Add Archived User licenses

Supported editions for this feature: Business Starter, Business Standard, and Business Plus; Enterprise Standard and Enterprise Plus. Compare your edition

For Google Workspace for Education customers: Education editions will support Archived User licenses in 2025. New and existing Google Workspace for Education customers will automatically receive Archived User licenses, and can request more if they need them.

To archive a user, you need an Archived User license. The Archived User license corresponds to your Google Workspace and Archived User subscriptions. For example, if you have Business Plus, you buy a Business Plus – Archived User license.

You can find how many Archived User licenses are available and already assigned for your organization or view the license for an individual user. You can also buy additional licenses, if needed.

Before you begin

• Your organization needs an Archived User subscription before you can add Archived User licenses. For the steps, go to Buy Archived User subscription. 
• If you transition your Google Workspace subscription, you also need to transition your Archived User subscription to match before you can archive more users. If you already have archived users, their Archived User licenses automatically transition to your new Archived User subscription. Learn how to Switch your Archived User edition.

• How you add licenses depends on your payment plan or edition::

  • Flexible Plan—You don’t need to buy more Archived User licenses. Instead, follow the steps to archive the users. You automatically get a license for each user you archive. You’re charged for the new users in your next monthly payment.
  • Annual Plan—If you assign all your Archived User licenses, you can buy more. We increase your monthly payment to cover the new licenses. Follow the steps in Add Archived User licenses on the Annual Plan (later on this page) to buy more licenses.

Add Archived User licenses on the Annual Plan

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  BillingSubscriptions.
3. Click the Google Workspace [edition] - Archived User subscription.
4. Next to the number of licenses you currently have, click Purchase more.
5. Enter the number of additional licenses you want to buy and click Continue.

   For example, if you have 50 licenses and need 25 more, enter 25.

6. Check the box to agree to the terms and click Continue.

It can take up to 48 hours for new licenses to become available.

View a user’s Archived User license

To find the licenses assigned to a user, including an Archived User license:

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  DirectoryUsers.
3. Click the name of the userLicenses.

Related topics

• Archive former employee accounts
• Switch your Archived User edition