Beli Löw
In this article, you'll learn how to invite guests to Notion and understand the differences between guests and members. We'll show you step by step how to efficiently integrate external people into your Notion workspace in a cost-effective way.
What is the difference between a member and a guest in Notion?
Inviting guests in Notion is a practical way to grant temporary or limited access to specific pages or databases without incurring additional license costs. This is particularly useful for collaborating with external partners, clients, or temporary team members. Or you simply want to save on license costs 🤫.
Notion members are typically employees and team members who need access to Notion content.
The key benefits of the guest feature are:
- Cost-efficient: No additional license fees for guest users
- Granular access control: Access can be restricted to specific pages
- Flexible permissions: Various access levels from "Can view" to "Full access"
- Security: Guests don't have access to the entire workspace
People who only need access to specific areas or when you want to save on license costs. Disadvantage: Granting permissions for individual pages can be time-consuming.
The key benefits of members are
- Full workspace access: Members can access all shared areas
- Workspace administration: Ability to manage workspace settings (depending on role)
- Template creation: Can create templates for the entire workspace
- Access to all teamspaces: Can join all available teamspaces
- Advanced collaboration: Can share content themselves and invite new members
- Personal private space where notes and personal content can be stored
Typically your employees, people who actively work in the workspace and need more than just access to specific content.
The difference from full members is that guests only have access to content explicitly shared with them and cannot access the entire workspace.
Inviting Guests to Notion
You can easily invite guests to specific pages or databases. Note that permissions are granted hierarchically. When you invite someone to a page, they automatically have access to all subpages (you can manually override this).
- Click on
Sharein the top right - Enter email addresses (multiple addresses can be added simultaneously)
- Select
Permission level(usually "Can edit" or "Can edit content" for a database)
- Select
Skip for nowin the next step - The person will receive an invitation via email.
When you invite users as guests, you don't pay any additional license fees. Therefore, always select Skip for now. If you choose "Upgrade to member," the person will be added to the workspace and automatically gain access to the contents of the default teamspace.
What does the invited person need to do?
The invited person receives an invitation that they must accept.
If the person already has a Notion account, the new page or workspace will automatically appear in their Notion overview.
If the person does not have an account yet, they will be prompted to create one.
Once they click the link, a verification code will be sent, which must be entered so that the account can be created in the next step.
Now all that's needed is to set up a name and password. It's best to upload a profile photo 📸 right away too. And with that, the guests are ready to go.
Summary
The guest feature in Notion is a flexible and cost-effective solution for collaborating with external users. It provides precise control over which content is shared while ensuring workspace security. The setup process is straightforward and quick to implement, with special attention needed to choose the "Skip for now" option to avoid incurring additional license costs.
The most important difference between guests and members lies in the access level: While members enjoy full workspace access and advanced features, guests only have access to specifically shared areas. This makes the guest feature ideal for temporary collaboration or for individuals who only need access to certain content.
FAQ
Beli Löw
Founder, Senior Notion Consultant
Beli is an IT project manager, tool enthusiast, entrepreneur and has organized his whole life with Notion. His news sources are release notes from tools. There is (almost) no feature or shortcut that he does not know.
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