Summary and recommendation
Sprout Social user management can be run manually, but complexity usually increases with role models, licensing gates, and offboarding dependencies. This guide gives the exact mechanics and where automation has the biggest impact.
Sprout Social user management lives at Settings → Team → Users.
Owners and Admins handle all provisioning;
there is no self-service signup path for new team members.
Every app in your social stack that touches Sprout Social access should be audited here, because profile-level permissions are set at invite time and are easy to misconfigure silently.
The permission model is role-based with five fixed roles: Owner, Admin, Manager, Member, and Reporting Only.
No custom roles exist.
Profile and group scoping can narrow what a Manager or Member sees, but the underlying permission set is always tied to the assigned role.
Quick facts
| Admin console path | Settings → Team → Users |
| Admin console URL | Official docs |
| SCIM available | Yes |
| SCIM tier required | Enterprise |
| SSO prerequisite | Yes |
User types and roles
| Role | Permissions | Cannot do | Plan required | Seat cost | Watch out for |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Owner | Full account access: manage billing, all settings, all social profiles, all users, all content, and all reports. Only one Owner per account. | Cannot transfer ownership without contacting Sprout Social support. | All plans | Counts as one paid seat | There is only one Owner per account; ownership transfer requires support intervention. |
| Admin | Manage users, social profiles, settings, and all content. Can add/remove users and manage billing on some plans. | Cannot transfer account ownership. | All plans | Counts as one paid seat | Admins have near-full access; carefully vet who receives this role. |
| Manager | Manage assigned social profiles, approve and publish content, view reports, manage team members within assigned groups. | Cannot manage billing or account-level settings; cannot access profiles not assigned to them. | All plans | Counts as one paid seat | Access is scoped to assigned profiles and groups only. |
| Member | Create and submit content for approval, respond to messages, view reports for assigned profiles. | Cannot publish content without approval (if approval workflow is enabled); cannot manage users or settings. | All plans | Counts as one paid seat | Publishing rights depend on whether an approval workflow is configured by a Manager or Admin. |
| Reporting Only | View and export reports only. No ability to publish, respond, or manage settings. | Cannot publish content, respond to messages, or manage any settings. | Available on Advanced and Enterprise plans | Counts as one paid seat on plans where available | Availability limited to higher-tier plans; verify current plan eligibility before assigning. |
Permission model
- Model type: role-based
- Description: Sprout Social uses a fixed set of predefined roles (Owner, Admin, Manager, Member, Reporting Only). Permissions are determined by role assignment. Profile-level access can be scoped per user, but the underlying permission set is tied to the assigned role.
- Custom roles: No
- Custom roles plan: Not documented
- Granularity: Role-level with profile/group scoping. Admins can restrict which social profiles a user can access, but cannot create custom permission sets beyond the predefined roles.
How to add users
- Log in as Owner or Admin.
- Navigate to Settings → Team → Users.
- Click 'Invite User' or 'Add User'.
- Enter the invitee's email address.
- Select a role (Admin, Manager, Member, or Reporting Only).
- Assign the user to one or more social profiles or groups.
- Click 'Send Invitation'.
- The invitee receives an email and must accept the invitation to activate their account.
Required fields: Email address, Role, Profile or group assignment
Watch out for:
- Invitations expire if not accepted; a new invitation must be sent if the link expires.
- Adding a user increases the seat count and may trigger a billing change depending on the plan.
- Users must accept the email invitation before they appear as active in the account.
- Profile assignments must be made at invite time or edited afterward; users without profile assignments have limited utility.
| Bulk option | Availability | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| CSV import | No | Not documented |
| Domain whitelisting | No | Automatic domain-based user add |
| IdP provisioning | Yes | Enterprise |
How to remove or deactivate users
- Can delete users: Yes
- Delete/deactivate behavior: Sprout Social allows admins and owners to remove (delete) users from the account via Settings → Team → Users. Removed users lose access immediately. Sprout Social's help documentation refers to this action as 'removing' a user rather than deactivating; there is no documented separate deactivation/suspension state distinct from removal.
