How do I add a user to Google Search Console?

Q: How do I add a user to Google Search Console?

Owners add users under Settings, Users and permissions. Here are the steps, what Owner, Full and Restricted access allow, and the per-property limits.

Only an owner can add users. Open the property, go to Settings > Users and permissions, choose Add user, enter the person's Google account email, choose Full or Restricted permission, or make them an owner, and save. The person needs a Google account, an email group will not work, and each property can have up to 100 users who are not owners.

Step by step

Open the property in Search Console.
Go to Settings > Users and permissions. Only owners see this page.
Choose Add user.
Enter the email address of the person's Google account.
Pick the permission level and save.

Users are added per property. If someone needs access to several properties, add them to each, or make them an owner of a property that contains the others.

Which permission to give

Level	Can	Cannot
Owner	Everything, including managing users and linking Google Analytics	Nothing is withheld
Full	See all data, submit sitemaps, inspect URLs, request removals, validate fixes	Add or remove users
Restricted	See most data	Take actions such as submitting sitemaps or removals

For an agency or a developer who fixes issues, Full is usually right. For someone who only reads reports, Restricted. Owners come in two kinds with identical rights: a verified owner proved ownership with their own token (an HTML file, a meta tag, a DNS record), while a delegated owner was granted ownership by an existing owner without a token.

Limits and error messages

100 non-owners (Full, Restricted and associates) per property.
500 owners in total, verified plus delegated, though more verified owners can always be added.
"This user may only be added as 'Owner'" means the person already owns a property that contains this one, so a lower level would be a demotion.

Removing someone safely

Open Settings > Users and permissions, use the menu next to the person and choose Remove access. A delegated owner or user loses access straight away. A verified owner also needs their verification token removed from the site, otherwise they can verify again; Search Console lists the tokens when you remove them, and the Ownership history shows every change.

Keep at least two verified owners on every important property. If all verified owners go, everyone else loses access after a grace period, even though Google keeps collecting data.

For what each level can see in more detail, see Search Console permissions and owner vs user.

How AutoPSEO helps

Colleagues and clients do not need a Search Console seat to see your reports. In AutoPSEO you invite them to your workspace with Read access (view dashboards, reports and exports) or Full access (also create and edit annotations, tags, content groups, topic clusters, saved filters and experiments), and you can limit an invitation to chosen properties. Starter includes one invited user, Pro three and Business ten. A shared report link shows a snapshot of a report to anyone with the link, without an account. See sharing and team access.

Sources: Google's Managing owners, users and permissions help.