Google Shared Drives Overview
- David Walton (Unlicensed)
- Sam Kalagi
- Timothy Pinkham
Features
- Files remain after an employee leaves.
- All members of shared drives see the same content.
- Members access shared drives from within their own Google account, and do not need to log in to a departmental account.
- You can add external (non-Biola) users to a shared drive.
- Files within each shared drive are searchable.
- When a user is added to a Google group, they are automatically added to all of the shared drives that include that group.
How to Use Shared Drives
You'll see your shared drives in the left sidebar in Google Drive.
- Add Files and Folders - Learn how to create folders and add and open files.
- Organize Files - Find instructions for how to move, delete, restore, and search for files.
- Share and Collaborate - Share files with people who are not part of the designated team.
- Migrate Data to a Shared Drive - Follow these instructions to properly move files from My Drive to a shared drive.
By default, Shared Drives have 50 GB of shared storage space. Storage quotas can be increased on request based on need.
Membership and Permission Levels
Shared drive members have different roles that determine their permission to manage or edit the data in the shared drive. Anyone added to a shared drive as a member will see the shared drive in the left sidebar in Google Drive.
When a shared drive is created, the individual who created the shared drive will be given the Manager role. (See more about permission levels in shared drives in the chart below.) That individual will then have the ability to add other individuals or Google groups as members to the shared drive.
By default, the Content Manager role is given to new members added to a shared drive. We recommend only giving a few people the Manager role since it has the most permissions allowed in shared drives.
| Action | Manager | Content Manager | Contributor | Commenter | Viewer |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| View files and folders | X | X | X | X | X |
| Comment on files | X | X | X | X | |
| Make/approve/reject edits in files | X | X | X | ||
Create/upload files and folders | X | X | X | ||
| Share files with others outside the team | X | X | X | ||
| Share folders with others outside the team | X | ||||
| Restore files/folders from trash (up to 30 days) | X | X | X | ||
Move files/folders within a shared drive Note: Only IT administrators can migrate folders from from My Drive to a shared drive. | X | X | |||
| Add/remove members | X | ||||
| Move files/folders from one shared drive to another | X | ||||
| Rename shared drives | X | ||||
Delete shared drives Note: All files/folders must first be deleted from the shared drive. | X | ||||
| Modify shared drives settings | X | ||||
| Delete files/folders | X | X | |||
| Permanently delete files in the trash | X |
Notes:
Requests for access to files in shared drives: Requests for access to shared drive files go only to the file creator. If the file creator is no longer a member of a shared drive, the requests will be sent to the shared drive Managers.
Google account needed to become a member of a shared drive: You can share files and folders with visitors without Google accounts with visitor sharing. However, to be a member of a shared drive, the invited user must have an email address associated with a Google account.