Share a workspace

Applies to

Smartsheet
  • Pro
  • Business
  • Enterprise

For more information about plan types and included capabilities, see the Smartsheet Plans page.

Capabilities

Who can use this capability

To share/unshare a workspace or to change the sharing permissions for collaborators, you must be the Owner or be shared to it with Admin or Editor - Can Share Sharing Permission Levels. The Owner or Admin can modify any collaborator’s sharing permissions, Editor - Can Share can not modify the Owner or Admins.

Find out if this capability is included in Smartsheet Regions or Smartsheet Gov.

When you share a workspace with a user, they’ll have access to all the items in that workspace.

If your sharing needs change, you can remove people from the workspace or change their sharing permission levels.

The people you share a workspace with can’t access any of your other Smartsheet items unless you choose to share them. To share an item in a workspace without sharing the entire workspace, share an individual sheet in a workspace.

Get started with workspace sharing

To open a workspace

  1. On the left Navigation Bar, select Browse Browse icon.

  2. To open a workspace, select Workspace then select the name of the workspace you want to share. 

When you’re in the workspace, check these two settings:

  • Workspace Shared To: Use this to see who has access to the workspace.
  • Sharing column: Check how a workspace item is shared. If an item is shared individually (or with other collaborators in the workspace), you'll see the icon, as in the image below.

Item shared individually and in workspace

To see which users or groups have access to the item, hover over Icon for checking list of collaborators on a Smartsheet item .

To share the workspace

  1. In the upper-right corner of the workspace, select Share.
  2. In the Workspace Sharing form, fill in the following fields:
    • Invite Collaborators: Type the email addresses of the user(s) or group(s) you need to share the workspace with. Or select the Select Contacts icon to add your contacts as collaborators.
    • Permissions: Select a permission level for each collaborator. 
  3. In the Invite Details section, customize the message.
  4. Select Share Workspace.
  5. If you see a dialog confirming if you still want to send the notification, select Notify anyway. Notify anyway
    • To remove people from the mailing list:
      1. Select Back.
      2. Clear the Notify people checkbox.

The contacts you selected will have access to the workspace, and receive a notification, if you chose to send one.

Stop sharing or change permission levels

To remove a collaborator or change their permission level

  1. In the upper-right area of the workspace, select Share. 
  2. Open the Collaborators section of the Workspace Sharing form.
  3. Hover over the collaborator you'd like to remove or change.
  4. Remove a collaborator or change their permission level by using either of these elements:
    • Remove from Workspace Sharing icon: Select this icon to remove the collaborator from the workspace. 
      If you stop sharing with a collaborator at the time that they are viewing a sheet in the workspace, the collaborator will receive an error message at the next save or refresh.

    • Permissions dropdown list: Select a new permission level from the dropdown list. 

Workspace sharing permissions

A user’s (or a group’s) access to a workspace and its items will depend on the permission level you grant them. For this reason, it's a good practice to share a workspace using the lowest level permissions (e.g., Viewer, Commenter).

Refer to this table to learn how a user’s access to a workspace, or a sheet in a workspace, will be affected.
 

When you do this
 		 The user will For example
Give an Admin-level or higher workspace permission level to a user who has an Editor-level or lower sharing permissions in a Smartsheet item that lives in that workspace  Have an Admin-level or higher workspace sharing permission to the Smartsheet item located in that workspace You gave someone Editor-level access to a sheet, and then made them an Admin in the workspace where the sheet is. That person will have Admin-level sharing permissions on the sheet.
Give a user a lower workspace sharing permission  See no changes to their access to an item in the workspace
 		 A user is an Editor in a sheet in a workspace. Then, you gave them a Viewer access to that workspace. The permission level they have in that sheet won’t change. They’ll still be an Editor on that sheet. 

You can't give another collaborator a higher access level than you have yourself. For example, if you’re an Editor, you can't promote another Editor to Admin.

Task Viewer Commenter Editor - cannot share Editor - can share Admin Owner
View all contents of the items in the workspace Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes
Edit sheets and add documents and comments to sheets in the workspace No Yes (Comments only) Yes Yes Yes Yes
Share the workspace or its contents with others No No No Yes Yes Yes
Modify the column layout in sheets No No No No Yes Yes
Add, edit, rename, or delete sheets in the workspace No No No No Yes Yes
Move items to the workspace No No No No Yes Yes
Delete items from the workspace No No No No Yes Yes
Delete the workspace No No No No No Yes

An Admin can make themselves the workspace owner by removing the current workspace owner. This is the only way to change ownership of a workspace. 

For details on permission levels and how they impact Smartsheet items (sheets, dashboards, and so on), see the Sharing Permission Levels article.

You can make workspace sharing easier to manage with Smartsheet Contact Groups. Note that if you share a workspace with a Smartsheet Contact group, all group members will inherit the selected permission level.