Understanding Guest Permissions in Airtable Portals

You have a client project base where you track tasks, files, approvals, and timelines. You create an interface so your clients can interact with the information in a simple and guided way.

Instead of inviting them directly to the interface as collaborators, you choose to share it through an Airtable portal. This gives you a controlled and safe way to let them access only what you want them to see.

Once you start inviting them to the portal as guest users, a big question comes up.

What can your guests actually do inside the interface? Can they update a drop down? Can they change a date? Can they edit text fields or add comments? Or are they limited to only viewing the data without writing anything back to your base?

These questions matter because your workflow depends on how much control your guests should have. So let us break it all down clearly.

How Guest Permissions Work

When you invite someone to a portal, Airtable gives you three permission levels. These decide exactly how the guest can interact with the interface.

Interface Only Editor

This is the most powerful level. Guests with this permission can edit any field that appears in the interface. If they change a single select, write in a text field, update a status, or modify a record, the change updates your base right away. They work just like any other editor on the interface.

Commenter

This level allows guests to add comments but nothing more. They can leave thoughts or ask questions inside the interface. They cannot change field values or update any records.

Read Only

Guests with read only access can view everything but cannot change any field values.

Which Permission Should You Use

If you want your clients or collaborators to edit values inside the interface, you must give them interface only editor access. This is the only role that writes changes into your Airtable base.

If you only need them to review things or leave feedback, commenter or read only will be enough.

An Important Note About Pricing

Any guest permission that is higher than read only, such as commenter or editor, counts as a paid seat. If you have many external users, the total cost can rise very quickly. This is why many teams avoid using Airtable portals when they have a large number of clients who need to interact with the interface.

If you are in a similar situation, there is a simple cost saving approach you can use.

You can give your visitors interface read only access and still let them update records without paying for extra seats. To do this, create a Fillout forms using the update record feature. In your interface, add a button field that says something like Update this record and link it to that Fillout form.

Read only users can still click buttons. When they click the button, the Fillout update form opens. They make their changes, submit the form, and the update is written back to your Airtable base. You get editable behavior without paying for commenter or editor seats.

This approach works well when you only need simple updates rather than full editing control inside the interface.