Applies to
- Business
- Enterprise
Capabilities
Who can use this capability
The Owner and shared collaborators with a license and Admin access to a sheet, report, or dashboard can use the publish feature.
System Admins on Business and Enterprise accounts can limit or disable publishing for all users on the account. For information about how to do this, see Global Account Settings.
Publish a Sheet, Report, or Dashboard
Publishing a sheet, report, or dashboard generates a unique URL that anyone can access without logging in to Smartsheet and iframe code that you can embed within the source code of a website to display the sheet or report.
Published items are dynamic: that is, rather than containing values that are fixed at publish time, they'll display current data, You can stop publishing at any time. When you do this, the published version of the sheet, report, or dashboard will no longer be accessible.
CAUTION: Using this feature has the potential to expose sensitive data outside of your company. To share a link in a more limited way, use the Access Control options (described below) or copy and share the link that's available in the the Sheet Properties, Report Properties, or Dashboard Properties window. The link available from the properties window is secure and only accessible to shared collaborators.
When publishing a Smartsheet item, you can use the Access Control to limit access to the item.
- Available to anyone with the link.
- This will create a link that will allow anyone with access to view or edit the content on your sheet.
- Only available to users in the owner’s account.
- This will create a secure link that will require the user to log in to Smartsheet before being able to view the content on your sheet. Only users who have been added to your Smartsheet account will be able to view the content.
- This does not include external users who have been shared as a collaborator to your Smartsheet item or to a workspace where your item may be stored. For more information, see Sharing.
Enterprise and up customers have an additional Access Control option:
- Only available to users who are shared to the item.
- This will create a secure link that will require the user to log in to Smartsheet before being able to view the content on your sheet. Only users who have been shared to the item will be able to access it, others will see an error page.
Users in your Smartsheet account include licensed or non-licensed users that would be listed as Active users in your System Administrator’s Admin Center. For more information, see User Management.
Save your item before you publish it; the last saved view will be the published view.
Publish a Sheet
- Click Publish on the right Feature Bar.
NOTE: The Publish option won't be available if you are part of a Business or Enterprise account and the System Admin has disabled publishing (for more information, see the Global Account Settings). - Click on the slider under one or more of the publish options and set it to ON.
When you set the slider to ON, a link to the sheet is created and a window is displayed that allows you to tune the publish experience further.
The different options for publishing a sheet are:
- Read Only - HTML: This option is best if you want a lightweight, quick-loading view of your sheet data. It provides a simple, read-only view of the sheet data, without the option to switch to Calendar or Gantt view. Attachments and comments aren’t available, and indented rows can't be collapsed/expanded.
- Read Only - Full: This option has a richer user interface than Read Only - HTML, enabling viewers to open row attachments and comments as well as collapse or expand hierarchies.
Use the Access Control options to control whether the link will be accessible by anyone or only by licensed and unlicensed users in the sheet owner's account.
Use the Publish Settings options to set the default view to Grid (Gantt) or Calendar. Visitors to the published sheet can switch between views as they like. - Edit by Anyone: This option enables anyone to open the sheet and make changes as if they have Editor-level sharing permissions to it.
Use the Access Control options to control whether the link will be accessible by anyone or only by users in the sheet owner's account.
Use the Publish Settings options to set the default view to Grid (Gantt), Card, or Calendar. Visitors to the published sheet can switch between views as they like. - iCal (Calendar): This option enables anyone to add dates from the sheet to their non-Smartsheet calendar. For more information, see Publishing a Smartsheet Calendar to iCal.
- To share the URL and embed code for the sheet, use the keyboard to copy the URL or code from the window and paste it into an email message or web page. (For tips about copying and pasting in Smartsheet, see Using Copy & Paste.)
Publish a Report
Use publish to display a report in a view-only format that allows viewers to open row attachments and comments, highlight changes, and print the report.
To publish a report:
- Click Publish on the right Feature Bar.
NOTE: The Publish option won't be available if you are part of a Business or Enterprise account and the System Admin has disabled publishing (for more information, see the Global Account Settings). - Click on the slider to turn publishing ON. The Read Only - Full - Publish Links window appears.
- Choose the attributes that you want:
- Use the Access Control options to control whether the link will be accessible by anyone or only by users in the sheet owner's account.
- Use the Publish Settings options to set the default view to Grid (Gantt), Calendar, or Card View. Visitors to the published sheet can switch between views as they like.
- To share the URL and embed code for the sheet, use the keyboard to copy the URL or code from the window and paste it into an email message or web page. (For tips about copying and pasting in Smartsheet, see Using Copy & Paste.)
The published report will display the same results as the person who published it sees in Smartsheet.
The published report will display the same results that the publisher sees when viewing the report directly. If the publisher's sharing access is removed from the report, publishing will be turned off and the report owner will be notified.
Publish a Dashboard
The publish option displays a dashboard in a read-only format. Viewers of the published dashboard will be able to use shortcuts in the dashboard as well as use any widget interactions set up for the dashboard.
Keep the following in mind before you publish a dashboard:
- The Publish option won't be available if you are part of a Business or Enterprise account and the System Admin has disabled publishing from the Global Account Settings.
- A published dashboard will automatically refresh once every 10 minutes. This behavior cannot be customized or disabled.
To publish a dashboard:
- In the top left of the dashboard, click File > Publish.
- Click the slider to turn publishing ON.
The Read Only - Full - Publish Links window appears.
- Use the Access Control options to control whether the link will be accessible by anyone or only by users in the dashboard owner's account.
- To share the URL and embed code for the sheet, use the keyboard to copy the URL or code from the window and paste it into an email message or web page. (For tips about copying and pasting in Smartsheet, see Using Copy & Paste.)
For more information about dashboard widget types and widget interactions, see Widget Types for Smartsheet Dashboards.
Stop Publish or Modify Publish Options
To stop publishing or to change the publish options:
- For sheets and reports, click Publish on the right Feature Bar. For dashboards, click File > Publish.
- Do either of the following:
- To turn off publish and discontinue access to the sheet from the published links or iframe code, click the slider under each enabled publish option to set it to OFF.
- To make a change, click Get Link next to the publish option you want to change.
- To turn off publish and discontinue access to the sheet from the published links or iframe code, click the slider under each enabled publish option to set it to OFF.