# SharePoint document library permissions report

Get full visibility into who can access each document library in your tenant and tighten control over sensitive content.

SharePoint Manager Plus offers a [wide range of permission reports](https://www.manageengine.com/sharepoint-management-reporting/sharepoint-reporting-tool.html?utm_source=spmp-features&utm_medium=document-library-permissions-report&utm_content=in-content-links) as part of its SharePoint reporting capabilities. These reports help administrators monitor and manage SharePoint more efficiently than native admin centers. One such report in SharePoint Manager Plus is the Document Library Permissions report.

## Why you need the Document Library Permissions report

Document libraries are where the bulk of your organization's working content resides. Contracts, financial records, HR files, and project documents all sit inside libraries that quietly accumulate permission changes, broken inheritance, and ad hoc sharing links over time. Without a clear view of who has access to what, sensitive content can drift outside its intended audience long before anyone notices.

SharePoint permission reviews are no longer only a routine administrative task. Microsoft reports that customers face over [600 million cybercriminal and nation-state attacks](https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/security/security-insider/threat-landscape/microsoft-digital-defense-report-2024) daily. Also, when a list, library, or folder contains [more than 100,000 items](https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/office365/servicedescriptions/sharepoint-online-service-description/sharepoint-online-limits), administrators cannot break or re-inherit permissions on that object, making early detection and review of inheritance changes especially important in large repositories.

Native SharePoint tools require administrators to open individual Manage Access dialog boxes or write PowerShell scripts to pull document library permissions in bulk. In a tenant with hundreds of sites and thousands of libraries, this approach becomes difficult to scale.

The Document Library Permissions report gives you complete visibility, helping you act on access risks instead of reacting to incidents:

- **Detect broken permission inheritance:** Identify libraries where custom permissions override site-level inheritance and verify that each exception is intentional and documented.
- [Enforce least-privilege access](https://www.manageengine.com/sharepoint-management-reporting/sharepoint-management-tool.html?utm_source=spmp-features&utm_medium=document-library-permissions-report&utm_content=in-content-links): Review the permission levels assigned to each user and group, then strip back excessive rights like Full Control or Edit access where Read access would suffice.
- **Spot orphaned and external user access:** Surface guest accounts, sharing links, and stale group memberships that continue to hold access to libraries containing regulated or confidential data.
- [Resolve group memberships in one place](https://www.manageengine.com/sharepoint-management-reporting/sharepoint-group-management-tool.html?utm_source=spmp-features&utm_medium=document-library-permissions-report&utm_content=in-content-links): Expand SharePoint groups to see the actual users behind each assignment so you can trace effective permissions without jumping between consoles.
- [Maintain audit readiness](https://www.manageengine.com/sharepoint-management-reporting/sharepoint-auditing-and-monitoring-tool.html?utm_source=spmp-features&utm_medium=document-library-permissions-report&utm_content=in-content-links): Keep a timestamped record of who was granted access, when permissions changed, and which libraries hold unique permissions so you're ready for internal reviews and external audits.

## What is the Document Library Permissions report in SharePoint Manager Plus?

The Document Library Permissions report provides details about who has access to each document library across your SharePoint Online environment and what level of access they hold. It captures the user or group assigned to a library, the type of principal, the permission level granted, whether the permission is inherited or unique, and when the assignment was created or last changed.

![The Document Library Permissions report in SharePoint Manager Plus.](https://www.manageengine.com/sharepoint-management-reporting/images/sharepoint-document-library-permissions-report.png)

## Compliance standards supported by the Document Library Permissions report

Organizations across industries are subject to information security standards such as ISO/IEC 27001, NIST SP 800-53, HIPAA, SOX, and the GDPR. Many of these frameworks require organizations to document, review, and restrict access to sensitive data.

The Document Library Permissions report supports these efforts by giving you a tenant-wide view of who can access specific libraries in SharePoint. This visibility helps you demonstrate that access rights are regularly reviewed, that least-privilege access is being enforced, and that permissions on sensitive content are aligned with internal policies.

## What does the Document Library Permissions report show?

Using SharePoint Manager Plus, you can filter the Document Library Permissions report with the following fields:

- **Farm:** Select the specific tenant or farm where you want to analyze document library permissions.
- **Site:** Filter by a specific SharePoint site or site collection to narrow down the report to libraries within that scope.

