Create a team workspace

Create a shared workspace backed by a SharePoint site your team already uses.

Connect SharePoint

The first time, Orbit needs permission to see and manage your SharePoint sites — it asks just in time, not at sign-in.

1. Open the workspace switcher at the top of the sidebar.
2. Click Connect Microsoft 365 at the bottom of the list.
3. Approve the Microsoft consent prompt.

One prompt covers both permissions involved: reading your sites (to list and search them) and managing sites (to create the Orbit document library). Orbit can only access sites your account can already access.

Note

If your organization restricts app permissions, the wizard shows a one-time approval link to send to your Microsoft 365 admin: SharePoint site access needs a one-time approval from your Microsoft 365 admin. After approval, continue from step 1.

Create the workspace

1. Open the workspace switcher and click Create SharePoint workspace.
2. Enter a name, pick an Icon (or click More for any emoji), and choose What’s this workspace for?: Knowledge base, Team hub, Project, Engineering, Product, or Blank. The preview on the right shows the folders and pages you’ll start with.
3. Bring in existing content (optional): choose OneNote or Confluence and pick the notebook or space to copy in, or choose Files or Folder to upload Markdown (.md) pages from your computer (a folder keeps its subfolders; other file types are skipped). Or click Skip.
4. Pick the SharePoint site. Choose from your followed sites or use Search sites.
5. Optionally invite your team (see below), then click Create workspace.

The Orbit document library is created automatically on the site if it doesn’t already exist. A new library starts with a Start here page plus a few folders for the purpose you picked, each with an example page you can edit or delete. Blank starts with just an empty Start here. If the site already has an Orbit library, Orbit leaves it exactly as it is.

If you picked something to bring in, it starts as soon as the workspace is created. It lands next to the starter pages (a notebook, space or folder in its own folder) and keeps running in the background, with progress in the banner at the top. Local files upload from your browser, so keep the tab open until the banner says they’re done.

You can change the icon later in Workspace settings. It appears in the workspace switcher and at the top of the sidebar.

Give your team access

The last step of the Create workspace dialog, Invite your team, lets you pick colleagues by name or email. Each person gets an email, the workspace is pinned in their switcher, and they get an editor seat while your organization’s free seats last. You can skip it and finish without inviting anyone.

An invite tells people the workspace exists. It does not give them access. Membership is the SharePoint site’s membership:

• Everyone already in the site’s Owners, Members, or Visitors groups can open the workspace now.
• To add or remove people, manage the site’s members in SharePoint (or the connected Microsoft 365 group in Teams/Outlook).
• Orbit’s Members section is a read-only mirror of those groups.

Note

When someone is newly added to the site, Microsoft can take a few minutes to propagate permissions. Orbit shows: This workspace was just shared with you. Files will appear once permissions sync (usually 2–5 minutes).

Writers also need an editor seat to edit; without one they can read everything but not change it.

FAQ

Can I connect one site to two workspaces? No. If the site already has an Orbit workspace, the dialog tells you: This site is already connected to the existing workspace.

Who administers the workspace? The creator and tenant admins — an Orbit rule, independent of SharePoint roles. See Workspace settings.

Up next: Switch and find workspaces.