Set up Chat restrictions for Education accounts

This feature is available only with Google Workspace for Education editions.

In Google Chat, as an admin of Google Workspace for Education accounts, you can set up restrictions to prevent groups of users from starting any new direct messages, group messages, or spaces. These users will also be restricted from managing members or settings of existing group direct messages or spaces they are already in.

Set up Chat restrictions

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 WorkspaceGoogle Chat.
3. Scroll to Chat and Space restrictions.
4. On the left, at Google Chat box, search for the group you want to apply Chat restrictions to and click it.
5. Check the Restrict creating direct messages, group messages, and spaces box.
6. Click Save.

Changes can take up to 24 hours but typically happen more quickly. Learn more

Set up automatic acceptance of your invitations

You can set Chat invitations to be automatically accepted by students, so that students don’t have the option to reject new messages from teachers. For more information, go to Automatically accept chat invitations.

Control external communication

To prevent external Google Workspace users from chatting with your students, we recommend that you turn off external communication as described in Control external Chat and spaces chat options.