How to Create a Company Directory in Google Workspace

A company directory in Google Workspace is built from your user accounts, enriched with profile details, extended with shared external contacts, and supported by visible group addresses. To create one, turn on the Directory so colleagues appear in autocomplete and search, populate each profile with details like job title, department, and manager, add external contacts as domain shared contacts, set who can see what, and keep it all current. Native Google Workspace gets you a solid internal directory for free; for sharing curated contact lists and keeping the directory clean at scale, a management tool helps. Here is how to build and maintain it.

The thing to hold onto is that a good directory is not a one-off setup, it is data you keep accurate. Turning it on is quick. The value comes from populated, current profiles and a clear rule for who owns the upkeep.

What a company directory is made of

Four things combine into what people think of as the company directory. Match each need to the right one and the rest is straightforward.

Part	What it is	Source
The Directory	Auto-generated profiles for your Workspace users	Your user accounts
Profile details	Titles, departments, managers, phone numbers	Admin-entered directory fields
Domain shared contacts	External people, such as clients and suppliers	Added by the admin
Group addresses	Shared team or department addresses, where visible	Google Groups

One clarification up front: personal contacts that users add themselves are not part of the shared company Directory, and suspended or deleted users are not shown. The Directory is the shared, admin-governed view, not each person’s private contacts.

Step 1: Turn on the Directory

The Directory is the shared address book built automatically from your Workspace users. When it is on, people find colleagues in Gmail autocomplete, Contacts, and other services. As an admin you turn the Directory on or off and control what appears (Google Workspace Admin Help, “Turn Directory on or off”; overview). In the Admin console, go to Directory, then Directory settings, then Sharing settings, then Contact sharing, and enable contact sharing. Directory sharing changes can take up to 24 hours to apply, so do not make visibility changes at the last minute before a rollout. This is the foundation and needs almost no maintenance, because it follows your user accounts.

Step 2: Populate profile details

A directory of names and email addresses is useful; a directory with titles, departments, managers, and phone numbers is far more so. You can add employee details to each user’s Directory profile, including job title, department, manager, and desk or phone information, editing them individually in the Admin console or in bulk with the Admin SDK Directory API or Google Cloud Directory Sync (Google Workspace Admin Help, “Add information to a user’s Directory profile”). Accurate profile data is also what powers people search and, if you set the manager field, an org chart from your directory.

Step 3: Add external contacts

Most company directories need external people too: clients, partners, and suppliers everyone should be able to find. These are domain shared contacts, and Google gives you three ways to add them, for different comfort levels (Google Workspace Admin Help, “Add shared external contacts to the Directory”):

• The Domain Shared Contacts API, for admins comfortable with the Admin SDK.
• A Google Workspace Marketplace app, for a user interface without writing code.
• Google Cloud Directory Sync, for syncing external contacts from Active Directory or LDAP.

There is a ceiling to note: you can add up to 200,000 external contacts or 40MB of storage, whichever comes first, so publish only the contacts most users need (Google Workspace Admin Help). Treat these as curated shared contacts, not a CRM replacement: the limit is large, but dumping every client and vendor record into the Directory makes search worse for everyone.

Step 4: Control visibility

A company directory is not all-or-nothing. In the same Contact sharing area, choose which email addresses appear, whether all addresses, the primary only, secondary and alias only, or only addresses in the user’s primary domain, and whether users see domain profiles, domain shared contacts, or both, hiding specific shared contacts where needed (Google Workspace Admin Help; hide shared contacts). For larger organizations, custom directories can show different sets of users to different organizational units, instead of exposing the same full directory to everyone (Google Workspace Admin Help, “Customize a directory for a team or group”). That is useful for schools, franchises, multi-brand companies, and anywhere with privacy boundaries. You can also control who is found in the Directory, including hiding specific users, through directory visibility and custom directories (Google Workspace Admin Help, “Control who users can find in the Directory”).

Set visibility deliberately, working through a short checklist:

• Which email addresses should show: all, primary only, secondary and alias only, or primary-domain only?
• Should users see domain profiles, domain shared contacts, or both?
• Should some shared contacts be hidden?
• Should some users be hidden from the Directory?
• Do different organizational units need different custom directory views?
• Who owns profile-data accuracy?

