# User Roles

Clarity LIMS users are assigned roles. These roles control permissions and the ability to:

* Access certain Clarity LIMS features.
* Perform certain actions.
* Sign in to the Clarity LIMS interfaces.

In a typical LIMS lab environment, there are four primary user roles:

* [#system-administrator-and-facility-administrator](#system-administrator-and-facility-administrator "mention")
* [#researcher](#researcher "mention")
* [#collaborator](#collaborator "mention")

The following sections describe the default permissions of the four primary user roles. Some user role permissions are configurable (see [Configured Role-Based Permissions](/clarity-lims/clarity-lims-v6.3-and-lablink-v2.5/clarity-lims-v6.3-reference-guide/configuration/user-management/configured-role-based-permissions.md)).

### System Administrator and Facility Administrator

By default, both the **System Administrator** and **Facility Administrator** user roles have access to:

* All configuration areas of the Clarity LIMS web interface, allowing them to:
  * Add and configure workflows, protocols, and steps.
  * Add consumables—reagents, controls, instruments, reagent labels, containers.
  * Add and configure custom fields.
  * Add and configure automations.
* Supervisory and lab management functions in the Clarity LIMS web interface, allowing them to:
  * Review escalations.
  * Remove samples from workflows.
  * Move samples into the next step in a workflow.
  * Access the Overview and Projects dashboards.
* User management, allowing them to:
  * Create, modify, and delete user accounts.
  * Modify user roles and permissions.
  * Approve access requests from external collaborators.

### Researcher

The **Researcher** role is typically assigned to the laboratory scientist. By default, individuals who are assigned this user role are able to:

* Log in to Clarity LIMS.
* Access Lab View.
* Manage and work with samples contained in all projects in the system.
* Edit their own user profiles—ie, they can change their own passwords and other profile information.
* Access three Consumables configuration areas: Reagents, Controls, and Instruments, and do the following.
  * View reagent kits and add new reagent lots to those kits (researchers cannot create reagent kits).
  * View controls.
  * View instrument types and add new instruments to those instrument types (researchers cannot create instrument types).
  * Reactivate expired (archived) instruments by resetting the expiration date.

### Collaborator

The **Collaborator** role is assigned to external collaborators who interact with Clarity LIMS using the LabLink Interface.

The Collaborator role is supported in v5.3 and later. It is not supported in v5.0.x to v5.2.x.

An external person can request a user ID through LabLink. By default, when the request is approved by an administrator, the collaborator is able to:

* Sign in to LabLink.
* Create, view, and delete projects. (Collaborators are automatically given full permissions to projects they create.)
* Submit samples to projects, and delete samples from projects.

By default, collaborators do not have access to the main Clarity LIMS web interface.


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