> ## Documentation Index
> Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://docs.bowerlabs.ai/llms.txt
> Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further.

# Invite team members

> Add paid members or free guests to your workspace — Bower hands you a link, you share it however you like.

Add colleagues to your workspace so they can capture, search, and collaborate on shared notes and collections. Bower invites are a **link you copy and share** — we don't email the invitee for you. That's deliberate: it keeps each invite traceable to a real conversation, lets you pick the channel (email, Slack, WhatsApp, in-person), and avoids triggering inbox-security filters on outreach mail.

## How to invite someone

<Steps>
  <Step title="Open the invite dialog">
    Click your avatar in the bottom-left and choose **Invite member**, or go to **Settings → Members → Invite member**.
  </Step>

  <Step title="Enter the invitee's email and pick a role">
    The email is what the invite is bound to — the recipient must sign in or sign up with that exact address to accept. Pick **Guest** (free, read-only) or **Paid member** (Admin or Member).
  </Step>

  <Step title="Copy the link Bower generates">
    Bower creates a unique invite link and shows it on the next screen. The link is auto-selected so **Cmd+C** / **Ctrl+C** just works. Share it however you like.
  </Step>

  <Step title="The invitee accepts">
    They open the link, sign in (or create an account) with the invited email, and land in your workspace.
  </Step>
</Steps>

The link is the bearer token — anyone holding it can attempt to accept. But Bower enforces a **strict email match** at accept time: the verified account email must match the address the invite was created for. If it doesn't, the accept is refused with a clear "this invitation is for a different email address" message, and the invite stays open for the right person. A stale or forwarded link can't be redeemed by anyone else.

Invite links expire after **30 days**. If a link expires, revoke it from **Settings → Members** and generate a new one.

## Roles

Bower has four workspace roles. Three are **paid seats** that count toward your subscription; the fourth is a **free guest** with a per-tier cap.

| Role       | Billing class | What they can do                                                                                                                                                                                             |
| ---------- | ------------- | ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ |
| **Owner**  | Paid seat     | Everything an Admin can do, plus manage billing and transfer ownership. Every workspace has at least one Owner — the person who created it. Ownership can be transferred to another Admin.                   |
| **Admin**  | Paid seat     | Everything a Member can do, plus invite and remove members, change member roles, edit workspace settings, and manage [workspace instructions](/ai-and-search/workspace-instructions). Cannot manage billing. |
| **Member** | Paid seat     | Capture, view, edit, and search all notes, protocols, and collections in the workspace. The default for invited collaborators.                                                                               |
| **Guest**  | Free          | Read-only across the workspace, no seat cost. Capped by plan. Right for external collaborators, supervisors, and stakeholders who need visibility but don't warrant a paid seat.                             |

A workspace must always have at least one Admin or Owner — Bower will block the last admin/owner from being downgraded or removed.

### Guest caps per plan

Guests don't consume a paid seat, but they're capped by your plan:

| Plan       | Guest allowance        |
| ---------- | ---------------------- |
| Starter    | 1 guest                |
| Individual | 4 guests               |
| Team       | 4 guests per paid seat |

When you hit the cap, the **Guest** option in the invite dialog is disabled with a prompt to upgrade or free up a slot.

### Paid ↔ Guest is "remove and re-invite", not in-place

Changing a guest into a paid member (or a paid member back to a guest) is a **billing-class change**, not a role flip. There's no in-place toggle for it — admins must **remove** the user and **re-invite** them in the new class. This is deliberate:

* Promoting a guest to paid is a Stripe-billable event that needs an explicit seat purchase, including a prorated-charge preview.
* Demoting a paid member to guest is a cancellation that should be a conscious decision (and may need a seat release).

Within the paid class, you can change roles freely (Member ↔ Admin, with Owner promotions reserved for the existing Owner).

## Pending invites

Open **Settings → Members** to see invites that haven't been accepted yet. From there you can:

* **Copy the link again** if the invitee lost it.
* **Revoke** a pending invite. For a guest, the slot is freed immediately. For a pending paid seat, the seat is released and Stripe issues a prorated credit on your next invoice.

## What each role can see

Everyone in a workspace — including Guests — can see content that's set to **Anyone in this workspace** privacy mode (the default). Two layers of access control then filter what individual people see beyond that:

* **Workspace role** — Guests are read-only across the board; Members, Admins, and Owners can edit at their role's level.
* **Per-entity privacy** — any note or collection can be restricted to **Only specific people** or **Just me**. Restricted content is hidden from anyone not on the list, regardless of workspace role.

See [Workspace permissions overview](/workspaces-and-account/permissions-overview) for how the two layers combine, and [Sharing notes and collections](/organisation/sharing-artifacts) for the Share dialog.

Members and Guests cannot see notes or collections in your other workspaces — workspaces are fully isolated from each other.

## Changing a member's role

Admins and Owners can change a paid member's role from **Settings → Members**. Click the role next to a member's name and pick **Owner**, **Admin**, or **Member**. (Owner is only available if you yourself are the Owner.)

Guest is not in this menu — see the [Paid ↔ Guest](#paid--guest-is-remove-and-re-invite-not-in-place) note above.

A workspace must always have at least one Admin or Owner. If a change would leave the workspace without one, Bower blocks it.

## Removing a member

To remove someone, go to **Settings → Members**, find their name, and choose **Remove**. Their notes remain in the workspace — only their access is revoked. Only Admins and Owners can remove members.

Removing a paid member drops your seat count for the next billing cycle. Removing a guest frees their guest slot immediately.
