Edit

Share files and manage permissions

Applies to: Developer

SharePoint Embedded content inherits permissions from its container hierarchy. You can't break inheritance on arbitrary files or folders. Use additive permissions to extend access to a specific drive item without changing the baseline container membership.

Understand container roles

Container roles provide the inherited baseline access for a container. These roles are defined in container permissions:

Role Access summary
Reader Reads container properties and contents.
Writer Has Reader access, plus permission to create, update, and delete content and update applicable container properties.
Manager Has Writer access, plus permission to manage container membership.
Owner Has Manager access, plus permission to delete containers.

A user with inherited Reader access can receive additive edit access on one document. Removing that added permission doesn't remove the user's inherited container role.

Grant additive access

Grant additive access with Microsoft Graph drive item invite. Set sendInvitation to false. App-only permissions aren't supported for this operation.

POST https://graph.microsoft.com/v1.0/drives/{drive-id}/items/{item-id}/invite
Content-Type: application/json

{
  "recipients": [
    { "email": "user@contoso.com" }
  ],
  "message": "",
  "requireSignIn": true,
  "sendInvitation": false,
  "roles": ["write"]
}

Use roles: ["read"] for view access and roles: ["write"] for edit access. Don't grant additive permissions to the root folder of a container; add the user to an appropriate container role instead.

Retrieve and delete permissions

List permissions when you need to show direct sharing state on a file or folder.

GET https://graph.microsoft.com/v1.0/drives/{drive-id}/items/{item-id}/permissions
GET https://graph.microsoft.com/v1.0/drives/{drive-id}/items/{item-id}/permissions/{perm-id}

Delete only the additive permission on the drive item where it was originally added.

DELETE https://graph.microsoft.com/v1.0/drives/{drive-id}/items/{item-id}/permissions/{perm-id}

If the user still has access after deletion, inspect inherited container roles, Microsoft Entra groups, and any other additive permission on parent folders.

Configure who can share

SharePoint Embedded supports a role-based sharing model on the container type. The restrictive model allows only Owner and Manager members to add new permissions to files. The open model allows container members and guests with edit permissions to add new file permissions. By default, a container type uses the open model.

Application owner developers control this container type setting. Design your UI so the share action is disabled or hidden when the current user's role can't add permissions. For administrative configuration, see Create apps with PowerShell.

Respect tenant sharing policy

By default, SharePoint Embedded application sharing follows the consuming tenant's sharing configuration. If the tenant disables guest sharing, your app can't add guests to container roles or grant guest additive permissions.

A consuming tenant SharePoint Embedded Administrator can configure application-level sharing in administrative tools.

Report policy failures in user-facing language. Distinguish inherited container access from direct item access in permission panels so users understand why a person can still open a file.

Manage membership from the consuming tenant

Consuming-tenant administrators can manage container membership directly in administrative tools. These tools complement the app-driven Microsoft Graph permission APIs and are useful for administrative or break-glass membership changes.

Next steps

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