How to manage your team’s Dropbox storage

What counts towards your team storage space?

Anything in your team’s shared space, including team folders, shared folders owned by the team, and content stored in your team member's folders counts against your team’s available storage space. Folders behave differently depending on their ownership and membership.

For example:

• Team folders use your team’s storage space and don't count towards the team member's storage limit.
• External shared folders use your team’s storage space if added to your team’s Dropbox.
• Shared folders owned by team members use your team's storage space and count against the individual member's storage limit.
• Replay and Backup content owned by members uses your team's storage space and counts against the individual member's storage limit.

Learn how shared folders affect your storage space.

How to see what storage space your team is using

There are two ways that team admins can get insights into how their teams or team members are using their storage space:

• The storage explorer: An interactive section of the admin console that shows what storage space your team is using and where the content is located.
• Storage reports: Team storage reports show what storage space is being used by team folders, shared folders (internal and external), and personal folders.

Storage explorer

The storage explorer on your admin console dashboard provides a breakdown of your team’s storage space usage, including:

• Team member folders: Files owned and stored in team members’ personal space  
• Team folders: Files stored in team folders
• Internally shared folders: Folders shared by members of your team
• Externally shared folders: Folders shared with your team by people outside your team 
• Orphaned shared folders: Shared folders without an assigned owner that still use your team’s storage space (for example, the owner is deactivated).
• Deleted members: Content associated with deleted team members that still uses your team’s storage space
• Replay: Storage space used by Dropbox Replay (only appears for teams that use Dropbox Replay)
• Other: Any other content contributing to your team’s storage usage

This interactive overview shows how much storage space each category is using, as an amount and as a percentage of the team’s used storage space. You can click into specific categories to view associated content, who owns it, and how much storage space each item is using.

It allows you to click into team members’ folders and team folders to explore and manage subfolders and team content. Other categories, such as internally shared folders, only allow you to see the first set of folders. 

You can also generate a report for team folders and shared folders directly from the storage explorer.

Storage reports on members and folders

Admins can create, view, and download reports to learn more about how their team and individual members are using storage.

Learn more about creating reports for team folders, shared folders, and team members.

How to manage storage limits

Team admins can set custom storage limits for individual team members. These limits apply only to a member’s own folders and help prevent accidental overages without restricting collaboration.

Per-user storage limits

• Apply only to folders owned by that team member.
• Don’t affect team folders, shared folders, or content owned outside of the team.
• Help admins manage storage without relying only on a single shared team storage pool.

Set a custom storage limit for all team members

1. Log in to dropbox.com with your admin credentials.
2. Click Admin console in the left sidebar.
3. Under Products, click the dropdown next to Dropbox.
4. Click Settings.
5. Under Content, scroll to Storage.
6. Toggle Member storage limit to On (Keep syncing) or On (Stop syncing).
7. Enter a custom limit value using the dropdown next to Storage limit per member.
8. Click Save.

Learn how to set storage limits for team folders.

Edit a storage limit for a team member

Team admins can update an individual team member’s storage limits from the Members tab. Before you start, make sure Member storage limit is set to On (Keep syncing) or On (Stop syncing) in the admin console.

1. Log in to dropbox.com with your admin credentials.
2. Click Admin console in the left sidebar.
3. Click Members.
4. Select the team member you want to update.
5. In the Storage used column, click ☑ (edit).
6. Enter a new custom limit.

You can also update a member’s storage limit by selecting the team member directly in the Members tab and clicking Edit space limit.

How to optimize storage space for your team

Storage cleanup

If your team is approaching its storage limit, use the Manage storage cleanup tool to review storage usage and identify opportunities on how to save storage space.

From the Manage storage cleanup tool, you can view files and folders, view how much storage they’re using, and take actions if needed.

To manage storage cleanup:

1. Log in to dropbox.com with your admin credentials.
2. Click ☑ (more options) next to the folder you want to manage.
3. Click More.
4. Click Manage storage.
5. Filter content by Largest or Last Activity.
6. Hover over the content to take action:
   • To delete the content, click Delete.
   • To open the content in a new tab, click ☑ (open).

Learn how to recover deleted files and folders.

Manage storage from removed members

Deleting team members doesn’t instantly free up space. Files and backups remain unless removed, so it’s recommended to:

• Transfer ownership of user content before deletion.
• Permanently delete removed private content and backups.

Learn how to manage deleted team members’ files.

Upgrade or add more storage space

If your team is nearing its storage limit, admins can:

• Upgrade the team's plan.
• Buy additional storage space.

Learn how to get more storage space.

How to troubleshoot storage space issues

To resolve syncing or hard drive space issues, you can use:

• Selective sync: Choose which folders sync locally.
• Online-only files: Keep files in the cloud only.

Learn how to troubleshoot hard drive space issues.