Playbooks roles

  • Release version: Zurich
  • Updated July 31, 2025
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    Summary of Playbooks roles

    Playbooks roles in ServiceNow enable users to create, manage, and interact with playbooks, triggers, and activity definitions. Assigning these roles allows system administrators to control user permissions for Playbooks features, ensuring appropriate access for development, management, and runtime activities. Playbook authors can also apply additional runtime user access filters within Workflow Studio.

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    Key Roles and Their Permissions

    • playbook.admin: Full control to create, update, delete triggers and activity definitions; manage playbooks in Workflow Studio; add translations; and view shared Experience activity tables.
    • pdauthor: Ability to create, activate, edit, and delete playbooks in Workflow Studio; view all activity definitions and shared Experience activity tables.
    • pdcontentauthor: Permissions to create, edit, and delete activity definitions and triggers; view shared Experience activity tables.
    • pdtriggerauthor: Create, update, and delete trigger definitions.
    • pdoperator: View process and activity executions, as well as execution logs.
    • pdshared.user: View shared Experience activity types and properties tables.
    • pdshared.admin: Edit shared Experience activity types and properties tables.
    • pdcancel: Cancel running playbooks without requiring full admin rights, useful for roles like agent managers.
    • pdrestarter: Restart active playbooks.
    • playbook.write: For users with content filtering restrictions, allows creating, activating, editing, and deleting playbooks, plus viewing shared Experience activity tables.
    • playbook.designeraccess: Lets users with content filtering restrictions view playbooks in Workflow Studio.
    • playbook.activitydefread: View all activity definitions unless restricted by Required Roles.

    Important Considerations

    • Granting Playbooks roles does not automatically provide access to the Workflow Studio design environment; additional permissions may be required.
    • Workflow Studio access is beneficial for users creating activity definitions.
    • Content filtering can restrict access to certain playbooks and activities; roles like playbook.write and playbook.designeraccess accommodate these restrictions.
    • For managing per-user subscriptions or detailed Workflow Studio roles, customers should consult their account representative or related documentation.

    Grant users one or more Playbooks roles to enable them to create triggers, playbooks, and activity definitions.

    Roles

    To learn more about managing per-user subscriptions, see and contact your account representative.

    System administrators can grant users access to Playbooks by assigning delegated development permissions or directly assigning Roles. Additionally, playbook authors can create additional filters for runtime user access as they build a playbook in Workflow Studio. The following user roles are available for Playbooks:

    Role Description
    playbook.admin Enables users to:
    • Create, update, and delete trigger definitions.
    • Launch Workflow Studio to create, activate, edit, and delete playbooks.
    • Create, edit, and delete activity definitions.
    • View the Experience activity types (sys_pd_activity) and Experience activity properties (sys_pd_activity_type_prop) tables that are shared by Playbooks and Playbook Experience.
    • Add translations for a playbook.
    pd_author Enables users to:
    • Launch Workflow Studio to create, activate, edit, and delete playbooks.
    • View all activity definitions.
    • View the Experience activity types (sys_pd_activity) and Experience activity properties (sys_pd_activity_type_prop) tables that are shared by Playbooks and Playbook Experience.
    pd_content_author Enables users to:
    • Create, edit, and delete activity definitions.
    • Create, edit, and delete trigger definitions.
    • View the Experience activity types (sys_pd_activity) and Experience activity properties (sys_pd_activity_type_prop) tables that are shared by Playbooks and Playbook Experience.
    pd_trigger_author Enables users to create, update, and delete trigger definitions.
    pd_operator Enables users to view process executions, activity executions, and execution logs only.
    pd_shared.user Enables users to view the Experience activity types (sys_pd_activity) and Experience activity properties (sys_pd_activity_type_prop) tables that are shared by Playbooks and Playbook Experience.
    pd_shared.admin Enables users to edit the Experience activity types (sys_pd_activity) and Experience activity properties (sys_pd_activity_type_prop) tables that are shared by Playbooks and Playbook Experience.
    pd_cancel Enables users to cancel running playbooks without the playbook.admin role or write access to the parent record. For example if you want to grant an agent manager the ability to cancel playbooks, but not an agent.
    pd_restarter Enables users to restart active playbooks.
    playbook.write Enables users who have content filtering restrictions to:
    • Launch Workflow Studio to create, activate, edit, and delete playbooks.
    • View the Experience activity types (sys_pd_activity) and Experience activity properties (sys_pd_activity_type_prop) tables that are shared by Playbooks and Playbook Experience.
    To learn more about content access filtering, see Content filtering for playbooks
    playbook.designer_access Enables users who have content filtering restrictions to launch Workflow Studio to view playbooks. To learn more about content access filtering, see Content filtering for playbooks.
    playbook.activity_def_read Enables users to view all activity definitions as long as there aren't Required Roles.
    Note:
    Granting users Playbooks roles does not automatically allow them to access the Workflow Studio design environment. Granting users access to Workflow Studio may be helpful when creating activity definitions. For more information on Workflow Studio roles, see user access to Flow Designer.