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This version of GitHub Enterprise was discontinued on 2022-06-03. No patch releases will be made, even for critical security issues. For better performance, improved security, and new features, upgrade to the latest version of GitHub Enterprise. For help with the upgrade, contact GitHub Enterprise support.

Repository roles for an organization

You can customize access to each repository in your organization by assigning granular roles, giving people access to the features and tasks they need.

Repository roles for organizations

You can give organization members, outside collaborators, and teams of people different levels of access to repositories owned by an organization by assigning them to roles. Choose the role that best fits each person or team's function in your project without giving people more access to the project than they need.

From least access to most access, the roles for an organization repository are:

  • Read: Recommended for non-code contributors who want to view or discuss your project
  • Triage: Recommended for contributors who need to proactively manage issues and pull requests without write access
  • Write: Recommended for contributors who actively push to your project
  • Maintain: Recommended for project managers who need to manage the repository without access to sensitive or destructive actions
  • Admin: Recommended for people who need full access to the project, including sensitive and destructive actions like managing security or deleting a repository

Organization owners can set base permissions that apply to all members of an organization when accessing any of the organization's repositories. For more information, see "Setting base permissions for an organization."

Organization owners can also choose to further limit access to certain settings and actions across the organization. For more information on options for specific settings, see "Managing organization settings."

In addition to managing organization-level settings, organization owners have admin access to every repository owned by the organization. For more information, see "Roles in an organization."

Warning: When someone adds a deploy key to a repository, any user who has the private key can read from or write to the repository (depending on the key settings), even if they're later removed from the organization.

Permissions for each role

Note: The roles required to use security features are listed in "Access requirements for security features" below.

Repository actionReadTriageWriteMaintainAdmin
Manage individual, team, and outside collaborator access to the repositoryX
Pull from the person or team's assigned repositoriesXXXXX
Fork the person or team's assigned repositoriesXXXXX
Edit and delete their own commentsXXXXX
Open issuesXXXXX
Close issues they opened themselvesXXXXX
Reopen issues they closed themselvesXXXXX
Have an issue assigned to themXXXXX
Send pull requests from forks of the team's assigned repositoriesXXXXX
Submit reviews on pull requestsXXXXX
View published releasesXXXXX
Edit wikis in public repositoriesXXXXX
Edit wikis in private repositoriesXXX
Apply/dismiss labelsXXXX
Create, edit, delete labelsXXX
Close, reopen, and assign all issues and pull requestsXXXX
Enable and disable auto-merge on a pull requestXXX
Apply milestonesXXXX
Mark duplicate issues and pull requestsXXXX
Request pull request reviewsXXXX
Merge a pull requestXXX
Push to (write) the person or team's assigned repositoriesXXX
Edit and delete anyone's comments on commits, pull requests, and issuesXXX
Hide anyone's commentsXXX
Lock conversationsXXX
Transfer issues (see "Transferring an issue to another repository" for details)XXX
Act as a designated code owner for a repositoryXXX
Mark a draft pull request as ready for reviewXXX
Convert a pull request to a draftXXX
Submit reviews that affect a pull request's mergeabilityXXX
Apply suggested changes to pull requestsXXX
Create status checksXXX
Create and edit releasesXXX
View draft releasesXXX
Edit a repository's descriptionXX
Manage topicsXX
Enable wikis and restrict wiki editorsXX
Enable project boardsXX
Configure pull request mergesXX
Configure a publishing source for GitHub PagesXX
Manage branch protection rulesX
Push to protected branchesXX
Merge pull requests on protected branches, even if there are no approving reviewsX
Create and edit repository social cardsXX
Delete an issue (see "Deleting an issue")X
Define code owners for a repositoryX
Add a repository to a team (see "Managing team access to an organization repository" for details)X
Manage outside collaborator access to a repositoryX
Change a repository's visibilityX
Make a repository a template (see "Creating a template repository")X
Change a repository's settingsX
Manage team and collaborator access to the repositoryX
Edit the repository's default branchX
Rename the repository's default branch (see "Renaming a branch")X
Rename a branch other than the repository's default branch (see "Renaming a branch")XXX
Manage webhooks and deploy keysX
Manage the forking policy for a repositoryX
Transfer repositories into the organizationX
Delete or transfer repositories out of the organizationX
Archive repositoriesX
Create autolink references to external resources, like Jira or Zendesk (see "Configuring autolinks to reference external resources")X

Access requirements for security features

In this section, you can find the access required for security features, such as Advanced Security features.

Repository actionReadTriageWriteMaintainAdmin
Receive Dependabot alerts for insecure dependencies in a repositoryX
Dismiss Dependabot alertsX
Designate additional people or teams to receive security alertsX
Manage access to GitHub Advanced Security features (see "Managing security and analysis settings for your organization")X
View code scanning alerts on pull requestsXXXXX
List, dismiss, and delete code scanning alertsXXX
View secret scanning alerts in a repositoryX[1]X[1]X
Resolve, revoke, or re-open secret scanning alertsX[1]X[1]X
Designate additional people or teams to receive secret scanning alerts in repositoriesX

[1] Repository writers and maintainers can only see alert information for their own commits.

Further reading