Sharing in Drive lets a colleague open a document without you sending it by email. You choose who gets access and exactly what they are allowed to do with it. This article walks you through sharing one document with one or more people from your company, and how to change or remove their access later.
Before you start
Only the owner of a document can share it. If you are not the owner, the Share button does not appear, and the sharing window explains that only the document owner can share the document. You can share only with people who are members of the company you have open in Drive.
Share a document
- Open My Documents or Company Documents from the left menu and find the document.
- Select the document so its details panel opens on the side.
- Select Share in the row of buttons at the top of the panel.
- In the Share document window, stay on the Share Document tab. Under Add people, type a name or an email address in the box that says "Search by name or email…".
- Pick the person from the matches. They are added to a list headed "Ready to share with" followed by the number of people.
- Repeat to add more people. If nobody matches, the box tells you that no member of this company matches what you typed.
- Next to each name, open the permission list and choose what the person may do (see below).
- Select the button at the bottom, which reads Share with 1 person or Share with 3 people depending on your list.
When it works, a green message confirms who the document was shared with and the permission each person received. If you added someone by mistake, select Remove beside their name before you share.
Choose the right permission
- Can view lets the person open and read the document.
- Can view & download also lets them save a copy. This is the starting choice for everyone you add.
- Can edit also lets them upload a new version of the document.
Pick the lowest level that lets the person do their job. You can always raise it later.
Change or remove someone's access
- Select the document, then select Share again.
- Open the Permissions tab. It lists everyone who already has access. The owner is marked Owner.
- To change what a person can do, pick a different level from the list beside their name.
- To stop sharing with them, select Revoke and confirm the question that appears.
If sharing only partly works
When you share with several people at once, Drive tries each one. If some succeed and others fail, you see a message that begins "Shared with the rest, but not with", followed by each person's name and the reason. Only the people who failed stay in your list, so you can fix the problem and select the button again without adding everyone twice.
How people find what you shared
The people you share with will see the document under Shared With Me in their left menu.