Step 5: Keep the directory accurate

A directory is only as good as its data, and directory data drifts as people join, change roles, and leave. The fix is to treat directory upkeep as part of the joiner-mover-leaver process: set profile details on onboarding, update them on role change, and suspend or remove the user on exit, cleaning up profile, group, and shared-contact records where needed. For why this matters well beyond the directory, see our note on keeping an accurate Google directory.

Where native falls short, and how a tool helps

Native Google Workspace builds a good internal directory and can publish external contacts, but two things get harder at scale. Keeping external contacts and profile details current by hand becomes its own job, and sharing a specific, curated contact list, such as “Key Accounts”, across a chosen team is not something native settings handle as cleanly as a dedicated shared-contact management tool. A management tool fills those gaps: it keeps the directory clean and lets you share contact groups across users from one interface. Patronum manages shared contacts and directory hygiene this way. For the difference between the contact types, see our explainer on directory contacts versus shared contacts versus Google Contacts, and for keeping the list clean, advanced filtering of Google directory contacts.

Best practices for a company directory

• Populate profiles, not just accounts. Titles, departments, and managers make the directory genuinely useful.
• Keep external contacts lean. Publish only what most users need, both for the 200,000 limit and for useful search results.
• Set visibility deliberately so the right people see the right details.
• Own the upkeep. Assign a person, or a tool, to keep the directory current, because a stale directory erodes trust in the whole thing.
• Tie it to the lifecycle. Update profile data on joins, role changes, and exits so it never drifts far from reality.
• Assign clear ownership. HR owns job titles and departments, IT owns accounts and visibility settings, and department leads validate team membership and contact accuracy.

Frequently asked questions

How do I create a company directory in Google Workspace?

Turn on the Directory, populate each user’s profile with details like title and department, add external contacts as domain shared contacts, set visibility, and keep the data current (Google Workspace Admin Help).

Is the Google Workspace Directory the same as a company directory?

The Directory is the internal, auto-generated part built from your users. A full company directory usually also includes populated profile details and external contacts added as domain shared contacts.

How do I add external contacts to the company directory?

Add them as domain shared contacts through the Domain Shared Contacts API, a Google Workspace Marketplace app, or Google Cloud Directory Sync, up to 200,000 contacts (Google Workspace Admin Help).

How many contacts can a Google Workspace directory hold?

You can add up to 200,000 external contacts or 40MB of storage, whichever comes first, so publish only what most users need (Google Workspace Admin Help).

How do I keep the company directory up to date?

Treat profile and contact upkeep as part of onboarding, role changes, and offboarding, and assign an owner or a management tool so the data stays current.

Can I control who sees which directory details?

Yes. You can choose which email addresses show and whether to display domain profiles, domain shared contacts, or both, and hide specific shared contacts (Google Workspace Admin Help).

Can I create different company directories for different teams?

Yes. Use custom directories to control which users different organizational units can find (Google Workspace Admin Help).

Are personal Google Contacts shared in the company directory?

No. Personal contacts that users create themselves are not shared through the Workspace Directory; the Directory shows admin-governed profiles and shared contacts.

Do Google Groups appear in the company directory?

Yes. Group addresses can appear in the Directory when the group is set as visible, which is why addresses like sales@ or support@ often show up.

Who should own company directory accuracy?

Usually HR owns job titles, departments, and managers; IT owns accounts and visibility settings; and department leads validate team membership and shared-contact accuracy.

Build a directory people can trust

A company directory is only as valuable as it is accurate and complete. See how Patronum manages shared contacts and directory hygiene so your directory stays current, useful, and shared with the right people.

Sources

• Google Workspace Admin Help, “Turn Directory on or off”
• Google Workspace Admin Help, “Overview: Set up and manage the Directory”
• Google Workspace Admin Help, “Add information to a user’s Directory profile”
• Google Workspace Admin Help, “Add shared external contacts to the Directory”
• Google Workspace Admin Help, “Set which email addresses show in the Directory”
• Google Workspace Admin Help, “Hide Groups or domain shared contacts”
• Google Workspace Admin Help, “Customize a directory for a team or group”
• Google Workspace Admin Help, “Control who users can find in the Directory”