The Document Library Permissions report displays the following details for every library:

| Attribute | Description |
|---|---|
| **Site URL** | The web address (URL) used to access the SharePoint site that hosts the library |
| **Object Name** | The name of the document library to which the permission is assigned |
| **Location** | The full path of the library or item within the site, indicating where the object sits in the SharePoint hierarchy |
| **User/Group Name** | The name of the user or SharePoint group that has been granted permission on the object |
| **Principal Type** | Indicates whether the principal holding the permission is a user, a security group, a SharePoint group, or an external user |
| **Group Members** | Lists the individual members resolved from a SharePoint group or security group so admins can see the effective users behind each assignment |
| **Permissions** | The permission level granted to the user or group, such as Full Control, Edit, Contribute, Read, or a custom permission level |
| **Is Inherited** | Indicates whether the permission is inherited from a parent object or is uniquely assigned to the library, signaling broken inheritance |
| **Modified On** | The exact date and timestamp when the permission assignment was last modified |
| **Created Date** | The exact date and timestamp when the permission assignment was first created |

## Native SharePoint admin portals and PowerShell vs. SharePoint Manager Plus

In the SharePoint admin center, administrators can open individual sites and use the Manage Access dialog box to view permissions for each library one at a time. For tenant-wide visibility, they often turn to Data access governance reports or PowerShell scripts using the SharePoint Online Management Shell and PnP PowerShell modules.

PowerShell closes some gaps by letting you script bulk exports of library permissions, but it still demands deep scripting expertise, careful handling of throttling and authentication, and ongoing maintenance every time Microsoft updates its modules. It also lacks the saveable filters, scheduled delivery, and visual dashboards that SharePoint Manager Plus provides out of the box.

## Benefits of SharePoint Manager Plus' Document Library Permissions report over SharePoint reports

With SharePoint Manager Plus, the Document Library Permissions report gets the power and granularity of PowerShell with the convenience of an admin center.

| Capability | SharePoint admin center limitations | PowerShell limitations | SharePoint Manager Plus advantage |
|---|---|---|---|
| **Report accessibility** | ❌  Manual filtering is required every time | ❌  Script execution is required for every run | ✅  Get one-click access to categorized reports |
| **Custom reports** | ❌ | ❌ | ✅  Create custom reports by saving granular, attribute-based conditional filters |
| **Report exports** | ✅  Reports can be exported only in CSV or JSON format | ✅  It requires additional scripting to format and export data | ✅  Export reports in CSV, HTML, PDF, and XLSX formats |
| **Emailing reports to admins** | ❌ | ❌ | ✅  Send report emails to stakeholders and admins in favorable formats |
| **Automated report generation** | ❌  It requires technical scripting or separate complex add-ons | ❌  It requires Task Scheduler or Azure Automation | ✅  Schedule multiple reports to be generated, filtered, emailed, and exported between defined periods automatically |

For a more detailed comparison, check out this page on [how to check SharePoint permissions](https://www.manageengine.com/sharepoint-management-reporting/kb/how-to-check-sharepoint-permissions.html?utm_source=spmp-features&utm_medium=document-library-permissions-report&utm_content=in-content-links).

## Features that enhance the Document Library Permissions report

SharePoint Manager Plus provides several built-in tools to help you automate reviews, share findings, and act on permission risks surfaced by the Document Library Permissions report:

- **Exportable reports:** Download the report in multiple formats, including CSV, PDF, HTML, or XLSX, for sharing with security teams and audit reviewers or maintaining offline records for compliance.
- **Automated report generation:** Set the Document Library Permissions report to be generated at specific intervals (daily, weekly, or monthly) to conduct permission reviews regularly without fatigue.
- [SharePoint alerts for unauthorized permission changes](https://www.manageengine.com/sharepoint-management-reporting/sharepoint-email-alerts-tool.html?utm_source=spmp-features&utm_medium=document-library-permissions-report&utm_content=in-content-links): Configure real-time alerts to notify admins when permissions are added or modified on sensitive libraries, when external users are granted access, or when inheritance is broken on a library that should remain locked down.
- [Bulk permission management](https://www.manageengine.com/sharepoint-management-reporting/sharepoint-permission-management-tool.html?utm_source=spmp-features&utm_medium=document-library-permissions-report&utm_content=in-content-links): Grant, remove, or copy permissions across multiple libraries and users directly from the SharePoint Manager Plus interface, enabling you to act on findings without writing PowerShell scripts or opening each library one by one.
- **Custom report filters:** Save granular filters, such as libraries with unique permissions, external users, or specific permission levels, and reuse them across audits and reviews without rebuilding the queries each time.

