Enable and configure guest access

Guest access lets people outside your organisation view files you have shared with them. Guests sign in with a one-time code sent to their email address, not a password, so they do not need a full account on your server.

How guest access works

When you share a file or folder with an email address that does not belong to a member, Eigen adds that email to the share. The next time that person visits your Eigen server and enters their email address, Eigen sends a six-digit code to their inbox. They enter the code to sign in and see only the content shared with them.

Guest accounts are separate from member accounts. They cannot access any app, setting, or file that has not been explicitly shared with them.

Configure guest access settings

The guest access settings are only visible to the server Owner. Admins cannot see this section.

1. Open Guest access in Admin.
2. Adjust the settings as needed and click Save.

Allow open guest signup

When Allow open guest signup is on (the default), anyone can enter their email address and request a sign-in code, even before anything has been shared with them. They will be able to sign in, though they will see an empty workspace until you share something.

Turn this off if you want to restrict sign-in codes to email addresses that already have a pending share. With open signup off, someone whose email is not in any share gets an error when they request a code.

Days of inactivity before deletion

Eigen runs a daily sweep that removes guest accounts that have not been active for longer than this many days. The default is 7. You can set any value from 1 to 365.

Deletion removes the guest account, but the share record is preserved. If the same person signs in again later, their access is restored automatically.

Review and remove guest accounts

The Guests page lists all current guest accounts. You can search by name or email address.

Click a guest's name to open their detail panel. To remove a guest immediately, click the delete icon in the toolbar and confirm the deletion. This removes the account, not the share, so if you shared something with that person before, they could sign in again and their access would be restored.

Email notifications for guests

When you share a file with a guest's email address, Eigen can send them a notification email. You control this from Settings, under Email notifications, using the Email guests when added to share toggle.

This is on by default. Guests have no in-app notification channel, so turning it off means they will not know a file has been shared with them unless you tell them yourself.