Default permissions quick reference for Azure DevOps

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To use Azure DevOps features, users must be added to a security group with the appropriate permissions and granted access to the web portal. Limitations to select features are based on the access level and security group to which a user is assigned. The Basic access level and higher supports full access to most Azure DevOps Services, except for Azure Test Plans. Stakeholder access level provides partial support to Azure Boards and Azure Pipelines. To learn more about access levels, see About access levels and Stakeholder access quick reference.

Assign users to a security group

The most common built-in security groups—Readers, Contributors, and Project Administrators— and team administrator role grant permissions to specific features.

In general, use the following guidance when assigning users to a security group:

• Add to the Contributors security group full-time workers who contribute to the code base or manage projects.
• Add to the Project Administrators security group users tasked with managing project resources. I
• Add to the Project Collection Administrators security group users tasked with managing organization or collection resources.

To learn more about administrative tasks see About user, team, project, and organization-level settings. For a complete reference of all built-in groups and permissions, see Permissions and groups. For information about access levels, see About access levels.

In the tables provided in this article, a ✔️ (checkmark) indicates that the corresponding access level or security group has access to a feature by default.

To assign or change an access level, see Add users and assign licenses. If you need to grant specific users select permissions, you can do so.

Work tracking

You can plan and track work from the web portal Work hub, and using Eclipse, Visual Studio, Excel, Project, and other clients.

Access to the following tasks are controlled by each user's access level or by permission assignments. Members of the Readers, Contributors, or Project Administrators group are assumed to have Basic access or greater.

General work item permissions

You can use work items to track anything you need to track. To learn more, see Understand how work items are used to track issues, tasks, and epics.

Boards

You use Boards to implement Kanban methods. Boards present work items as cards and support quick status updates through drag-and-drop.

Backlogs features access

Backlogs display work items as lists. A product backlog represents your project plan and a repository of all the information you need to track and share with your team. Portfolio backlogs allow you to group and organize your backlog into a hierarchy.

Sprints

You use sprint tools to implement Scrum methods. The Sprints set of tools provide filtered views of work items that a team has assigned to specific iteration paths or sprints.

Queries

Queries are filtered lists of work items based on criteria that you define by using a query editor. Adhoc searches are powered by a semantic search engine.

Code: Source control

You can connect to your code from the web portal Code hub, or using Xcode, Eclipse, IntelliJ, Android Studio, Visual Studio, or Visual Studio Code. Stakeholders for private projects have no access to Code.

Git

You can use Git repositories to host and collaborate on your source code. For an overview of code features and functions.

By default, the project-level Readers groups have read-only permissions.

TFVC

Team Foundation Version Control (TFVC) provides a centralized version control system to manage your source control.

Build and Release

You can define and manage your builds and releases from the web portal, Build and Release. For an overview of pipelines features and functions, see Continuous integration on any platform. From the web portal, you can set permissions for all or individual builds and releases. See Set build and release permissions.

Build

Release

Test

Users granted Visual Studio Enterprise or Advanced access level can define and manage manual tests from the web portal. For an overview of manual test features and functions, see Testing overview. You set several test permissions at the project level from Project Settings>Permissions.

Notifications, alerts, and team collaboration tools

To manage notifications, see Manage personal notifications and Manage team notifications.

Dashboards, charts, reports, and widgets

You can define and manage team dashboards from the web portal, Dashboards. For an overview of dashboard and chart features, see Dashboards. You set dashboard permissions at the team level from the team dashboard page.

Related articles

• Add users to a project or team
• Security and permission management tools
• Permissions and groups reference
• About access levels
• Web portal navigation
• Troubleshoot permissions