How to transfer file ownership

Problem

You need to make someone else the owner of your file.

Environment

  • Drive
  • Sharing and Permissions

Solution

Within the organization, there are two ways to transfer file ownership as described below.

As a user you can share a file or folder manually, which would include the files inside so long as you own them.
  1. On your computer, open Google Drive.
  2. Right-click the file or folder you want to share with someone else and click Share.
  3. Find the user whose ownership you want to change, and from the right of their name, select Transfer ownership.
  4. Click Done.

As an administrator, you can transfer all the files of one user to another from the Admin console. Note that the option to transfer some files is not available.
  1. On your computer, open the Admin console.
  2. From the left panel, go to Apps > Google Workspace > Drive and Docs.
  3. Administrator privileges in Service Settings are required.
  4. Click Transfer ownership.
  5. For From user, enter the current owner's email address and select the user from the results.
  6. For To user, enter the new owner's email address and select the user from the results.
  7. Click Transfer Files.
Outside the organization, users can use Google Takeout to export a copy of their files to be imported into another account.
  1. On your computer, open Google Takeout .
  2. Under Select data to include,  select the files that you'd like to be exported and click Next Step.
  3. Under Choose file type, frequency & destination, select your preferred export method and proceed by clicking Create export.
  4. After exporting, download the data's zip file and unzip the folder.
  5. Log in to Google Drive as the receiving user.
  6. Click New > Folder upload to upload this parent folder into Drive.