Activate organization branding features

This article is for administrators who manage Drive and Docs editors for an organization. For help managing your own files, go to the Learning Center.

As an administrator, you can activate branding features, for example a logo on a slide,  so that you can set default themes and templates for users. Activating branding has no impact on end users but allows you to assign Google Slides, Forms, and Sites documents for your users to use as templates. 

When you activate branding

When you activate branding, a service account and shared drive are automatically created. The templates that you upload are stored in this shared drive.

A service account is a special type of account that Google creates that is typically used by an application rather than a person. Slides, Forms, and Sites authenticate as a service account in order to upload default templates and themes to the shared drive. If you have a customer merge, this results in more than one organizational branding account, but only one is used. For details, go to What are service accounts?

The shared drive is created in the default organizational unit. This is usually the root organizational unit, but is based on your shared drive creation settings. For details, go to Set the default sharing settings for shared drives.

View default templates & themes in the shared drive

• If you edit or delete documents directly in the shared drive, this feature can become inaccessible to users in your organization. Use the procedures shown in Manage default templates & themes.
• By default, all users in the organization can view the default templates and themes, but they can’t edit or delete them. To edit or delete them, you need to use the Drive and Docs admin privilege to change the access level of a shared drive member. Anyone with the correct permissions can delete them just like any other Drive file.
• Removing a default template or theme in the Admin console doesn’t delete the document.
• You should monitor the use of this shared drive to ensure quota limits are not exceeded. For details, go to Shared drive limits in Google Drive.

Activate branding

1. Sign in to your Google Admin console.

   Sign in using your administrator account (does not end in @gmail.com).

2. In the Admin console, go to Menu  AppsGoogle WorkspaceDrive and DocsTemplates.

   Requires having the Drive and Docs administrator privilege.

3. Click Org brandingActivate.
   Changes can take up to 24 hours but typically happen more quickly. Learn more
4. Check that your shared drive policies allow access to all users who should have access to the default template. Learn more about adding members to a shared drive.
5. Check your Vault retention policies to ensure that users have continued access to the default template. Learn more about retaining Drive files with Vault.

Related topics

• What are default templates & themes?
• How the organizational structure works
• Create custom email layouts in Gmail