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).

If you change a workspace Admin’s permission to Editor or Viewer, you’ll be the new owner of the Smartsheet items they own in that workspace. They’ll lose ownership rights over the sheets they created.

Refer to this table for examples of how a user’s access to a workspace, or a sheet in a workspace, could be affected.
 

When you do this
 		 The user will For example
Give a user higher workspace sharing permissions than they have on an individual item Receive the higher permission level on the 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 located. That person will have Admin-level permissions on the sheet.
Give a user lower workspace sharing permissions than they have on an individual item See no changes to their access to the item in the workspace A user is an Editor on a sheet. Then, you gave them Viewer access to the workspace where the sheet is located. The permission level they have in that sheet won’t change: they will still be an Editor on that specific 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 Admin Owner
View all workspace item contents  ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓
Add comments and attachments to rows  x ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓
Edit content in sheets and reports  x x ✓ ✓ ✓
Share the workspace or workspace items  x x

x
(unless specified)

 ✓ ✓
Rename or add workspace items  x x x ✓ ✓
Move workspace items in or out  x x x ✓ ✓
Delete workspace items  x x x ✓ ✓
Delete the workspace  x x x x ✓

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.