Collaborate on documents in Pages, Numbers and Keynote
With built-in collaboration, you can work on documents, spreadsheets or presentations with others in real time.
With collaboration in Pages, Numbers and Keynote on iPhone, iPad, Mac and Apple Vision Pro, invite others to collaborate on a document, set permissions for the document, see who’s worked on the document and a summary of the changes they’ve made and start communications with participants from within the app.
You can also collaborate using Pages, Numbers and Keynote online at iCloud.com.
Invite others to collaborate
When you invite people to collaborate on a document, spreadsheet or presentation, you send a link to them. Up to 100 people can view and edit a shared document at the same time.
To start collaborating:
Sign in to iCloud on your device, then turn on iCloud Drive for Pages, Numbers and Keynote.
With your document open, click or tap the Share button
in the toolbar, choose Collaborate from the pop-up menu, then choose how you want to invite others.
People you invite can open and view a shared document of any size. If your document is larger than 2 GB and you want people you’ve invited to be able to edit it, use Pages, Numbers or Keynote to reduce the document’s size to less than 2 GB before inviting others.
If you have a managed Apple Account, you can collaborate with others outside of your organisation. Contact your administrator to turn on those settings.
Set permissions
To set permissions for who can view, edit and invite others to collaborate on your document, click or tap the pop-up menu below the Collaborate pop-up menu.
You can set the following options:
To allow only specific participants to access the document, choose “Only people you invite”. To open the shared document, those participants must sign in to iCloud or iCloud.com with an Apple Account. If they don’t have an Apple Account, they can create one after you share the document with them.
To allow anyone who has the link to the shared document to be able to open it, choose “Anyone with the link”.
To allow anyone who can access the document to be able to edit and print it, choose “Can make changes”.
To allow anyone who can access the document to be able to view and print it, but not edit it, choose “View only”.
If you don’t want participants to be able to invite others to collaborate, deselect “Anyone can add more people”.
Collaborate on a shared document
Once you’ve opened the document, you can see the edits made by others in real time and what they’ve done recently. Depending on your device, the number of people editing or viewing the document appears on the Collaboration button
in the toolbar, which appears after you’ve invited others. You can also view a list of participants by clicking or tapping the Collaboration button.
When editing a shared document, you can use all of the features of Pages, Numbers and Keynote, with some exceptions.
See the latest activity
In Pages, Numbers and Keynote on iPhone, iPad and Mac, tap or click the Collaboration button in the toolbar to see what’s happened since the last time you visited the document. You can also start communication with participants from within the app and change activity settings.
Click or tap Show All Activity to see who’s worked on the document and a summary of the changes they’ve made. Click or tap the disclosure arrow to see more detailed changes, such as edits made by one participant in several different places. Or tap an activity to show where the change was made. Unread activities are highlighted, and tapping a highlighted activity will mark all unread activities as read.
Click or tap a name in the participant list to jump to where they are currently working in the document.
Click or tap Activity Settings to turn notifications on or off for when new people join, make edits or make comments.
Click or tap the message button to start a Messages conversation with participants, or click or tap the audio or video button to start a FaceTime call.
With Keynote on Apple Vision Pro, you can collaborate with others on presentations and participants can see your activity, but you can’t see others’ activities.
Change a shared document’s settings
To change permissions after you’ve shared your document, click or tap the Collaboration button in the toolbar, then click or tap Manage Shared Document, Presentation or Spreadsheet, depending on the iWork app you’re using. You can change access and permissions, as well as stop sharing.
Features not supported with collaboration
If you need to use one of these features, stop sharing the document, make your changes, then share the document again. When you stop sharing a document, it will be removed from iCloud Drive for all participants. If you’ve restricted the document to “Only people you invite”, you’ll need to re-invite everyone after you’ve finished making changes.
These features aren’t currently available when you collaborate with other participants:
Pages, Numbers and Keynote
Reduce File Size (File > Reduce File Size).
Drag rows and columns between body and header areas in tables.
Create, delete or reorder styles.
Edit with Ruby in Asian languages.
Create or edit custom cell formats.
Replace every instance of a font in a document.
* You can’t reduce the size of a shared document, but you can reduce the size of a copy.
Pages
Adjust footnote settings.
Insert, cut, copy, paste, delete, duplicate, reorder or edit sections.
Adjust EndNote settings.
Add and edit section layout objects.
Insert date and time smart fields.
Convert Word Processing documents to Page Layout documents and vice versa.
Edit page number settings.
Add or edit page templates.
Reapply a page template to a page.
Numbers
Insert smart fields.
Copy or paste table styles.
Transpose tables.
Keynote
Change slide size.
Change theme.
Record a slideshow or play a previously recorded slideshow.
Add or edit a soundtrack.
Clear a soundtrack or delete tracks.
Clear an existing recording of a slideshow.
Pages, Numbers and Keynote for iCloud
You can use Pages, Numbers and Keynote online at iCloud.com to invite others to collaborate on a document, set permissions for participants and collaborate. But some features aren’t currently available when you collaborate from iCloud.com:
If you are tracking changes in a Pages document, you can view the document and select text, but not edit it.
If your Pages, Numbers or Keynote document has any vertical text, you can view an image of the document on iCloud.com, but not edit it.
Editing objects inside groups.
You can jump to another participant’s cursor in a collaborative document, but other collaboration features, such as the activity feed and tools to start communications, aren’t available in Pages, Numbers and Keynote for iCloud. Changes made to a collaborative document from iCloud.com will still be displayed in the activity feed of participants who are using Pages, Numbers and Keynote on iPhone, iPad and Mac.
You can still edit documents containing tracked changes and vertical text in Pages, Numbers and Keynote on iPhone, iPad and Mac.
If collaboration isn’t available
If you use Pages, Numbers or Keynote and collaboration isn’t available, you might need to update your apps. Turn on automatic updates so that your apps always stay up to date. If your device is too old to update your apps, you can still collaborate online at iCloud.com using a Mac or PC.
If you want to send a copy of the document, you can send it without collaborating. Click or tap the Share button, choose Send Copy from the pop-up menu, then choose how you want to send the document.
Minimum system requirements and iCloud requirements for collaboration
To view or edit a shared document, and invite others to participate in the presentation, you and the people you share it with need any of the following:
A Mac with macOS Ventura and Pages, Numbers or Keynote 14.2 or later.
An iPhone or iPad with iOS or iPadOS 17 and Pages, Numbers or Keynote 14.2 or later.
An Apple Vision Pro with Pages, Numbers or Keynote 14.2 or later.
Pages, Numbers and Keynote for iCloud works with a Mac or PC using Safari 11.1.2 or later, Google Chrome or Microsoft Edge.
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