people, follow the sharing steps in this article. (To share an individual item that is stored in a workspace, see the share an item from a workspace section of this article.)
  • To share one or more items with a group of people, use a workspace. For more information about how to do that, see Create a Workspace and Workspace Sharing.

Once your items are shared, you can learn some best practices here: more about what to expect here: Work with Multiple People on a Sheet at the Same Time.

Overview of Permission Levels and Sharing

When you share an item with someone, that person will need to log in to Smartsheet to access it. You control the level of access a person has through the sharing permission level you choose—Viewer, Editor, or Admin. You can stop sharing an item or change a collaborator's permission level at any time. For more information about Smartsheet permissions, please see Sharing Permission Levels.

Share Reports: You Must Also Share Source Sheets 

If you find that a report looks different for you than it does for someone that you've shared it to—if it's missing information or blank—you may not have shared all of the source sheets with that person. 

For security purposes, a report doesn't give access to sheets that haven't already been shared to a user. For example, you can share a report that looks across three sheets to a collaborator who only has access to one of them. When the collaborator opens the report, they'll only see rows pulled from the one sheet that's shared to them. If the collaborator isn't shared to any sheets, their version of the report will be blank.

  • If you’d like to share a report with somebody who doesn’t have access to the source sheets, you can publish the report and share the link. For more information about publishing, see Publish a Sheet, Report, or Dashboard.
  • You can also insert the report as a widget in a dashboard. For more information on the Report widget, check out the Widget Types for Smartsheet Dashboards article.

System Admin and Group Admin Sharing Controls

A System Admin can remove a user from sharing items owned by licensed users on the account. For more information, see Manage Users in a Multi-User Plan.

A Group Admin can remove a member from a group to also remove them from all items that are shared to that group. For more information, see Manage and Use Smartsheet Contact Groups.

Share a Smartsheet Item

People with Owner, Admin, and Editor - Can Share permissions have the ability to share Smartsheet items.

If the item is located in a workspace, you can either share it individually or share the entire workspace. For more information, see Sharing an Item from a Workspace later in this article.

  1. In the top right corner of the item, click Share. If you don't see the Share button, click the down arrow icon in the upper-right corner of the Smartsheet window.

  2. The sharing form opens. 

    If the item isn't already shared, you'll see the Invite Details. Use Invite Details to enable or disable the invitation email and draft a custom message.

    If others are currently shared, you'll see a list of existing Collaborators appear by default. (You can select Invite Details if you want to see those instead.)


    TIP: All shared collaborators can use the secure sheet link to open it directly—consider bookmarking the link for quick access to the item. When using the link, you'll be prompted to log in to Smartsheet (if you aren't already logged in) in order to access the sheet.


  3. In the Invite Collaborators box at the top, type the email addresses of the people or groups you want to share the item with. Separate multiple email addresses with a comma or semicolon.
  4. Select a Permissions level. For a detailed breakdown of features available to each permission level, check out the Sharing Permission Levels article.
  5. Click Share.

The collaborators will be shared to the item and will receive a notification if you opted to send one. The Sharing form will be updated to display the list of shared Collaborators including those you just added.

You can ensure that a collaborator is looking at an item with the same view and filters applied by sending them the URL from the address bar of your browser. (Learn more about views.)

More Sharing Options

If you want to collaborate or share data without sharing people directly to your Smartsheet items, you can use any of the following options:

  • Publish: If you want to share Smartsheet items with people who don’t have Smartsheet accounts, you can send them a publish link. Published Smartsheet items are dynamic, so the data is always up to date. See Publish a Sheet, Report, or Dashboard for more information about publishing.
  • Send as Attachment: If you want to share a static Excel or PDF file of a Smartsheet item, you can email it as an attachment using the Send as Attachment feature. You can also email specific row data to other people which can be useful if they want information about a specific task or group of rows in a large sheet. To learn more, see Share Sheet Information in Email.
  • Use a Form: If you want to collect information from people, use a form. Forms allow people to add new rows to your sheet based on their form submissions without direct sharing access. For more information, see Collect Information with a Form.
  • Use Automated Workflows: If you need to share specific data to automatically notify people of changes to your sheets, send reminders for due dates, or request automatic updates or approvals, use automated workflows. Information about automated workflows can be found in Save Time and Work Faster With Automated Workflows.

