Advanced Procedures > Setup > System Administration

PRTG Manual: User Accounts

This documentation refers to an administrator that accesses the PRTG web interface on a master node. Other user accounts, interfaces, or failover nodes might not have all of the options in the way described here. In a cluster, note that failover nodes are read-only by default.

If you use PRTG on premises and open the system administration page from a different administration page, PRTG asks you to enter your credentials again for security reasons if 15 minutes (900 seconds) have passed since your last credential-based login. A dialog box appears. Enter your Login Name and Password for PRTG in the corresponding fields and confirm to continue.

Administrators can add new user accounts, edit user accounts, and define which user groups that users are members of.

User Accounts Overview

The User Accounts tab shows a list of all user accounts in this PRTG installation and various types of information about each user.

Object: The name of the user account. Click the user account to open its settings.
Type: The user type, for example, read-only user.
Email: The primary email address of the user account.
Primary Group: The primary group of the user account. Click the user group name to open its settings.
Group Memberships: All user groups that the user account belongs to.
Active/Paused: The status of this user account. This can be active or paused.

For more information, see also section Working with Table Lists.

Add User Accounts

You have several options to add user accounts:

To add a new user to PRTG on premises, hover over and select Add User from the menu. The options are almost the same as for editing users.
To add a new user to PRTG hosted by Paessler, click Invite User. The options are almost the same as for editing users, but the initial account password is automatically generated. The new user can change it later. Click Send Invite to save your settings and to send the invitation per email to the defined primary email address.

To batch-add several users at once, hover over and select Add Multiple Users from the menu. In the dialog box that appears, select a user group from the dropdown menu and enter or paste a list of email addresses. Separate them by a space, comma, semicolon, or a new line. Click OK to confirm. For each email address, PRTG creates a new, local user account in the user group, using the email address as value for Login Name, Display Name, and Primary Email Address. A new password is automatically generated and sent to the email address.

Access rights to device tree objects, libraries, maps, reports, or the ticket system are defined in user groups. Make sure that the user is a member of the correct user group with the required group access rights.

To change a user's account settings, click the user's name in the list of user accounts.

You cannot delete fixed objects such as the PRTG System Administrator user account, the PRTG Users Group, or the PRTG Administrators group.

User Account Settings

Setting	Description
Login Name	Enter the login name for the user. The following characters are not allowed: ' / [ ] : ; \| = , \ + * ? < > This option is not available in PRTG hosted by Paessler.
Display Name	Enter a name that the user recognizes. It is for display purposes only. If the name contains angle brackets (<>), PRTG replaces them with braces ({}) for security reasons. For more information, see the Knowledge Base: What security features does PRTG include?
Primary Email Address	Enter the user's email address. Use an email client that can show HTML emails, otherwise you cannot read emails from PRTG.
Password	Define the user password or decide whether to change a password: Do not change Specify new password For security reasons, PRTG does not display the password. If you choose to specify a new password, enter the old password, then enter the new password twice. The new password must be at least 8 characters long. It must contain a number and a capital letter. Leading and trailing whitespaces are removed. The password of an administrator can only be changed by the same administrator. This option is not available in PRTG hosted by Paessler.
Passhash	Click Show passhash to display the passhash for the user. The passhash is necessary, for example, when using the PRTG API. This setting is shown for your information only and cannot be changed here. This option is not available in PRTG hosted by Paessler.

API Access

These settings are only available in PRTG hosted by Paessler.

Setting	Description
API Username	Shows the username of the user account. The username is necessary when using the PRTG API. This setting is shown for your information only and cannot be changed here.
API Passhash	Click Show passhash to display the passhash of the user. The passhash is necessary when using the PRTG API. This setting is shown for your information only and cannot be changed here.
Reset API Passhash	Click Generate new passhash to reset the passhash of the user.

Account Control

Setting	Description
User Type	This setting is only visible to administrators. Define the user type. Read/write user: The user can view monitoring results, libraries, maps, reports, and also edit the according settings. In addition, they can add and delete objects, libraries, maps, and reports. The user can acknowledge alarms, edit notification templates, notification contacts, and schedules. Read-only user: The user can only view monitoring results, libraries, maps, reports, and the according settings. The user can acknowledge alarms and change their own password if allowed. This is a good choice for public or semi-public logins. Read-only users cannot be members of groups with administrative rights. This setting is not available for the PRTG System Administrator user account.
Acknowledge Alarms	This setting is only visible if you enable Read-only user above. Acknowledging an alarm is an action that requires write access. However, you can explicitly allow the read-only user to acknowledge alarms. Choose between: User can acknowledge alarms: Allow the read-only user to acknowledge alarms. User cannot acknowledge alarms (default): Do not allow the read-only user to acknowledge alarms.
Password Change	This setting is only visible if you enable Read-only user above. Define if the user can change their account password or not. If you allow the user to change their account password, this option is available in the My Account settings of the user. Choose between: User can change the account password User cannot change the account password (default)
Primary Group	This setting is only visible to administrators. Select the primary group for the user. Every user has to be a member of a primary group to make sure there is no user without group membership. Membership in other user groups is optional. For user experience, there is no difference between the primary group and other user groups. Select Create new user group for this user to create a user group for the new user. This option is only visible when you add a new user account. The default name of the new user group is the Display Name of the new user. You cannot change the primary group of Active Directory users. Users that you add via Active Directory integration can only have the respective Active Directory group as their primary group.
Status	This setting is only visible to administrators. Define the status of the user: Active: The user can log in to the PRTG web interface. Paused: The user cannot log in to the PRTG web interface. Use this option to temporarily deny access for this user. This setting is not available for the PRTG System Administrator user account.
Last Login	Shows the time stamp of the user's last login. This setting is shown for your information only and cannot be changed here.

