ServiceNow Studio personas and roles

  • Release version: Zurich
  • Updated July 31, 2025
  • 2 minutes to read
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    Summary of ServiceNow Studio Personas and Roles

    ServiceNow Studio provides various roles with distinct capabilities for application development. Key personas include Admins, Delegated Developers, and users with Guided Application Creator roles, each designed to facilitate different aspects of app management and development within the platform.

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    Key Features

    • Delegated Developer: Limited to specific apps, with permissions to access ServiceNow Studio, update delegated apps, create update sets, and submit apps for deployment.
    • Admin: Broader access, allowing for the review and approval of custom app development tasks, app creation and editing, management of update sets, and handling of both scoped and global metadata.
    • Guided Application Creator (GAC): Enables users to create custom applications and automatically receive delegated developer permissions for their created apps.
    • ServiceNow Studio Admin: Grants administrative access to manage system properties and configurations specifically for ServiceNow Studio.
    • Preferred Tables Admin: Focuses on configuring preferred tables within Table Builder without requiring additional admin roles.
    • Metadata-Specific Admin Roles: Provide CRUD access to specific metadata types like Business Rules and Script Includes, enabling targeted management within ServiceNow Studio.

    Key Outcomes

    By understanding these roles and their capabilities, ServiceNow customers can effectively manage application development processes, ensuring that access and permissions are appropriately assigned based on individual responsibilities. This structured approach enhances collaboration, streamlines development workflows, and maintains system integrity within the ServiceNow environment.

    Admins, delegated developers, and users with Guided Application Creator roles have access to work in ServiceNow Studio.

    ServiceNow Studio personas

    Admins and delegated developers have different capabilities in ServiceNow Studio. Admins can delegate people to work on certain apps and app files by providing delegated developer permissions.

    For more information about roles and access to different app development tools, see Working with roles and access in app development tools.
    Table 1. Roles and capabilities
    Role Permissions Capabilities
    Delegated developer (delegated_developer) Delegated developers have access to just the app or apps they're delegated to. These permissions may vary based on your configuration.
    • Access ServiceNow Studio.
    • Update apps that they are given delegated development permissions for.
    • Create an update set to package changes.
    • Create and update app files and other metadata records.
    • Submit an app for deployment through update sets, pipelines, or the Application Repository.
    Admin Admins can review and approve tasks related to custom application development.
    • Access ServiceNow Studio.
    • Create apps in ServiceNow Studio.
    • Edit existing apps and app files or delegate development to someone else.
    • Create, edit, and manage update sets.
    • Update existing metadata records.
    • Create and edit global (unscoped) metadata records.
    Guided Application Creator (GAC) roles (sn_g_app_creator.app_creator, sn_g_app_creator.global) Users with GAC roles can access ServiceNow Studio and create apps. After creating an application, the user receives the delegated_developer role for that application.
    • Access ServiceNow Studio.
    • Create custom applications.
    • With the GAC Global role, create custom global apps.
    ServiceNow Studio admin / Unified Developer Core (UDC) admin (sn_udc.admin) Provides administrative access to tables within ServiceNow Studio scope and configuration access to the experience switcher roles. Granular admin role that enables the following actions:
    • Managing all ServiceNow Studio system properties, settings, and configurations.
    • Managing roles and permissions specific to ServiceNow Studio.
    • Configuring the experience switcher roles across Creator Studio, ServiceNow Studio, and ServiceNow IDE.

    For more information about granular admin roles, see Granular admin roles required to secure your instance.
    Preferred tables admin (sn_prfrd_tables.admin) Provides administrative access to configure preferred tables for Table Builder. Granular admin role that enables you to configure preferred tables in your instance for Table Builder.
    Note:
    Table Builder itself does not require an additional admin role.
    Metadata-specific admin roles
    • Business rule admin
    • Script include admin
    		 Provide access to ServiceNow Studio Metadata-specific admin roles are existing roles on the ServiceNow AI Platform that provide developers with admin access to a specific metadata type. For example, a script include admin allows a developer to CRUD any script include on the ServiceNow AI Platform and perform development on script includes in ServiceNow Studio.
    Each granular metadata-specific admin role must:
    • Enable CRUD access to the metadata types they represent directly within ServiceNow Studio.
    • Be configurable within the experience switcher.