When should I attach AWSManagedSettingsReadOnlyAccess?

The reference page says you can attach AWSManagedSettingsReadOnlyAccess to your users, groups and roles, and describes it as read-only access to AWS Settings for team members. Attach it where viewing is the intended scope.

What does AWSManagedSettingsReadOnlyAccess grant?

It allows 14 read actions on all resources: account information and contact information, identity store and IAM Identity Center directory user and group reads, and AWS Organizations account, delegated administrator and policy lists.

What are the security risks of AWSManagedSettingsReadOnlyAccess?

It grants no write actions, but it exposes contact details, directory users and groups, and the list of organisation accounts. AWS managed policies don't grant least privilege permissions, and you must consider the security risk of granting principals more permissions than they need. AWS updates to the policy affect every identity it is attached to.

AWSManagedSettingsReadOnlyAccess

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Summary

Grants team members read-only access to AWS Settings, including workspace and owner information, team membership, plan and spend summary. It does not grant permissions to modify workspace configuration or to manage billing and payments.

Permissions imported from the AWS Managed Policy Reference Guide; other sections reviewed against the listed AWS sources.

Identity

ARN: arn:aws:iam::aws:policy/AWSManagedSettingsReadOnlyAccess
Default version: v3
Created: 2026-07-22
Last edited: 2026-08-21
Services: account, identitystore, organizations, sso, sso-directory

Control-plane actions (14)

By access level: 6 List, 8 Read.

Control-plane actions by service
Service	Granted	Access levels and limits	Granted by
Account	2 of 20	2 Read; 0 restricted, 0 conditional	account:GetAccountInformation, account:GetContactInformation
Identity Store	4 of 29	3 List, 1 Read; 0 restricted, 0 conditional	identitystore:DescribeUser, identitystore:ListGroupMemberships, identitystore:ListGroups, identitystore:ListUsers
Organizations	4 of 63	3 List, 1 Read; 0 restricted, 0 conditional	organizations:DescribeOrganization, organizations:ListAccounts, organizations:ListDelegatedAdministrators, organizations:ListPolicies
IAM Identity Center	1 of 126	1 Read; 0 restricted, 0 conditional	sso:DescribeInstance
IAM Identity Center directory	3 of 57	3 Read; 0 restricted, 0 conditional	sso-directory:DescribeUsers, sso-directory:SearchGroups, sso-directory:SearchUsers

Account: 2 actions

account:GetAccountInformation (Read)
account:GetContactInformation (Read)

Identity Store: 4 actions

identitystore:DescribeUser (Read)
identitystore:ListGroupMemberships (List)
identitystore:ListGroups (List)
identitystore:ListUsers (List)

Organizations: 4 actions

organizations:DescribeOrganization (Read)
organizations:ListAccounts (List)
organizations:ListDelegatedAdministrators (List)
organizations:ListPolicies (List)

IAM Identity Center: 1 actions

sso:DescribeInstance (Read)

IAM Identity Center directory: 3 actions

sso-directory:DescribeUsers (Read)
sso-directory:SearchGroups (Read)
sso-directory:SearchUsers (Read)

Data-plane actions (0)

By access level: none.

This policy grants no actions in this plane.

Excluded and conditional actions

No patterns are excluded by NotAction or Deny statements.

Resource scope and attachment

Resource scope across granted actions: all-resources.

Can be attached: Yes, to users, groups and roles.

Why this tier

Grants only List and Read actions.

Guidance

Practical scope

Five statements, all on Resource "*". AccountReadOnly allows account:GetAccountInformation and account:GetContactInformation. IdentityStoreReadOnly allows identitystore:DescribeUser, identitystore:ListGroupMemberships, identitystore:ListGroups and identitystore:ListUsers. OrganizationsReadOnly allows organizations:DescribeOrganization, organizations:ListAccounts, organizations:ListDelegatedAdministrators and organizations:ListPolicies. SSOReadOnly allows sso:DescribeInstance. SSODirectoryReadOnly allows sso-directory:DescribeUsers, sso-directory:SearchGroups and sso-directory:SearchUsers.

Use cases

Let team members view AWS Settings information such as workspace and owner details, team membership and the plan and spend summary, without changing configuration or billing.

Best practices

AWS managed policies don't grant least privilege permissions. The IAM User Guide suggests using IAM Access Analyzer to see which permissions principals actually use, then writing a custom policy or generating one with only the required permissions.

