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Tutorial: Set up your organization

DETAILS: Tier: Free, Premium, Ultimate Offering: Self-managed

In GitLab, you set up and manage your company's GitLab organization by:

  • Creating groups, subgroups, and projects.
  • Assigning group members different roles in these groups and projects.

In this tutorial, you are the IT administrator of a small software company. This company uses GitLab and is divided into marketing, sales, and development divisions.

You have already set up the marketing and sales organizations. In this tutorial, you will set up the software development organization. This organization has the following permanent employees:

  • One IT administrator: You.
  • One product manager: Alex Smith.
  • One engineering manager: Blake Wang.
  • Three software developers: Charlie Devi, Devon Ivanov, Evan Kim.
  • One UX designer: Frankie Ali.
  • One technical writer: Grayson Garcia.

The organization also has a contractor content strategist, Hunter Silva.

You're going to create:

  1. The software development organization.
  2. Groups, subgroups, and projects to manage work.
  3. Users to add to the groups and projects and assign roles to those users.
  4. A project in the organization for a specific piece of work, and add users to that project.

Before you begin

  • Make sure you have administrator access to your self-managed GitLab instance.

Create the organization parent group and subgroups

You first create a group, Development, to serve as the parent group for the whole software development organization.

  1. Open your self-managed GitLab instance.
  2. On the left sidebar, at the top, select Create new ({plus}) and New group.
  3. Select Create group.
  4. In Group name, enter Development.
  5. Enter development-group for the group in Group URL. You see a message saying "Group path is available". The group URL is used for the namespace.
  6. For visibility level, make the group Private. This means any subgroups of this group must be private as well.
  7. Personalize your GitLab experience by answering the following questions:
    • For Role, select Development Team Lead. This role is different to the roles that affect member permissions.
    • For Who will be using this group?, select My company or team.
    • For What will you use this group for?, select I want to store my code.
  8. Do not invite any GitLab members or other users to join the group yet.
  9. Select Create group.

In GitLab, a namespace provides a place to organize your related projects.

You have created the parent group for your organization. Next you will create subgroups.

Create the organization subgroups

For this tutorial, we assume that Development is organized into the following working areas:

  • Product Management.
  • Engineering.
  • User Experience.
    • UX Design.
    • Technical Writing.

You will now create subgroups to reflect this organization structure.

Subgroups and projects must have visibility settings that are at least as restrictive as the visibility setting of their parent group. For example, you cannot have a private parent group and a public subgroup.

  1. On the left sidebar, select Search or go to.
  2. Select View all my groups.
  3. Select Development. You should see an Owner label next to the group name as you have the Owner role.
  4. On the parent group's overview page, in the upper-right corner, select New subgroup.
  5. In Subgroup name, enter Product Management.
  6. The Subgroup slug is automatically completed with product-management. Do not change this field.
  7. For Visibility level, you can only select Private because the parent group, Development, is also private.
  8. Select Create subgroup.
  9. Repeat for the following subgroups:
    • Engineering.
    • User Experience.
      • UX Design.
      • Technical Writing.

UX Design and Technical Writing are subgroups nested in the User Experience subgroup.

You have now created the subgroups for your organization. Next you will create users for the organization.

Create the users for your organization

You will now manually create the users for your organization. These are test users. To create the first test user, Alex Smith:

  1. On the left sidebar, at the bottom, select Admin area.
  2. Select Overview > Users.
  3. Select New user.
  4. Complete the required fields:
    • Name: Alex Smith
    • Username: alexsmith
    • Email: alexsmith@example.com
    • Leave all other fields as is.
  5. Select Create user.

For real users, a reset link is sent to the user's email, and that user is forced to set their password on first sign in. However, as this user is a test user with a fake email, you must set the user's password without using the email confirmation.

Set the test user's password

  1. Select the user.
  2. Select Edit.
  3. Complete the password and password confirmation fields.
  4. Select Save changes.

You have created the first test user. Now repeat this for the other users:

Name Username Email
Blake Wang blakewang blakewang@example.com
Charlie Devi charliedevi charliedevi@example.com
Devon Ivanov devonivanov devonivanov@example.com
Evan Kim evankim evankim@example.com
Frankie Ali frankieali frankieali@example.com
Grayson Garcia graysongarcia graysongarcia@example.com
Hunter Silva huntersilva huntersilva@example.com

You have created the users for your organization. Next you will add these users to the different groups and subgroups.

Add users to the group and subgroups

You can give users access to all projects in a group by adding them to that group.

First, you will add all the users to the parent group, Development.

