Manage permissions

Set up permission groups, assign members, set organization and project permissions, and provision service accounts for system integrations. For the permission model, see the Access control overview.

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Create custom permission groups

Build groups with specific permissions:

1. Go to Settings > Permission groups.
2. Click Create permission group.
3. Enter a name and description.
4. Set the group’s permissions inline. Configure organization-level permissions for the Organization and All projects columns, plus project-specific and object-level permissions in the Project-specific permissions section.
5. Click Create.

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Manage access to a permission group

Control who can administer a permission group itself: who can view it, edit its permissions, rename it, or grant others access to it. This is separate from the permissions the group grants its members. For the distinction, see Permissions vs. Manage access.

1. Go to Settings > Permission groups.
2. Find the group in the permission groups list, then click the more options menu () on its row.
3. Select Manage access.
4. In the Object permissions dialog, select the tab for who you want to grant access to: Permission groups, Members, or Service accounts.
5. Search for the user, group, or service account, then click the edit icon next to it.
6. Select the permissions to grant on the group:
   • Read: View the group and its permissions.
   • Update: Edit the group’s name, description, and permissions.
   • Delete: Delete the group.
   • Manage access: Grant and revoke access to the group (super-user ability).
7. Click Save.

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Set organization permissions

Grant organization-level permissions to custom groups:

1. Go to Settings > Permission groups.
2. Find the group in the permission groups list, then click Permissions on its row.
3. Select organization-level permissions:
   • Manage settings: Change organization configuration.
   • Manage members: Invite users.
   • Remove members: Remove users (organizations must have at least one member).
   • Manage access: Grant and revoke permissions (super-user ability).
   • Read audit logs: Read organization audit log entries.
4. Select permissions for all projects:
   • Read: View all projects and their resources.
   • Create: Create projects, and create experiments, logs, and datasets in all projects.
   • Update: Modify existing resources in all projects.
   • Delete: Remove resources from all projects.
   • Manage access: Grant permissions on all projects.
5. (Optional) Select project-specific and object-level permissions in the Project-specific permissions section. This section lets you set project-specific and object-level permissions directly from the permission group dialog, without going to each project’s Project permissions settings.
6. Click Save.

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Set project permissions

Specify a group’s permissions for a particular project and its objects:

1. Create a custom permission group.
2. In your project, go to Settings > Project permissions.
3. Search for your group.
4. Click the pencil icon next to the group.
5. Select project permissions:
   • Read: View project and its resources.
   • Create: Create experiments, logs, datasets.
   • Update: Modify existing resources.
   • Delete: Remove resources.
   • Manage access: Grant permissions on this project.
6. Select object-level permissions for experiments, datasets, logs, prompts, playgrounds, functions, scorers, and classifiers:
   • Create: Create the object.
   • Read: View the object.
   • Update: Modify the object.
   • Delete: Remove the object.
   • Manage access: Grant permissions on this object.
7. Click Save.

Users must have Read permission on a project to see it in the UI.

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Manage project groups

A project group is a named collection of projects. Grant a permission group access to the project group once, and every project in the group inherits that access. Without project groups, giving a team the same access across 100 projects means creating and maintaining 100 separate project-level grants. For how project-group access works, see How permissions work. Use a project group when the same team, role, or service account needs the same access across multiple projects. You create a group, grant access to it, and choose its projects in a single sheet:

1. Go to Settings > Project groups.
2. Click Create project group.
3. Enter a Name and an optional Description.
4. In the Permissions section, choose which permission groups, members, and service accounts can access the group. Select the Permission groups, Members, or Service accounts tab, click the edit icon () next to a group, member, or service account, select the permissions to grant, then click Apply. You can also grant access later from the permission group itself. See Set project group permissions.
5. In the Projects section, select the projects to include. A project can belong to more than one project group.
6. Click Create project group.

