Inspect a user's permissions

This feature is offered with Confluence Cloud Premium.

If you’re not sure why a user doesn’t have (or has) permission to view, edit, or comment on a piece of content, you can inspect their permissions from that content. You’ll get a report showing at which level of the content, space, and product hierarchy they’re being denied (or allowed) permissions. For example, the item may allow the user permissions to view and edit it, but the space denies them edit permissions. The report helps you pinpoint where you need to adjust the user’s permissions.

Learn about permissions and restrictions in Confluence.

Permissions you can inspect

You can inspect the following permissions for a user:

• Can view

• Can view and edit

• Can view and comment

How to inspect a user’s permissions

You can inspect permissions on any content you're viewing. 

1. Browse to the content you want to inspect permissions on. 

2. Click the restrictions (lock) icon at the top of the page. The Restrictions dialog appears. 

3. Click the Inspect permissions link.

4. Type the name of the user whose permissions you want to view.

5. Choose the permission you want to inspect: Can view, Can view and edit, or Can view and comment.

   A report appears and shows whether the user has the permission at each level of the content, space, and product hierarchy.

How to read the report

When you inspect the permissions on a piece of content, you'll get a report that looks like this:

The report displays one of the following results for each level of the content, space, and product hierarchy:

• Allowed: The user is allowed the permission at this level

• Denied: The user is denied the permission at this level

• Inherited: (Appears for pages and live docs only) The content inherits a restriction from a parent or the space. Check its parent items and space to see if they deny the user the permission.

• Irrelevant: (Appears for pages and live docs only) The content has a restriction denying the permission, but it’s not relevant to the content you’re inspecting. You can ignore these rows.

To further investigate the issue:

1. Click a row to expand it, view more information, or take one of the following actions:

   • Click the View page, View space permissions, or View global permissions link (depending on which level you’re at). From there, you can troubleshoot the issue.

   • Click the Contact content owner, Contact space admins, or Contact Confluence admins link (again, depending on the level you’re at) and send them an email asking for help.

2. When you’re finished viewing the report, click OK.