How to Change Admin on Google Workspace, Change Roles Easily 2026

Sign in with an account that already has admin access and land on the Admin console home. The dashboard shows a Manage Workspace section with quick cards for Users and Billing, plus setup recommendations along the top. None of that is where role changes happen; the role tools sit deeper in the left-hand navigation, under Account.

Scroll the left sidebar down to Account and expand it. This reveals Account settings, Admin roles, Domains, Rules, and Storage. Admin roles sits a level below where most people look for it; it isn't a top-level item and isn't filed under Security or Users, which is where people tend to check first.

The Admin roles page lists every system role in a table: role name, a short description, and its type. Super admin is described as having unrestricted access, alongside narrower roles like User management admin, Storage admin, and Help desk admin.

Each row has an "Assign admin" link, not a generic actions menu, for granting that specific role. Scan the list before assigning anything. A narrower role such as Groups admin or Services admin is often the safer pick if the person only needs access to one part of the organization.

Click Assign admin on the role you want to grant, then Assign members. Type the first few letters of an email address and pick from the list.

You can add up to 20 users, or up to 20 security groups, in a single assignment; a group must be a regular, non-dynamic security group to be eligible. Click Assign Role to confirm.

Google's own guidance says the change usually applies within a few minutes but can take up to 24 hours to finish propagating across every connected service. If the organization has multi-party approval turned on for admin changes, the assignment sits as pending until a second super admin approves it, and an unapproved request expires after three days. For a single user, it's often quicker to go the other way: open Directory, then Users, open that person's account page, scroll to Admin roles and privileges, and toggle the role on from there.

If the goal is handing over full control instead of just adding a second admin, assign Super admin to the new person first and have them confirm they can access the console before you remove your own rights. Doing it in that order avoids the worst case: revoking your own access before anyone else has full control, which can leave the organization with no working super admin and force a recovery process through Google.

Ask the newly promoted user to sign in and check that the admin tools their new role should cover actually show up without permission errors: Users, Billing, Security, whatever applies. This catches the rare case where a role didn't fully propagate, and it's far easier to fix right away than to diagnose later when someone can't complete an urgent task.

If none of the built-in roles fit, say someone needs to manage users but not billing, the Create new role button on the same Admin roles page builds a custom permission set instead of over-granting a system role because it's the closest match. This keeps access scoped to what each person actually needs, which matters more as the organization grows.