Group Membership

Setting	Description
Member of	Shows the user groups that the user is a member of. This setting is shown for your information only and cannot be changed here.

Web Interface

Setting	Description
Automatic Refresh	Define if you want PRTG to automatically refresh web pages in the PRTG web interface for the user: Refresh pages (recommended): PRTG automatically refreshes single page elements on the web pages in the PRTG web interface. Do not refresh pages: PRTG does not automatically refresh web pages in the PRTG web interface.
Refresh Interval (Sec.)	This setting is only visible if you enable Refresh pages (recommended) above. Enter the number of seconds that PRTG waits between two refreshes. We recommend that you use 30 seconds or more. The minimum value is 20 seconds. Shorter refresh intervals create more CPU load on the probe system. If you experience load issues while using the PRTG web interface (or maps), set a longer refresh interval.
Audible Alarms	Define whether PRTG plays an audible alarm on web pages in the PRTG web interface when there is a new alarm: Do not play audible alarms: PRTG does not play sound files on any web pages. Play audible alarms on dashboard pages only: When there is a new alarm, PRTG plays a predefined sound on dashboard pages only. PRTG plays the sound with every refresh of the dashboard page if there is at least one new alarm. Play audible alarms on all pages: When there is a new alarm, PRTG plays a predefined sound on all web pages. PRTG plays the sound with every page refresh if there is at least one new alarm. PRTG only plays audible alarms if the New Alarms value in the global header area of the PRTG web interface is greater than 0 after a page refresh. PRTG does not consider the number of old alarms. For more information, see the Knowledge Base: Which audible notifications are available in PRTG? Can I change the default sound? and Why are audible alerts in public maps not working in Chrome?
Homepage URL	Define the user's default homepage in the PRTG web interface. This is the page that the user sees after logging in or when selecting Home from the main menu. Enter a PRTG-internal web page.
Time Zone	Define the time zone for the user. Depending on the time zone you select here, PRTG shows the user's local time zone in all data tables and graph legends. PRTG receives the Coordinated Universal Time (UTC) from the system time set on the PRTG core server for this purpose. If you get a warning message about differing time zones, see the Knowledge Base: Why do I get a warning message when time zones differ?
Date Format	Select the date format for the user: Use System Settings: Use the date format of the PRTG core server system. DD.MM.YYYY HH:MM:SS (24h) DD.MM.YYYY HH:MM:SS (A.M./P.M.) MM/DD/YYYY HH:MM:SS (24h) MM/DD/YYYY HH:MM:SS (A.M./P.M.) YYYY-MM-DD HH:MM:SS (24h) YYYY-MM-DD HH:MM:SS (A.M./P.M.) This setting takes effect after the next login.
Color Mode	Select a color mode for the PRTG web interface: Light Dark

Ticket System

Setting	Description
Email Notifications	Define if the user receives emails from the ticket system: Receive an email when a ticket changes: The user receives an email each time a ticket is assigned to the user or to the user group they are a member of, or if a ticket is changed. If the user edits tickets that are assigned to them or the user group they are a member of, or if they assign a ticket to themselves or their user group, they do not get an email. Do not receive any emails from the ticket system: The user does not receive any emails from the ticket system.

Setting

Description

Email Notifications

Define if the user receives emails from the ticket system:

Receive an email when a ticket changes: The user receives an email each time a ticket is assigned to the user or to the user group they are a member of, or if a ticket is changed.
If the user edits tickets that are assigned to them or the user group they are a member of, or if they assign a ticket to themselves or their user group, they do not get an email.
Do not receive any emails from the ticket system: The user does not receive any emails from the ticket system.

Save your settings. If you leave the page, all changes to the settings are lost.

Notification Contacts

On the Notification Contacts tab, you can define contact methods for each user account. Contact methods can be email addresses, phone numbers, or push devices (iOS and Android devices with the corresponding PRTG app).

Comments

On the Comments tab, you can enter free text for each object. You can use this function for documentation purposes or to leave information for other users.

History

On the History tab, all changes in the settings of an object are logged with a time stamp, the name of the user who made the change, and a message. The history log retains the last 100 entries.

KNOWLEDGE BASE