Share Microsoft 365 files with External Users

Students, faculty, and staff may share OneDrive and SharePoint files securely with people outside of the UConn community. Anyone who does not have a @uconn.edu email address is considered external; this includes UConn Health and the Foundation.

Sharing a file from a UConn account to an external account

When you share a file or folder, you have two options:

• Directly with others (recommended): Enter the email address for the external recipient. We recommend that the recipients log in to their Microsoft accounts because it is a more streamlined and secure experience.

• Anyone: This is not recommended. This option allows anyone view/edit the file without authentication (signing in). This means anyone who gets the share link can edit the data.

  • When choosing the “Anyone” option, UConn community members are given extra tools to help with security. Only when choosing “Anyone,” you may also set a password to access the data and an expiration date for the share link. After this date, or without the password, a user cannot access the data behind the share link.

Experience of External Users

To view the external user experience, visit Access a Shared File as an External User. This guide can be shared with external users to help them through the process.

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