  1. On the left sidebar, select Search or go to and find the Development group.

  2. Select Manage > Members.

  3. Select Invite members.

  4. Complete the fields for the product manager, Alex Smith.

    • Give Alex the Owner role. The role applies to all subgroups projects in the group.
    • Leave Access expiration date blank.

  5. Select Invite.

  6. Repeat this process for the following users:

    User Role Access expiration date
    Blake Wang Maintainer Leave blank
    Charlie Devi Developer Leave blank
    Devon Ivanov Developer Leave blank
    Evan Kim Developer Leave blank
    Frankie Ali Reporter Leave blank
    Grayson Garcia Reporter Leave blank
    Hunter Silva Guest 2025-12-31

    You can invite multiple users at the same time if they have the same role and access expiration date.

Confirm that everything is set up correctly

On the Group Members page of the Development group and all subgroups, check the membership of these groups.

The Source is the origin of the user's membership of this group. The added members are direct members because you added them directly to the group.

The Max role is the added members' highest level of access they are allowed to have in this group. You can use the dropdown list in this column to change the added members' roles in this group.

All the users you have added as parent group members are also members of all the subgroups with the same role.

Filter a subgroup on membership type

You can filter a subgroup to show which users are direct members of that subgroup, and which members have inherited membership of that subgroup from the parent group.

  1. On the left sidebar, select Search or go to and find the Development group.
  2. Select the User Experience subgroup.
  3. On the left sidebar, select Subgroup information > Members.
  4. On the Members page, select the Filter members field.
  5. Select Membership, then select Inherited, and press Return.

You now only see the User Experience subgroup members that have inherited membership of that subgroup.

You want each user to only be a member of the subgroup that is associated with their role in your organization. You decide to remove the users from the groups and subgroups.

Remove users from the groups and subgroups

You cannot remove the members from the subgroups directly. You can only remove them from the parent group.

Go back to the parent group and remove everyone except Alex Smith:

  1. On the left sidebar, select Search or go to and find the parent group.
  2. Select Manage > Members.
  3. On the member row you want to remove, select the vertical ellipsis ({ellipsis_v}) and then select Remove member.
  4. In the Remove member confirmation box, select the Also remove direct user membership from subgroups and projects checkbox.
  5. Select Remove member.

You now have one member only in the parent group and subgroups, and that member has the Owner role.

Next you will add users directly to the subgroups.

Add users to the subgroups

You will now add users directly to the different subgroups.

Add users to the Product Management subgroup

  1. On the left sidebar, select Search or go to and find the Development group.
  2. Select the Product Management subgroup.
  3. On the left sidebar, select Subgroup information > Members.

Excluding you, Alex is the only member of this subgroup and is a direct member, which is correct. However, you believe they should have the Maintainer role instead of the Owner role.

Change user role in the subgroup

You cannot change their role directly on the members page. To change their role in the subgroup, invite them to the subgroup as a Maintainer.

  1. Select Invite members.
  2. Complete the fields for the product manager, Alex Smith.
    • Give Alex the Maintainer role.
    • Leave Access expiration date blank.
  3. Select Invite.

You will see the following message:

The following member couldn't be invited
Review the invite errors and try again:
- Alex Smith: Access level should be greater than or equal to Owner inherited membership from group Development

You cannot give Alex a subgroup role with an access level less than their role in the subgroup's parent group, as they have an inherited membership from the parent group.

You decide to keep Alex as an Owner in this subgroup as it is appropriate given their role in the organization. Select Cancel to cancel this invite.

The Product Management subgroup has the correct members and roles. Next you will add users to the Engineering subgroup.

Add users to the Engineering subgroup

You are now going to invite some users to the Engineering subgroup.

  1. On the left sidebar, select Search or go to and find the Development group.

  2. Select the Engineering subgroup.

  3. On the left sidebar, select Subgroup information > Members. The only members are you and Alex, both with the Owner role. These are inherited roles.

  4. Select Invite members.

  5. Complete the fields for the following members:

    User Role Access expiration date
    Blake Wang Maintainer Leave blank
    Charlie Devi Developer Leave blank
    Devon Ivanov Developer Leave blank
    Evan Kim Developer Leave blank

  6. Select Invite.

    Blake Wang has the Maintainer role in this subgroup, in line with their responsibilities as engineering manager. The three developers all have the Developer role. These are direct roles.

  7. You can change their roles directly on this subgroup's member page. Change Blake Wang to an Owner for this subgroup.

  8. Go back to the Development group's member page. You see that the members of the Engineering subgroup are not members of the parent group.

By adding users directly to the groups and subgroups they need to be members of, you avoid the issue of users being members of groups unnecessarily. You can control access to different groups and projects in a more precise way.