## Reports that complement the Document Library Permissions report

If you are auditing access governance across your SharePoint environment, SharePoint Manager Plus provides several other reports that complement the data found in the Document Library Permissions report:

- [List Permissions report](https://www.manageengine.com/sharepoint-management-reporting/list-permissions-report.html?utm_source=spmp-features&utm_medium=document-library-permissions-report&utm_content=in-content-links): Surface permissions at the list and library level, helping you pair list-level access with the document library view from this report.
- [File Permissions report](https://www.manageengine.com/sharepoint-management-reporting/file-permissions-report.html?utm_source=spmp-features&utm_medium=document-library-permissions-report&utm_content=in-content-links): See access on individual files within libraries, which is useful for drilling down to specific documents with access that diverges from their parent library.
- [Folder Permissions report](https://www.manageengine.com/sharepoint-management-reporting/folder-permissions-report.html?utm_source=spmp-features&utm_medium=document-library-permissions-report&utm_content=in-content-links): View access on folders inside libraries, helping you trace whether library-level access cascades cleanly or breaks at the folder layer.
- [External and Sharing reports](https://www.manageengine.com/sharepoint-management-reporting/sharepoint-permission-reporting-tool.html#external-sharing-access): Identify libraries and items shared with guest users or via anonymous links, complementing the library-level view with sharing link context.
- [SharePoint Groups Permission report](https://www.manageengine.com/sharepoint-management-reporting/sharepoint-groups-permission-report.html?utm_source=spmp-features&utm_medium=document-library-permissions-report&utm_content=in-content-links): Expand SharePoint groups to view their permissions and members, helping you verify the effective access behind each group-based library permission.
- [Permission change audit reports](https://www.manageengine.com/sharepoint-management-reporting/sharepoint-permission-auditing-tool.html?utm_source=spmp-features&utm_medium=document-library-permissions-report&utm_content=in-content-links): Track every permission grant, modification, and removal across libraries, giving you a chronological trail to pair with the current state permissions report.

## Other features of SharePoint Manager Plus

- [SharePoint management](https://www.manageengine.com/sharepoint-management-reporting/sharepoint-management-tool.html?utm_source=spmp-kb&utm_medium=document-library-permissions-report&utm_content=other-features): Grant, remove, or copy SharePoint permissions and manage group members in bulk without relying on complex scripts, simplifying your SharePoint administration.
- [SharePoint reporting](https://www.manageengine.com/sharepoint-management-reporting/sharepoint-reporting-tool.html?utm_source=spmp-kb&utm_medium=document-library-permissions-report&utm_content=other-features): Access over 140 prebuilt and custom reports for SharePoint, including on permissions, site usage, the content inventory, and security insights—all from a centralized dashboard.
- [SharePoint auditing](https://www.manageengine.com/sharepoint-management-reporting/sharepoint-auditing-and-monitoring-tool.html?utm_source=spmp-kb&utm_medium=document-library-permissions-report&utm_content=other-features): Maintain a comprehensive, searchable audit trail of all activities across your SharePoint environment, including user actions, permission changes, and content modifications.
- [SharePoint alerting](https://www.manageengine.com/sharepoint-management-reporting/sharepoint-email-alerts-tool.html?utm_source=spmp-kb&utm_medium=document-library-permissions-report&utm_content=other-features): Get real-time alerts on critical events such as permission changes, suspicious user activities, site access anomalies, and policy violations.
- [Delegated administration](https://www.manageengine.com/sharepoint-management-reporting/sharepoint-helpdesk-delegation-tool.html?utm_source=spmp-kb&utm_medium=document-library-permissions-report&utm_content=other-features): Empower help desk technicians with granular, role-based access for performing specific SharePoint administrative tasks, without elevating native privileges.
- [SharePoint migration](https://www.manageengine.com/sharepoint-management-reporting/sharepoint-migration-tool.html?utm_source=spmp-kb&utm_medium=document-library-permissions-report&utm_content=other-features): Simplify SharePoint migration by enabling seamless content and permission migration across sites and tenants, with minimal downtime and full visibility into the migration progress.