What happens when a files permissions are moved to a different location within the same drive?

This article does not describe moving content to or from shared drives. For details, see Move content to a shared drive.

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Before you begin
File permissions
Notifications when moving files
What should your organization do?
Related topics
Access control to shared drives
Share files and folders with non-members
How sharing a folder in a shared drive works
How link sharing in a shared drive works
Move files or folders into a shared drive
Move Google Sites files into shared drives
Move files out of shared drives
Remove access to files and folders in shared drives
What happens to the permissions of a file or folder that is moved within the same NTFS volume?
What happened to the permissions when you moved the folder to its new location?
What happens to the NTFS permissions applied to a folder when the folder is moved to a different folder in the same volume?
Which two permissions must you have in order to move a file or folder within a volume or between volumes?

Shared folders are different from shared drives. Moving an item from a shared folder may change who can see it and what permissions apply to the item. Consider using shared drives in your organization instead of simply sharing folders.

Note: If you move folders with a lot of files or subfolders, it might take some time to move all the items to the new location.

Before you begin

To move files or folders from a shared folder to My Drive:

Make sure to share the item with can Edit access.
Enable the Editors can change permissions and share setting for the file or folder. For instructions, go to Restrict sharing options on Drive files.

File permissions

Moving a file or folder from a shared folder into My Drive is a move and not a copy. The moved content is no longer in the shared folder. As a result:

Any permissions that the moved content inherited from the shared folder are removed. It inherits new permissions from the destination folder, in addition to other, explicitly set, permissions.
Users no longer see the moved files or folders in the shared folder.

Example

A user shared a file with users A and B.
Users A and B have access to the file, regardless of its location.
A user shared a file stored in folder X with users A and C.
Users A, B, and C have access to the file.
A file that is shared with user D is moved to folder Y.
Users A, B and D have access to the file, but user C no longer sees it in folder X and no longer has access to the file.

Notifications when moving files

When a user moves a file from a shared folder to My Drive, they see a warning before the move takes effect. This notification helps reduce the risk of a user accidentally moving files and removing access from other users.

If the user proceeds with the move, they see another message notifying them of the change, giving them a chance to undo it.

Users can also track activity for files and folders in My Drive to see the history of any changes, including notices when files are moved. So, if you share a folder from My Drive and someone moves an item out of the shared folder, you can see a notice in the activity history that the file was removed. The notice also tells you who moved the file and when.

What should your organization do?

If your organization doesn’t have an extensive shared folder structure, you might not need to do anything. However, organizations that use shared folders extensively might:

Consider using shared drives in your organization instead of sharing folders—Read What are shared drives?
Lock down your shared folders to Can view access only—If a user only has view access to a folder, they can’t remove or add files to it. This is the safest way to ensure someone doesn’t add or remove content from a shared folder. However, develop a business process to identify people with the can Edit sharing setting for a shared folder. Alternatively, you might want to educate your users to be careful about granting edit access to shared folders.
Add shortcuts instead of moving files—Train your users to add shortcuts wherever they want to access a file from another folder. Refer them to Create a shortcut for a file or folder and Find files & folders with Google Drive shortcuts.

Tip: If an item shows up in your My Drive root that previously wasn't there, read Find a file you don't think you deleted.

Share folders in Google Drive
View activity and file versions

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Shared drives are a great way for teams to collaborate and reference the same files in Google Drive. But it can be confusing trying to tell who can access a file or folder in a shared drive, what permissions they have for that item, and what to do if you want to change access.

For a complete list of what each access level allows, review the following table:

Permission	Manager	Content manager	Contributor	Commenter	Viewer
Can view files and folders	✔	✔	✔	✔	✔
Can comment on files	✔	✔	✔	✔
Can edit files	✔	✔	✔
Can create and add files, can create folders	✔	✔	✔
Can add and remove people and groups on specific files	✔	✔	✔
Can restore files from the Trash (up to 30 days)	✔	✔	✔
Can move files from My Drive to a shared drive	✔	✔	✔
Can move files and folders to the Trash	✔	✔
Can move files and folders within a shared drive	✔	✔
Can add or remove people and groups on specific folders in a shared drive	✔
Can move files from one shared drive to another shared drive	✔
Can add or remove members of a shared drive	✔
Can change member access levels	✔
Can permanently delete files in the Trash	✔
Can rename or change theme	✔
Can delete the shared drive	✔

Note: In Google Drive for desktop or files in the Chrome OS Files app, Contributor access gives only read access to files. For example, if you share an Excel file in a shared drive with a user who opens the file in Drive for desktop, the user can only view and not edit the file. To allow users to create, upload, and edit files in a shared drive in Drive for desktop and Chrome OS, give the user Content manager or Manager access to the folders in the shared drive.

Access control to shared drives

Members with Manager access and Google Workspace admins can control access to the items in a shared drive. In addition to setting up members, they can set restrictions on sharing as follows:

Prevent sharing files with people outside your organization
Prevent sharing files with non-members
Prevent members with Commenter or Viewer access from downloading, copying, or printing files

These restrictions override file and folder sharing (described in the next section). If a shared drive Manager changes a shared drive’s restriction settings, access privileges for files in the shared drive are updated.

For example, if a file in a shared drive is shared with an external person and then the shared drive settings are updated to prevent sharing with people outside your organization, that external user can’t access the file anymore. However, their permission on the file stays in place. If the setting is changed to allow sharing with external users again, any external users who the file was already shared with regain access to it.

Learn how to set sharing permissions

Unless prohibited by the sharing settings for the shared drives (described in the previous section), members with Manager, Content manager, or Contributor privileges can share files with people and groups, the same as other files in My Drive.

Only Managers can share folders with people and groups.

