How to Add, Remove, and Correctly Assign Permissions for Users in Google Analytics

Understanding Google Analytics User Permissions at Account, Property and View Level

It happens quite often that when I'm reviewing analytics accounts for new clients I find that every user has either full permissions or not enough to be able to do some tasks, for example, to create filters.

Assigning the correct permissions in Google Analytics will ensure that:

• People can work without interruptions.
• Your data is protected from possible misconfigurations.
• Your users can see only the data concerning them, for example, only data from their city.

The different Google Analytics permissions and levels

If you are the owner and only user of the account you shouldn't worry much about this. But, if you have or need to add more users you should assign the right permissions at the correct level to avoid users lurking around other views/properties or permanent loss of data because someone messes up some setting.

There are 3 levels for permissions and 4 type of permissions for each level.

3 Permissions Levels

• Level 1: Account: Grants access to all Properties and Views in the Account.
• Level 2: Property: Grants access to all Views in the Property.
• Level 3: View: Grants access only to that View.

4 Permissions Types

Each level has the same 4 type of permissions, from lower to higher: 1. Read & Analyze, 2. Collaborate, 3. Edit, and 4. Manage Users.

Permission	Actions
1. Read & Analyze	See reports and manipulate data within them. (sort, use report filter,  use the second dimension...) Create/Edit/Share personal assets, like segments, dashboards, annotations or custom alerts. (Full list at the bottom of the post)
2. Collaborate	All Permissions from "Read & Analyze" Can collaborate on shared assets,
3. Edit	All Permissions from "Collaborate" and "Read & Analyze" View Level: Delete that view, Create/edit goals, Create/edit channel groupings, E-commerce setup, Create calculated metrics, Add/remove filters (existing filters ONLY). Property Level: All view level permissions, Delete that property, Create new views, Configure the "Referral Exclusion List", "Session settings",  "User-ID", Remarketing, "Organic Search Sources" Link Adwords, Search Console, and other Products, Create/edit custom dimensions and metrics, Account Level: All property level permissions, * Edit/Create Filters, Delete the account, Create new properties, See "Change History" log, See "Rubbish bin" (Trash can) and restore deleted elements. * Filters are a special case, although they are applied at a view level, to create and update filters you need edit permissions at account level. At a view/property level, you can only add/remove existing filters.
4. Manage Users	By itself doesn't grant any other permission, a user can manage other users without access to the data or assets in the account. Add and remove users, and edit their permissions.

How to Give/Change User Permissions in Google Analytics

To be able to assign and change permissions you must have 'Manage Users' rights, and you can only give permissions at the level you are or below. Account->Property->View

To change/assign permission:

How to Remove a User from Google Analytics

Even if you can add new users with 'Manage User' permissions at property and view level, you can only remove users if you have 'Manage Users' permissions at Account level.

To delete users from Analytics go to User Management at the top level and click on Delete next to the user email. You might want to tell the user that it has been removed because there is no automatic notification.

Example: A simple scenario

Assuming the following Analytics account structure:

With the following team:

Following the example you can assign the permissions as follows:

For more information on user management and permissions.

Extra: What are Personal Assets in Google Analytics

Personal assets are configurations created by any user with edit, collaborate, or read & analyze permissions. These assets are user-based and can be shared with other users in the account.