Creating users

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You can create users:

• Manually through the sign-in page.
• Manually in the Admin area.
• Manually using the API.
• Automatically through user authentication integrations.

Create users on sign-in page

Prerequisites:

• Sign-up must be enabled.

Users can create their own accounts by either:

• Selecting the Register now link on the sign-in page.
• Navigating to your GitLab instance's sign-up link. For example: https://gitlab.example.com/users/sign_up.

Create users in Admin area

Prerequisites:

• You must have administrator access to the instance.

To create a user manually:

1. On the left sidebar, at the bottom, select Admin.
2. Select Overview > Users.
3. Select New user.
4. Complete the required fields, such as name, username, and email.
5. Select Create user.

A reset link is sent to the user's email and they are forced to set their password on first sign in.

To set a user's password without relying on the email confirmation, after you create a user following the previous steps:

1. Select the user.
2. Select Edit.
3. Complete the password and password confirmation fields.
4. Select Save changes.

The user can now sign in with the new username and password, and they are asked to change the password you set up for them.

NOTE: If you wanted to create a test user, you could follow the previous steps by providing a fake email and using the same password in the final confirmation.

Create users through authentication integrations

Users are:

• Automatically created upon first sign in with the LDAP integration.
• Created when first signing in using an OmniAuth provider if the allow_single_sign_on setting is present.
• Created when first signing with Group SAML.
• Automatically created by SCIM when the user is created in the identity provider.

Create users through the Rails console

WARNING: Commands that change data can cause damage if not run correctly or under the right conditions. Always run commands in a test environment first and have a backup instance ready to restore. You can create a user through the Rails console.

If you want to automate user creation, you should use the users API endpoint instead. This is because GitLab source code is subject to change at any time.

To create a user through the Rails console:

1. Start a Rails console session.

2. The command you run to create a user differs depending on your version of GitLab.

   For GitLab 16.10 and earlier, run:

   u = User.new(username: 'test_user', email: 'test@example.com', name: 'Test User', password: 'password', password_confirmation: 'password')
   # u.assign_personal_namespace
   u.skip_confirmation! # Use only if you want the user to be automatically confirmed. If you do not use this, the user receives a confirmation email.
   u.save!

   For GitLab 16.11 and later, run:

   u = User.new(username: 'test_user', email: 'test@example.com', name: 'Test User', password: 'password', password_confirmation: 'password')
   u.assign_personal_namespace(Organizations::Organization.default_organization)
   u.skip_confirmation! # Use only if you want the user to be automatically confirmed. If you do not use this, the user receives a confirmation email.
   u.save!