Security considerations

The policy grants no write actions, but it lets a principal read account and contact information, search and describe IAM Identity Center users and groups, and list every account in the organisation.
You cannot change the permissions in an AWS managed policy. If AWS updates the policy, the update affects every user, group and role it is attached to.

Assignment guidance

You can attach this policy to your users, groups and roles. The reference page also links to guidance on creating a permission set using AWS managed policies in IAM Identity Center. It fits where read-only access to AWS Settings information is intended.

Same service

Same domain

Frequently asked questions

When should I attach AWSManagedSettingsReadOnlyAccess?: The reference page says you can attach AWSManagedSettingsReadOnlyAccess to your users, groups and roles, and describes it as read-only access to AWS Settings for team members. Attach it where viewing is the intended scope.
What does AWSManagedSettingsReadOnlyAccess grant?: It allows 14 read actions on all resources: account information and contact information, identity store and IAM Identity Center directory user and group reads, and AWS Organizations account, delegated administrator and policy lists.
What are the security risks of AWSManagedSettingsReadOnlyAccess?: It grants no write actions, but it exposes contact details, directory users and groups, and the list of organisation accounts. AWS managed policies don't grant least privilege permissions, and you must consider the security risk of granting principals more permissions than they need. AWS updates to the policy affect every identity it is attached to.

Policy JSON

Download policy.json

{
  "Version": "2012-10-17",
  "Statement": [
    {
      "Sid": "AccountReadOnly",
      "Effect": "Allow",
      "Action": [
        "account:GetAccountInformation",
        "account:GetContactInformation"
      ],
      "Resource": "*"
    },
    {
      "Sid": "IdentityStoreReadOnly",
      "Effect": "Allow",
      "Action": [
        "identitystore:DescribeUser",
        "identitystore:ListGroupMemberships",
        "identitystore:ListGroups",
        "identitystore:ListUsers"
      ],
      "Resource": "*"
    },
    {
      "Sid": "OrganizationsReadOnly",
      "Effect": "Allow",
      "Action": [
        "organizations:DescribeOrganization",
        "organizations:ListAccounts",
        "organizations:ListDelegatedAdministrators",
        "organizations:ListPolicies"
      ],
      "Resource": "*"
    },
    {
      "Sid": "SSOReadOnly",
      "Effect": "Allow",
      "Action": [
        "sso:DescribeInstance"
      ],
      "Resource": "*"
    },
    {
      "Sid": "SSODirectoryReadOnly",
      "Effect": "Allow",
      "Action": [
        "sso-directory:DescribeUsers",
        "sso-directory:SearchGroups",
        "sso-directory:SearchUsers"
      ],
      "Resource": "*"
    }
  ]
}

Version history

Current version v3, edited by AWS on 2026-08-21. Version history is recorded from 2026-11-11. Earlier versions are in the IAM console under Policy versions.

Attach snippets

AWS CLI

aws iam attach-role-policy --role-name ROLE_NAME --policy-arn arn:aws:iam::aws:policy/AWSManagedSettingsReadOnlyAccess
aws iam attach-user-policy --user-name USER_NAME --policy-arn arn:aws:iam::aws:policy/AWSManagedSettingsReadOnlyAccess
aws iam attach-group-policy --group-name GROUP_NAME --policy-arn arn:aws:iam::aws:policy/AWSManagedSettingsReadOnlyAccess

CloudFormation

Resources:
  ExampleRole:
    Type: AWS::IAM::Role
    Properties:
      AssumeRolePolicyDocument: {}  # replace with your trust policy
      ManagedPolicyArns:
        - arn:aws:iam::aws:policy/AWSManagedSettingsReadOnlyAccess

Terraform

resource "aws_iam_role_policy_attachment" "awsmanagedsettingsreadonlyaccess" {
  role       = aws_iam_role.example.name
  policy_arn = "arn:aws:iam::aws:policy/AWSManagedSettingsReadOnlyAccess"
}

CDK (TypeScript)

role.addManagedPolicy(
  iam.ManagedPolicy.fromAwsManagedPolicyName("AWSManagedSettingsReadOnlyAccess"),
);

Sources

AWSManagedSettingsReadOnlyAccess (AWS Managed Policy Reference Guide) (retrieved 2026-11-13; supports summary, practicalScope, useCases, securityConsiderations, assignmentGuidance, faqs)
Managed policies and inline policies (IAM User Guide) (retrieved 2026-11-12; supports securityConsiderations, faqs)
AWS managed policies for job functions (IAM User Guide) (retrieved 2026-11-12; supports bestPractices, faqs)