Share an Item from a Workspace

When a sheet, report, or dashboard exists in a workspace, it will be available to anyone who has sharing permissions for the workspace. Even when it's in a workspace, the item can be shared at the item level so that people who don't have access to the workspace can still have access to the item.

You must have Owner, Admin, or Editor - can share permissions to the item in order to share it. Similarly, to share a workspace, you'll need Owner, Admin, or Editor - can share permission to the workspace.

NOTE: Only Owners  and Admins can share dashboards.

Here's how you can give someone access to an item that's located in a workspace:

  1. Browse to the Workspace where the item you want to share is located.
  2. In the top right corner of the item, click Share.
  3. Click in the Invite Collaborators box and type or select contacts.
    At the bottom of the form, you'll see This sheet, report, or dashboard is in a workspace. If you have permissions to access the workspace, you'll also see the name of the workspace.
  4. To share the item only, click Share. To share the workspace, click Share Workspace.

When items and workspaces are shared, you'll see the Shared to Sheet, Report, or dashboard via workspace icon and/or the Shared to Sheet, Report, or dashboard only icon next to the permission levels in the Collaborators section of the sharing form. These icons show how the item has been shared with the various collaborators.

Set a Default Sharing View

If you are the sheet Owner or have Admin-level sharing permissions, you can ensure that anyone shared to your sheet sees the sheet as you've intended by applying a default view and filter. Set a default view, for example, for newly shared collaborators to open a sheet directly to Card View with a filter applied to show only high priority tasks.

You'll need to create a saved filter before setting a default filter. For more information about creating filters, see our article on Using Filters to Show or Hide Sheet Data.

To set a default view on your sheet:

  1. In the top right corner of the item, click Share.
  2. Select Collaborators to display the list of current Smartsheet users shared on the sheet.
  3. To the right of Default View, select Edit. The Default View form appears.
  4. Under View, select Grid View, Card View, Gantt View, or Calendar View. You can also select a default filter and specific Card View lanes.

    NOTE: You'll need to create a shared filter before you can set a default filter. For more information about creating filters, see our article on Using Filters to Show or Hide Sheet Data.
     
  5. Click Save.

You can ensure that a collaborator is looking at an item with the same view and filters applied by sending them the URL from the address bar of your browser. (Learn more about views.)
NOTE: Default View settings don't apply to the Mobile App. Users accessing a sheet from the App will be defaulted to Grid View.

Remove a Collaborator or Change Permission Levels

The item owner and collaborators with Admin access to the item can remove others or change their permission levels. Editors may also have this ability if they were given permission to share the item when they were invited.

  1. In the top right corner of the item, click Share.

    If you don't see the Share button, click the down arrow icon in the upper-right of the Smartsheet window.

  2. In the Sharing form, mouse-over the name of the person you'd like to remove or change to highlight the row and do either of the following:
    • Change Permissions: Select a new permission level from the drop-down list. Note that you can't give another collaborator a higher access level than you have yourself (that is, someone with Editor-level permissions can't promote another person with Editor-level permissions and give them Admin-level access).
    • Remove from Sharing: Click the X at the right end of the permission level row.

      The person will no longer have access to the item. If you stop sharing with someone at the time that they are viewing the item, they'll will receive an error message at the next save or refresh.

      NOTE:  If you see the Shared via workspace icon next to the permission level for a collaborator, that means that the collaborator has access to the item via a workspace. Clicking X will remove the collaborator's permissions from the workspace. For more information about sharing a workspace, see Workspace Sharing.

      In the Collaborators section, notice the Shared via Workspace icon or the Shared to...only icon next to the permission levels. These will help you distinguish how the item has been shared with the various collaborators.

Request Access From Owner

In some cases, you may attempt to open an item and will see a message similar to the following: "The item is not currently available - it may have been deleted or your permission may have been removed from it.."

Common reasons for this message include:

  • A sharing link was forwarded to you but your email address isn't shared to the item
  • You're logged into Smartsheet with an email address that is different from the one the email was sent to
  • The item owner or another collaborator has removed you from sharing
  • The item has since been deleted

If you'd like to access a sheet, report, dashboard, or workspace that isn't shared to your email address, click Request Access From Owner. This sends email to the owner with a link they can click to select a sharing permission level. Once the item or workspace owner has completed this process you’ll be able to access the item.