Labsistant is built around a shared lab, so the inventory is only useful once the people using it are in it. This article covers inviting members and choosing the right role for each one.
Who can invite people
Inviting new members is a PI permission. The Users administration page is available to PIs. Researchers and Junior Researchers cannot send invitations or change anyone's role.
Invite a member
- Go to Users in the sidebar.
- Click Invite Member in the top right. A three-step dialog opens.
- Step 1, Enter Details. Fill in the Email Address and Full Name of the person you are inviting, then click Continue.
- Step 2, Set Role and Groups. Pick their Role from the dropdown. You can also add them to one or more Groups here, which is optional. Click Continue.
- Step 3, Review and Send. Check the summary of name, email, role, and groups. Click Send Invitation.
Choosing the PI role asks for an extra confirmation because it grants lab administration access.
The invitation is saved under Pending Invites, and the app attempts email delivery. If delivery fails or is paused, read the status shown; the app may offer an invitation link to share. The person joins the lab only after accepting the invitation.
Track and manage pending invitations
The Users page has three tabs: Members, Pending Invites, and Roles & Permissions.
Open Pending Invites to see everyone who has been invited but has not accepted yet. From the actions menu on each row you can:
- Resend Invite, if the first email did not land.
- Revoke Invite, which cancels the invitation. The invite link stops working.
The three roles
Every member has exactly one role. These roles are built in, and the permissions attached to them are fixed.
| Role | Meant for |
|---|---|
| PI | The Principal Investigator. Lab administration, settings, and member management; inventory ownership rules still apply. |
| Researcher | Day-to-day lab members who need full research access but not admin control. |
| Junior Researcher | Members who need to see inventory and record their own work, with the narrowest set of permissions. |
A lab can have more than one PI, and every PI has the same access. One PI is also the lab's owner, marked Owner on the Users page. Whoever creates the lab starts as its owner. Only the owner can change a PI's role, remove a PI from the lab, or hand ownership to another PI.
What each role can do
PIs can see this table in the app: go to Users and open the Roles & Permissions tab. The member-view permission below does not give other roles access to that administration page.
Inventory
| Permission | PI | Researcher | Junior Researcher |
|---|---|---|---|
| View all inventory | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Add inventory | Yes | Yes | No |
| Edit inventory you own | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Edit shared lab stock and your groups' stock | Yes | Yes | No |
| Edit someone else's personal item | Only to reassign it, as a recorded override | No | No |
Ownership is checked before role. A colleague's personal stock is theirs, and no role edits it, consumes it or moves it in the normal course of things. The PI has one exception: Reassign this item moves a colleague's item somewhere else and sets who owns it there, in one step. It is an override, recorded in the Audit Log with the PI's name on it, and the current owner is not asked first. It exists for stuck items, such as stock left behind by someone who has gone, not for skipping the line: day to day the PI asks like everyone else. No other role has it. To get some of a colleague's item, ask: open the item and use Request item. The request goes to the item's manager if it has one, otherwise to the owner. Requests: ask for an item, answer a request covers what happens next.
The same split applies to what you can see. A colleague's personal item shows its name, quantity and expiry to the whole lab, but its storage location is hidden. See Personal, group and lab: who sees what.
Experiments
| Permission | PI | Researcher | Junior Researcher |
|---|---|---|---|
| View experiments | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Create experiments | Yes | Yes | No |
| Schedule experiments | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Edit any experiment | Yes | Yes | No |
Experiments are not scoped by ownership the way inventory is. "Any" means any: a Researcher can edit any experiment in the lab, including one somebody else wrote, and group membership does not narrow it. This is worth knowing if you are used to the inventory rules above, because the two do not behave the same way.
Users
| Permission | PI | Researcher | Junior Researcher |
|---|---|---|---|
| View lab members | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Invite users | Yes | No | No |
| Manage users, meaning roles and groups | Yes | No | No |
| Remove users | Yes | No | No |
Storage
| Permission | PI | Researcher | Junior Researcher |
|---|---|---|---|
| View storage locations | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Manage storage locations | Yes | Yes | No |
| Manage zones | Yes | Yes | No |
Analytics and settings
| Permission | PI | Researcher | Junior Researcher |
|---|---|---|---|
| View analytics | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Export data | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Change lab settings | Yes | No | No |
Analytics and exports also depend on the lab's plan. A role permission does not unlock a paid feature.
All three roles can view inventory within its visibility rules. PIs and Researchers can create new inventory; Junior Researchers work with existing items they are allowed to use. Edits and administration depend on role, ownership, and the lab's plan.
Change someone's role later
- Go to Users and stay on the Members tab.
- Open the actions menu at the end of that person's row and choose Edit User.
- Pick a new Role. You will be asked to confirm, since it changes what they can do.
Any PI can make someone a PI from this dialog, or change the role of a Researcher or Junior Researcher. Only the owner can change a PI's role: another PI who opens the dialog for a PI sees the role without the dropdown, and a note that only the lab's owner can change it. The owner's own role cannot change until they hand ownership to another PI, so a lab always has an owner.
You can also add or remove someone's Group Memberships from the same dialog.
Remove someone from the lab
From the actions menu on their row, choose Remove from Lab. You will be asked to confirm. After removal, they lose lab access; bringing them back requires a new invitation.
Only the owner can remove a PI, and nobody can remove the owner. To step away from a lab you own, hand ownership over first.
Hand over ownership
The owner can make another PI the owner. On the Users page, open the actions menu on that PI's row and choose Hand over ownership, then confirm. The other PI becomes the owner, and you stay a PI. A lab has one owner at a time, so this is how ownership moves from one PI to another.
A note on plans
The number of members you can have depends on your plan, and the Junior Researcher role is not available on the Free plan. See Plans and limits for the details, or the plan comparison for what a larger lab costs.