When someone requests access to a file in a shared drive, the request goes to the file creator if the creator has edit access to the file, even if the file creator isn’t a member of the shared drive. If the file creator no longer has edit permissions, the request goes to members of the shared drive with Manager privileges.

Access requests to folders in shared drives are sent to the Managers of the corresponding shared drive.

If you have Manager access to a shared drive, you can share a specific folder with other people and groups. Sharing folders instead of the entire shared drive can make sense when everyone needs view access, but only certain people need edit access. For example:

For a marketing department, you can make a shared drive accessible by all internal employees, with a specific folder for advertising materials that’s also shared with an external agency.
For a shared drive used to prepare for a specific event, you can give all members view access to all files, while providing each specific team with edit access to the documents relevant to their part of the event.

You can’t make the access to folders more restrictive than the shared drive itself. For example, a member with Commenter access can’t have only Viewer access to a folder in that shared drive. If access to a file or folder is made more restricted, then access to the shared drive is also restricted to the same degree.

When you share a folder in a shared drive with someone, they get a notification and can find the folder in the Shared with me section in Google Drive. They can organize shared folders in their My Drive using shortcuts.

In Google Drive for desktop, shared drives and folders shared directly with you don’t automatically appear unless you have Manager access. If you don't have Manager access, create shortcuts in your My Drive to the shared folders or shared drives. This way you can easily access them in Drive for desktop.

Unless prohibited by the sharing settings for the shared drives, you can share files and folders by link instead of directly with users and groups. However, link sharing can’t be less restrictive for files and folders in a folder already shared with a link. If you share a folder in a shared drive with the option Anyone in this group with this link can view, you can't share any file or folder inside with the option Anyone with the link. To work around this limitation, try the following workarounds:

First, share the item with the option Anyone with the link, then share the parent folder with the option Anyone in this group with this link can view.
Ask your admin to use the Drive API to share the child folder after the parent.

Learn more about sharing items in shared drives

Move files or folders into a shared drive

When a file or folder is moved into a shared drive, it keeps its sharing permissions, but access privileges may change if sharing settings for the shared drive are more restrictive. If access privileges on the file are more restrictive than the shared drive, they aren’t relaxed. For example, if a file owner sets their file to prevent downloading, copying, and printing, it stays like that after it's moved to a shared drive, even if those actions are allowed by the shared drive.

Moving files into a shared drive does not affect sharing permissions or user roles, such as Editor or Viewer, set directly on the file. However, file permissions inherited from the folder the file was in aren’t copied. For example, if someone had a folder in My Drive shared with them, but not a file, if files from that folder are moved to a shared drive that person can lose access unless they’re a member of the shared drive.

When you move a file you created into a shared drive, you’re still the creator but no longer the owner. If the shared drive's access permissions change, it’s possible for you to lose access to a file you created.

Moving folders into a shared drive can create broad changes to content access. Therefore, only users who have Manager access to the original and target locations can move folders into or between shared drives. If you move a folder to a shared drive, all of its files are visible to all members of the shared drive, including previously hidden files. Hidden files occur in My Drive when you share a folder with someone but remove access to a specific file in that folder.

Move Google Sites files into shared drives

Moving sites into a shared drive doesn’t change the visibility of a published site, but it can change who has access to the site file:

If the original owner of the site is in the same organization as the shared drive, the Sites file associated with the site is still accessible to users who it was previously shared with.
If the original owner of the site is in a different organization than the shared drive, the site file is not accessible to people who aren’t members of the shared drive, even if it was previously shared with them.

Learn more about moving files

Move files out of shared drives

If you have Manager access to a shared drive, you can move files and folders out of shared drive to My Drive or another shared drive. To move files from a shared drive to another, you need Contributor, Content manager, or Manager access in the destination shared drive. To move folders from one shared drive to another, you need Manager access in the destination shared drive.

Just like moving files into shared drives, access privileges on files and folders are reassessed when they’re moved out of a shared drive. If a file or folder is moved out of a shared drive to My Drive within the same organization:

The shared drive’s sharing settings no longer apply and the file’s original sharing settings take effect. Some users might gain or lose access. For example, you have a file in the Sales team shared drive, and all members of the Sales team have Viewer access to the shared drive and the file. The document was also directly shared with five Sales team members to give them Editor access. If the file is moved out of the Sales team shared drive, most of the Sales team loses their access, but the five people it was directly shared with still have Editor access.
File-level restrictions stay in place unless specifically changed or removed from the file. For example, if a file owner sets their file to prevent downloading, copying, and printing, it stays like that after it's moved out of a shared drive, even if those actions are allowed by the new location.

Remove access to files and folders in shared drives

Just like in My Drive, you can remove someone’s access to a file or folder in a shared drive that’s directly shared with them. (For details, go to Unshare files or folders.) However, all members of the shared drive can still at least view the file or folder. To remove access for shared drive members, you need to move the file or folder out of the shared drive, which requires Manager access.

What happens to the permissions of a file or folder that is moved within the same NTFS volume?

When you move a folder or file within an NTFS partition, the folder or file retains its original permissions. When you move a folder or file to a different NTFS partition, the folder or file inherits the permissions of the destination folder.

What happened to the permissions when you moved the folder to its new location?

File permissions Any permissions that the moved content inherited from the shared folder are removed. It inherits new permissions from the destination folder, in addition to other, explicitly set, permissions.

What happens to the NTFS permissions applied to a folder when the folder is moved to a different folder in the same volume?

Moving Files and Folders When moving a folder or file between different NTFS partitions, the file or folder will inherit the destination folder permissions.

Which two permissions must you have in order to move a file or folder within a volume or between volumes?

The file or folder retains its original NTFS permissions. You must have the “Write” permission set up for the destination folder to move files and folders into that folder. You must have the “Modify” permission set up for the source file or folder.