Understanding access and permissions in Horizon – Help Centre

Horizon uses three layers of access control that work together to determine what a user can see and do:

Product access controls which Horizon features your organisation can use.
User roles control what an individual user can do within Horizon.
Dashboard permissions control what a user can do with a specific dashboard or workspace.

All Vista Cloud customers receive read-only access to Horizon by default, which allows users to view starter dashboards. Organisations with full access can also create and manage dashboards, reports, and other Horizon content.

A user's effective access is determined by all three layers. Dashboard permissions cannot grant access beyond a user's Horizon role, and user roles cannot provide features that are unavailable under the organisation's product access level. For example, a Basic user can be given Viewer permission to a dashboard, but they cannot edit it because editing requires a Designer or Admin role.

Product access

Horizon is available with either read-only access or full access.

Product access	Available features
Read-only	View starter dashboards only
Full access	View starter dashboards, create dashboards, edit dashboards, create reports, perform pivot-table analysis, and integrate with tools such as Power BI and Tableau

All Vista Cloud customers receive read-only access by default. Contact Vista Support to upgrade to full access.

User roles

A user's role determines what they can access and manage within Horizon.

Role	Product access required	Access
Basic	Read-only or Full	View data for assigned sites only
All sites	Read-only	View data for all sites in the organisation
Designer	Full	Create and modify dashboards and other objects
Admin	Full	Full access to all objects and permissions

For read-only customers:

Basic users can view starter dashboards for their assigned sites.
All sites users can view starter dashboards for all sites in the organisation.

For full-access customers:

Basic users can view dashboards shared with them.
Designers can create and edit dashboards.
Admins have full administrative permissions.

Dashboard permissions

Dashboard permissions control access to individual dashboards and workspaces.

Permission	Compatible user roles	Access
Owner	Admin, Designer	View, edit, share permissions, rename, transfer ownership, delete
Editor	Admin, Designer	View, edit, share permissions
Viewer	Admin, Designer, Basic	View only
Public	All Horizon users	Visible to all users

Dashboard permissions are only available to organisations with full access.

How access is evaluated

When a user opens a dashboard, Horizon evaluates access in this order:

Does the organisation have the required product access?
Does the user have a Horizon role that supports the activity?
Does the user have permission to the specific dashboard?

For example:

A Basic user in a read-only organisation can view starter dashboards but cannot access shared custom dashboards because custom dashboards require full access.
A Basic user in a full-access organisation can view a custom dashboard if they have Viewer permission.
A Designer can be assigned Editor or Owner permissions because they can modify dashboards.
An Admin can access and manage all dashboards regardless of ownership.

See also: