Introducing Collaborative Editing: Work Together Without Chaos

One of our most requested features has arrived: Collaborative Editing lets your team work on the same content simultaneously.

You know the situation. Marketing needs that landing page updated by 3 PM. Sarah's working on the hero copy, Mike's updating the product features, and someone needs to swap out those images.

In most systems, this means coordinating who's editing what and when, hoping nobody overwrites someone else's work.

Collaborative Editing solves this.

How It Works

When multiple people open the same content item, everyone can clearly see who else is there. More importantly, when someone starts editing a specific field, it locks for everyone else until they're done.

You'll see user avatars showing who's active on the page, and any field someone is currently editing gets locked with a clear indicator of who's working on it. No more mystery edits or lost changes.

The best part? It works across all your content relationships too.

Building complex pages with linked content blocks, product relationships, or any of the dynamic structures Directus makes easy? Your whole team can work on different pieces simultaneously.

What Makes This Different

1. Field-Level Protection. Other systems might lock entire pages or sections. We lock individual fields, so your team can work on the same content item without getting in each other's way.
2. Clear Visibility. See exactly who's editing what in real time. No guessing if someone else is working on something.
3. Works Everywhere. Whether you're editing a simple blog post or a complex page with multiple content relationships, collaborative editing works the same way.
4. Your Choice When to Use It. This is an extension, not a forced feature. Enable it globally or just for specific collections where your team needs it most.

A Practical Example

Let's say your team is updating a product launch page that includes hero content, feature sections, testimonials, and pricing tables (all stored as separate content relationships).

❌ Without Collaborative Editing

Your team has to coordinate who edits what and when. Someone calls dibs on the hero section, another person waits to update pricing, and the designer can't swap images until everyone else is done. One person accidentally overwrites the testimonials someone else just updated.

✅ With Collaborative Editing

Everyone opens the same page. Charlie immediately starts editing the hero headline, and that field locks with her avatar. Mac jumps into the pricing table while Dennis swaps images in the feature section. The testimonials editor, Dee, sees exactly which sections are being worked on and updates the customer quotes. All changes happen simultaneously, safely, and everyone can see the page coming together.

Getting Started

Since Collaborative Editing is an extension, you'll need to install it first. Download it from the Directus marketplace or grab it from Directus Labs.

Once installed, you have two ways to enable it:

Global Approach: Go to Project Settings > Module Bar and check "Real Time Collaboration." This adds collaborative editing to all your collections and is the easiest way to get started.

Selective Approach: If you prefer more control, enable collaborative editing only for specific collections. Go to any collection's settings, add the "Collaboration Interface," and it'll only work for that collection. Perfect if you have sensitive data that doesn't need collaborative editing.

Collaborative Editing is Available Now!

This extension is ready to install and use in your Directus projects.

And as always, we're curious to see how this changes your team's workflow. Let us know how collaborative editing works for your projects in our community at directus.chat.