Create or edit users

As the Office 365 admin, you need to create a user account for everyone in your organization who uses Office 365 services. When you add a user, licenses associated with the subscription will be automatically assigned to the user. The user must have the licenses assigned to them so they can use the services that are included with the subscription.

You can edit an existing user account to make changes, such as removing a license or setting a user’s administrative permissions. You can also delete an account if it’s no longer needed. To learn more about editing user accounts, watch this video.

To create a single user account

  1. Go to Admin > Users & groups, and then click Add Add.
  2. On the Details page, complete the user information. To add optional user information, click the arrow next to Additional details, and then click Next.
  3. On the Settings page, click Yes if you want to assign the user admin permissions.
  4. Under Set user location, select the user’s work location, and then click Next.
  5. On the Assign licenses page, you have the option of not assigning the subscription licenses at that time. To do this, just clear the check box.

If you have no licenses available, you can remove licenses from existing users who no longer need them, or delete user accounts that are no longer needed to free up licenses.

  1. On the Send results in email page, select Send email, type your email address, and then click Create.

You can enter a total of five email addresses.

  1. Review the information on the Results page, and then click Finish, or you can choose to Create another user.

Some changes may take time to apply across multiple services.

If your organization uses more than one domain, here are some things to be aware of when you create a user account:

  • You can create user accounts with the same user principal name (UPN) across domains if the first account you create is, for example, geoff@contoso.onmicrosoft.com. That account must use the “onmicrosoft” portion of the domain name. You could then also create the account geoff@contoso.com.
  • You cannot create geoff@contoso.com followed by geoff@contoso.onmicrosoft.com.
What do you want to do?

Edit a user

Use this procedure to edit a single user’s information.

  1. Go to Admin > Users & groups.
  2. On the Users page, click the user that you want to edit, and then click Edit Edit.
  3. Click the Details, Settings, Licenses, or More tabs, depending on the changes that you want to make.
  4. Complete your changes, and then click Save.

You can also learn about:

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Edit multiple users

Use this procedure to edit user information or assign licenses for multiple users.

  1. Go to Admin > Users & groups.
  2. On the Users page, click the users that you want to edit, and then click Edit Edit.
  3. On the Details and Settings pages, edit the information as needed, and then click Next. Or, just click Next if you have no changes to make on those pages.
  4. On the Assign licenses page, do one of the following, and then click Submit:
  • If you’re not making any changes to the existing license assignments, click Retain current license assignments.
  • To replace existing license assignments, click Replace existing license assignments, and then choose one or more licenses from the list.
  • To add licenses to the existing license assignments, click Add to existing license assignments, and then choose one or more licenses from the list.
  1. Review the information on the Results page, and then click Finish.

Some changes may take time to apply across multiple services.

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Delete one or more users

To delete one or more users:

  1. Go to Admin > Users & groups.
  2. On the Users page, click the user or users that you want to delete, and then click Delete Delete.
  3. In the Delete confirmation message, click Yes.

To learn more about deleting users, and restoring them, see Delete or restore users.

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Applies to:
Office 365 Small Business admin