What is the difference between My Drive and shared drives?
The difference is ownership. Every file in My Drive belongs to the person who created or uploaded it, even if they share it with the whole company. Every file in a shared drive belongs to the organization, and access comes from membership in that shared drive.
That one difference drives everything else. If someone leaves and their account is deleted, their My Drive files go with it unless an admin transfers ownership first. Files in a shared drive stay exactly where they are, with the same access for everyone else.
Shared drive features vary by edition, so confirm what your plan includes before you design your folder structure. Our Google Workspace licensing page covers the editions.
When should a file live in a shared drive?
A file belongs in a shared drive when the team needs it more than any one person does. A simple test: if this person left tomorrow, would someone else need this file? If the answer is yes, it belongs in a shared drive.
Good candidates include:
- Client and project folders
- Finance, payroll, and HR records, with tight membership
- Policies, templates, and brand assets
- Anything that used to live on a shared network drive or a SharePoint site
My Drive still has a job. It suits drafts, personal notes, and early work that is not ready for the team. When a draft becomes a team document, move it to the right shared drive.
How do permissions work in a shared drive?
Permissions come from membership roles set at the shared drive level. Each member gets one role: Manager, Content manager, Contributor, Commenter, or Viewer. Managers control membership and settings. Content managers can add, edit, move, and delete files. Contributors can add and edit files. Commenters and Viewers can open files, and Commenters can also leave comments.
Because roles apply to the whole shared drive, design drives around access, not around topics. If finance and operations need different access, give them separate shared drives rather than one drive full of locked-down folders. Drive-level access is far easier to manage over time.
Admins also control whether files in shared drives can be shared outside the organization. Our guide to Google Drive sharing settings that protect your data explains the options.
What happens to someone's files when they leave?
Files in shared drives stay put. Files in the person's My Drive need attention. Before you delete a departing user, an admin can transfer ownership of their Drive files to another person from the Admin console. Skipping that step is an easy way to lose work.
This is the strongest reason to put team files in shared drives from day one. The full set of steps is in offboarding employees in Google Workspace.
How should you set up shared drives during a migration?
Plan your shared drives before you move files, not after. Map each old location, such as a network share, a OneDrive folder, or a SharePoint site, to a shared drive or to a person's My Drive. Then decide who belongs to each shared drive and in which role.
Keep the number of shared drives manageable and the names clear. A name like Finance or Client Projects tells people where to look. Our guides on SharePoint to Google shared drives and OneDrive to Google Drive migration cover the mapping in detail. The Google Workspace adoption and training guide covers how to teach the split to your team.
Next step
If you want help designing shared drives and teaching your team where files go, see our support and training options or contact us.
Frequently asked questions
Can I move a folder from My Drive into a shared drive?
Usually, yes, if you have permission to add files to that shared drive. Admins can restrict who moves content into shared drives. After the move, the shared drive's membership controls access, so check that the right people can still open the files.
Do I need Drive for desktop?
Not always. Many people work entirely in the browser. Drive for desktop helps people who open files in desktop apps or want Drive to appear as a folder on their computer. It can stream files on demand or keep local copies.
