Having so much data on multiple spreadsheets can become stressful and overwhelming when trying to organize it all – until you learn that you can share those documents with other people so they can see them as well. This article will describe some misconceptions about what specific sharing settings do in Google Sheets, how to change them, and how to make your data more secure.
What is sharing in Google Sheets
Sharing in Google Sheets allows multiple people to view the same spreadsheet at the same time. This is good when someone needs help understanding their spreadsheet and changes can easily be made as more people are able to build on what they have created. Sharing also allows a blocked sheet to be seen by others who have been given access. Finally, sharing makes it easy to share a link that is accessibly throughout Google Drive. Suppose you want to share a Google Sheet document with one person or several people. To do this, go to the file sharing page for the particular spreadsheet you would like to be shared and hit Share sheet. You will have an option at this point where you both share the spreadsheet version and allow the person who has been invited back to access the board they cannot edit.
What is ownership and how can it be achieved
Sharing in a spreadsheet is the same as owning or having access to that spreadsheet. Anyone who shares in the spreadsheet has the ability to make changes, add content, and update even if it is locked. They also have full control of what worksheet is being edited by making sure that [your ID] is not shared with anyone else’s id. There is one way to remove a user from the sharing for that tab. You cannot remove the owner or change the ownership. Deleting will remove the owner, but does not remove others who also share that tab and will reset licensing settings.
You can also make changes to a sharing policy at any time to assign access based on additional users. This can limit total access to one person versus everyone, by requiring email address and password details (and are tied) to allow changes via Excel
How do I share a sheet with multiple users?
Sometimes you might want to work in a spreadsheet with multiple people, but you don’t want everyone editing the same sheet at the same time. One way to share sheets is by deleting rows from one board and then copying them into another. This method is helpful for instances when you’re trying to create budgets or something similar. It would be more difficult to share a CSV file, since CSV file sharing software is feature limited.
Keep in mind that copying and pasting shared spreadsheets work only when multiple people are working in the same copy of the spreadsheet (locked or unlocked) at the same time. Duplicating a locked spreadsheet locks you out during editing. If you login as two different users (one user can logout their own login, for example), but want both copies of the spreadsheet to be editable at
How do I add security to the sheet?
If you do not want anyone else to view or edit your sheet, then enable “share” on the sheet. This will allow you to share it with specific people in order to see what they are doing and also allows them to make changes. You will need to give each person access by adding their email address to the sheet that is only visible if they log onto Google and open the sheet. Each person’s email address will appear at the bottom left hand corner of your sheet.
Are there features I do not see that I would like?
Please feel free to email me and let me know how you think we could improve your experience with my SheetsandIves Sharing Sheet.
Accessing sheets for other users
Accessing sheets for everybody? Sharing of sheets is giving the users access to a sheet, thereby enabling them to make edits. The spreadsheet can be edited in realtime by anyone who has access to the sheet.
Sharing Sheet:
If two user have one sheet, then one user with full rights could copy it and give it out to as many users as needed without having to realize that there would be an issue with other user rights. Each new receiving user will have the same working conditions each other user has. For example, if someone with full rights makes an edit and starts off editing their workbook cell B2 and then some other users are given sharing rights on the same sheet, their change should reflect any changes made by other users in cells B2 or C2 since they now share that row but not cells A2 or B2 unlike original owner of said row. Additionally, new users that are given shared rights to a sheet best adopt the properties of the one user with full rights. (It would’nt make sense for those newly granted access to have sheet property A3 be protected so have it be blank and allow to change only when checking in.) Changing values that are blocked by anti-virus or product protection software should mostly result in an error message and probably “stop edit” functionality on other sharing users.
Conclusion
“Sharing” means making your spreadsheet visible to other users in the same workbook. You can share a range, a single cell or an entire sheet. This gives them exactly what you have; nothing more and nothing less, with the same formatting, permissions, etc. The users need only to request it, via a function called Office.Share. Iframe-mode reports still work though in all scenarios: range sharing, sheet sharing, and even partial files (ie. cells). The main difference is that they may only be opened locally using the same user account you first use to open your file; ie. not over “domain” connections (what ShareX does).
Disclaimer: Any graphics presented herein are made for demonstration purposes and have not been researched or