To change a group’s name, description, permissions, or projects, click its row in the project groups list, or click the edit icon () on the row. Make your changes, then click Save. Membership is edited in this sheet, not from the Projects column in the list. Adding or removing a project requires Manage access on that project, so you can only change membership for projects you administer. Removing a project from a group revokes only the access that group granted. Permissions the project has from other sources stay in effect. To remove a group, click the delete icon () on its row.

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Set project group permissions

Grant a permission group access to a project group from the permission group side. To grant the same access while creating the project group, use the Permissions section described in Manage project groups.

1. Go to Settings > Permission groups.
2. Find the group in the permission groups list, then click Permissions on its row.
3. In the Project and project-group permissions section, find Project groups and click Project group.
4. Select a project group, then set its permissions:
   • Read: View the projects in the group and their resources.
   • Create: Create experiments, logs, and datasets in those projects.
   • Update: Modify existing resources in those projects.
   • Delete: Remove resources from those projects.
   • Manage access: Grant permissions on those projects.
5. (Optional) Set object-level permissions for experiments, datasets, logs, prompts, playgrounds, functions, scorers, and classifiers. These work the same as they do at the project level, and apply to those objects in every project in the group. See Set project permissions.
6. Click Save.

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Manage group membership

Users can belong to multiple permission groups, either directly or through a group that is itself a member of another group. Their effective permissions are the union of all group permissions. To change the groups a specific user belongs to:

1. Go to Settings > Members.
2. Find the member, then click Manage permissions on their row.
3. Select Edit permission groups.
4. The dialog lists the groups you can manage under Member of, Member of via inheritance (groups the user joins through another group’s membership), and Not a member of.
5. To add: Click + next to a group under Not a member of.
6. To remove: Click the x next to a group under Member of.

To view and edit all members of a specific group:

1. Go to Settings > Permission groups.
2. Find the group in the permission groups list.
3. Click Members.
4. To add: Search for users and click +.
5. To remove: Click the x next to a user’s name.

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Use service accounts

A service account is an identity for system integrations, authenticated with a service token that you use like an API key. Unlike a personal API key, which inherits the full permissions of the user who created it, a service account is a separate identity whose permissions come from its own permission group memberships and isn’t tied to any individual. Use service accounts to:

• Authenticate integrations and automations that shouldn’t depend on one person’s account. A service account keeps working even after team members leave.
• Grant least-privilege, project-scoped access. Because its permissions come from its own groups, you can scope a service account more restrictively than your own access, for example to a single project or a subset of projects. A personal API key can’t be scoped below your own permissions.
• Separate environments. Create distinct tokens for development, staging, and production, each assigned to a permission group scoped to the right projects.

To create a service account:

1. Go to Settings > Service tokens.
2. Click + Service token.
3. Enter a service account name.
4. Assign permission groups or grant specific permissions. To scope the account to specific projects, assign it to a permission group limited to those projects.
5. Click Create.
6. Copy and save the auto-generated service token somewhere safe and accessible. For security reasons, you will not be able to view it again. If you lose the service token, you must create a new one.
7. Use the token like an API key in SDK or API calls.

Only organization owners can edit a service account’s permission groups after creation:

1. Go to Settings > Service tokens.
2. Find the service account, then click the more options menu () on its card.
3. Select Edit permission groups.
4. The dialog lists the groups you can manage under Member of, Member of via inheritance, and Not a member of.
5. To add: Click + next to a group under Not a member of.
6. To remove: Click the x next to a group under Member of.

The service account’s Edit direct permissions dialog shows the project permissions it inherits from its permission groups, labeled “Inherited from [group name]”. Inherited permissions can’t be edited there. To change them, update the service account’s group membership instead.

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Programmatic access control

To automate the creation of permission groups and their access control rules, use the Braintrust API. See the API reference for groups and permissions.

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Next steps

• Review the permissions reference to understand what each permission grants.
• Set up automations with service accounts.
• API reference for programmatic access control.