Add users to the User Experience subgroup

The User Experience subgroup has two further nested subgroups:

  • UX Design.
  • Technical Writing.

In terms of users, UX Design should only include Frankie Ali and Hunter Silva, and Technical Writing should only include Grayson Garcia.

If you add all three users to the User Experience subgroup, they will all be included in both nested subgroups due to inherited permissions.

Therefore, you will add these users to the appropriate nested subgroup directly rather than to the User Experience subgroup.

  1. On the left sidebar, select Search or go to and find the Development group.

  2. Select the User Experience subgroup, and then the UX Design subgroup.

  3. On the left sidebar, select Subgroup information > Members. You and Alex Smith are currently the only members. These are inherited roles.

  4. Select Invite members.

  5. Complete the fields and select Invite for the following members:

    User Role Access expiration date
    Frankie Ali Maintainer Leave blank
    Hunter Silva Guest 2025-12-31

  6. Repeat for the Technical Writing subgroup:

    User Role Access expiration date
    Grayson Garcia Maintainer Leave blank

You have added the users to their appropriate nested subgroups. You decide that Grayson Garcia should be in the User Experience subgroup as well.

Add users to other subgroups

You can add Grayson to the User Experience subgroup as a specific role, while keeping their role in the Technical Writing subgroup the same.

  1. Go to the User Experience subgroup.
  2. On the left sidebar, select Subgroup information > Members. You and Alex Smith are currently the only members. These are inherited roles.
  3. Select Invite members.
  4. Invite Grayson Garcia as a Developer, a role with a lower level of permissions than their Maintainer role in the Technical Writing subgroup.

This means that Grayson Garcia does not have an unnecessarily high level of permissions in the User Experience subgroup.

However, due to inherited permissions, adding Grayson Garcia to the User Experience subgroup also adds them to the UX Design nested subgroup as a Developer.

Be mindful of inherited permissions for groups and subgroups. Add users to a minimum number of groups and subgroups to minimize the chance of inadvertently adding a user to a group they do not need to be a member of.

  1. Go to the User Experience subgroup members page.
  2. Add Frankie Ali and Hunter Silva as Reporters. Give Hunter the same expiration date.
  3. Go the Technical Writing nested subgroup.

Frankie Ali and Hunter Silva are now members of the Technical Writing subgroup due to inherited permissions.

You have successfully set up your organization with groups, subgroups and members.

Next you will create a project in one of the groups for members to work on.

Create a project

Now, let's assume that you have a piece of work that certain members of your organization need to work on, and that piece of work is for the whole organization. To organize that work, you are going to create a project in the Development parent group, and add different users to that project.

  1. On the left sidebar, select Search or go to and find the Development group.
  2. Select Create new ({plus}) and New project/repository.
  3. Select Create blank project.
  4. Enter the project details:
    • In the Project name field, enter Release 2.0 as the name of your project.
    • Leave the Project slug field as is, which is based on the project name.
    • To modify the project's viewing and access rights for users, you can change the Visibility Level. Given that the parent group is private, the project can only be Private as well.
    • To create a README file so that the Git repository is initialized, has a default branch, and can be cloned, select the Initialize repository with a README checkbox.
    • To analyze the source code in the project for known security vulnerabilities, select the Enable Static Application Security Testing (SAST) checkbox.
  5. Select Create project.

You have now created a project in the parent group.

In this project, go to Manage > Members.

The existing members of the parent group (you and Alex) are already members of this project because when your project belongs to a group, project members inherit their role from the group.

There are other users that need to be part of this project. You will now add users directly to the project.

Add users to the project and parent group

  1. On the left sidebar, select Search or go to and find the Release 2.0 project.

  2. On the left sidebar, select Manage > Members.

  3. Select Invite members. Invite the following users:

    User Role Access expiration date
    Charlie Devi Maintainer Leave blank
    Frankie Ali Maintainer Leave blank
    Grayson Garcia Maintainer Leave blank

  4. Select Invite.

  5. Because you added these users directly to the project, you can change their roles on the project members page if needed. Change Grayson Garcia's role to Developer to test this out.

  6. Go to the Development parent group members page. The users you just added to the project are not there despite the project being in the parent group.

  7. Add the same users directly to the parent group with Guest roles. You can change their role directly on this page. Change Frankie's role to Reporter.

  8. Go back to the Release 2.0 project members page. The members' project roles are still 2 Maintainers and 1 Developer.

You have successfully added three users who are members of subgroups to a project in the parent group, and given those users specific roles in the project and parent group.