Reports and dashboards use a deliberate-sharing model: nothing is visible to anyone until someone makes it so. That keeps half-built content out of everyone's menus, but it also produces the single most common analytics complaint — "the report is missing" — which is almost never a lost report and almost always an unshared one. This page states the rule exactly, shows how to share, and names the pitfalls.
Favorites, My Reports, Subscribed, All Reports and folders describe different relationships to a definition; none alone grants source-data access. Deliberate sharing controls whether the report or dashboard is discoverable, while entity, field and record permissions still determine what each viewer can execute and see. Creator and folder metadata help administrators trace why an asset appears in a catalogue.
When someone reports missing content, confirm the exact definition, active status and grant list before examining data. When content opens but differs between users, compare parameters and underlying security rather than adding a broader report grant. Test with a representative recipient, and remember that subscription delivery also requires both definition visibility and valid recipient access at execution time.
The visibility rule
A user sees a report in their Reports menu — and can open it — when it is active and at least one of these holds:
- they created it;
- it is shared with all users;
- it is assigned to one of their roles, teams or security profiles.
Dashboards follow the identical rule with their own sharing lists. Two properties of the rule are worth stating plainly, because both defy intuition:
- There is no administrator bypass. The Reports and Dashboards menus show an administrator only what the rule grants them, like anyone else. Administrators see the complete inventory in Setup instead (below).
- Inactive means invisible to everyone. Deactivating a report or dashboard hides it from every user's menus — including its creator's — while preserving the definition, sharing and subscriptions for reactivation.
New content starts private
A newly created report or dashboard is visible only to its creator. So is a clone — copying a shared report does not copy its sharing. This is by design: you build and test privately, then publish deliberately. The corollary is that publishing is a step you must remember, and forgetting it explains most "my team can't see it" reports.
How to share
Sharing lives in the item's edit dialog — administrators reach it in Setup → Model → Analytics, on the Reports and Dashboards tabs, via the row's Edit action and its Visibility section. The choices map directly onto the rule:
| Choice | Effect |
|---|---|
| Only me | No grants — creator-only, the default for new content |
| All users | Everyone with access to the system sees it |
| Selected users | Assignments to selected roles, teams or security profiles |
Despite the current Selected users label, the editor exposes group principals rather than individual user accounts: Roles, Profiles and Teams. Share with "the sales role" and new salespeople inherit the report on day one, with no per-person maintenance.
Dashboards need sharing twice
A dashboard's tiles load their data through the dashboard's backing reports, under the viewing user's own access. Sharing the dashboard therefore only controls whether it opens; each tile still requires the viewer to see its report. Dashboard visible + reports invisible = a frame of empty tiles. When you share a dashboard, share its backing reports with the same audience in the same sitting.
The unshared-content pitfall
Because visibility depends on explicit grants, content with no grants is invisible to everyone except its creator — and if the creator is gone (a departed employee) or was never a person at all (content brought in by an import), it is invisible to everyone, administrators included, in the end-user menus. It still exists: the Setup analytics screen lists all reports and dashboards regardless of sharing, which makes it the place to diagnose and fix. Open Setup, find the item, and grant visibility.
Sharing shares the results
A report's rows are defined by its query and filters. When you share it, the audience you grant sees those results — the visibility list is, in effect, the data audience for that query. Before sharing a report over a sensitive entity with "All users", read its output the way the widest reader will, and prefer role- or team-scoped sharing when the content is narrower than the whole company. The platform's broader access machinery is described in the security model and security profiles.
Common questions
Why can't our administrator see a report in the Reports menu?
Because the menu applies the same visibility rule to administrators as to everyone else — there is no bypass. The report is not gone: it is listed in Setup → Model → Analytics, where the administrator can open its Edit dialog and grant visibility (to themselves included).
Does sharing a report let people change it?
No — sharing grants viewing. Recipients can open the report, filter it, export it and subscribe to it, but changing its definition is a management action governed by permissions, not by the visibility list.
A user says a shared dashboard is "empty" — what do I check first?
The backing reports. Empty tiles on a dashboard that opens fine almost always mean the viewer can see the dashboard but not the reports behind its tiles. Share each backing report with the same audience as the dashboard. The general method for "user can't see X" complaints is in Diagnosing what a user can't see.