- Log in as Owner or Admin.
- Navigate to Settings → Team → Users.
- Locate the user to be removed.
- Click the options menu (ellipsis or gear icon) next to the user.
- Select 'Remove User' or 'Delete User'.
- Confirm the removal when prompted.
| Data impact | Behavior |
|---|---|
| Owned records | Content (drafts, scheduled posts) created by the removed user remains in the account and is accessible to Admins and Owners. |
| Shared content | Published posts and shared assets attributed to the removed user remain visible in the account. |
| Integrations | Any personal social profile authentications connected by the removed user may need to be re-authenticated by another user. |
| License freed | Removing a user frees the seat; billing adjusts at the next billing cycle per Sprout Social's billing terms. |
Watch out for:
- Removing a user is not reversible through the UI; the user would need to be re-invited.
- Social profile connections authenticated by the removed user may break and require re-authentication.
- Seat count reduction and billing credit timing depends on the plan and billing cycle; confirm with Sprout Social billing support.
- SCIM-provisioned users removed via the IdP are deprovisioned automatically on Enterprise plans with SCIM enabled.
License and seat management
| Seat type | Includes | Cost |
|---|---|---|
| Full User Seat | Access to publishing, engagement, analytics, and all features permitted by the assigned role. Applies to Owner, Admin, Manager, and Member roles. | Included in per-seat plan pricing: Standard ~$249/seat/mo, Professional ~$399/seat/mo, Advanced ~$499/seat/mo (annual billing discounts apply). Enterprise is custom-priced. |
| Reporting Only Seat | Read-only access to reports and analytics. No publishing or engagement capabilities. | Counts as a paid seat on plans where available (Advanced and Enterprise); specific per-seat cost not publicly listed separately. |
- Where to check usage: Settings → Team → Users (shows all active users and their roles)
- How to identify unused seats: Review the user list in Settings → Team → Users and check last login dates if visible, or audit via SCIM/SSO logs on Enterprise plans. Sprout Social does not prominently surface a 'last active' column in the standard UI per available documentation.
- Billing notes: Sprout Social pricing is per seat per month, billed annually or monthly. Adding seats mid-cycle is prorated. Removing seats typically takes effect at the next billing cycle. Enterprise pricing is negotiated directly. Annual billing provides approximately 20% savings over monthly billing.
The cost of manual management
Sprout Social is priced per seat per month, with plans ranging from Standard ($249/seat/mo) through Advanced ($499/seat/mo), plus custom Enterprise pricing. Annual billing reduces costs by approximately 20%.
Every app stakeholder who needs even read-only access requires a paid seat on plans below Advanced, because the Reporting Only role is gated to Advanced and Enterprise tiers.
Adding a seat mid-cycle is prorated; removing a seat typically takes effect at the next billing cycle, not immediately. Social profile re-authentication is required if the user who originally connected a profile is removed - a hidden operational cost that is frequently overlooked at offboarding.
What IT admins are saying
Community evidence is not specific enough to quote or summarize yet for this app.
The decision
Manual provisioning is viable for small, stable teams where seat counts change infrequently. The invite-and-accept flow is straightforward, but the absence of a suspension state means offboarding is a one-way action with no quick reversal.
For teams on Enterprise, SCIM via Okta or Microsoft Entra ID is the operationally safer path: deprovisioning is push-based from the IdP, and the risk of orphaned active seats is significantly reduced. Teams on Standard, Professional, or Advanced plans have no SCIM option and must manage the full lifecycle manually.
Bottom line
Sprout Social's manual user management is functional but unforgiving: there is no deactivation toggle, Reporting Only access is gated to higher tiers, and removing a user who owns social profile connections creates immediate re-authentication work.
Every app stakeholder who needs access - even read-only - consumes a paid seat, so auditing the user list in Settings → Team → Users on a regular cadence is the most direct way to control costs.
Teams on Enterprise should prioritize SCIM setup to eliminate the manual offboarding risk entirely.
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