🤔 Suggestion: What about sharing your private repo with anyone just by a special link ?

[ayoub3bidi]

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I was thinking lately about the possibility of sharing my private repo with someone by a link I give it to him, so he can see it without making it public (a similare thing when you want to share a file from your google drive, you switch the General Access from Restricted to Anyone with the link and then you get a link you can give it to anyone to see your file).

I Think it will be a cool feature to have. What do you think ?

[devvsakib]

You can invite them so they will be able to access your repo and fork, as well as pr

[ayoub3bidi]

I know but that requires them to accept the invitation, but what about giving a link straight ahead just to see the code without any pre-actions. I think that will be useful.

[devvsakib]

no doubt. this would be obviously helpful and easier.

[itcarroll]

An "Anyone with the link can clone" feature for private repositories would be tremendously useful for exactly the same reasons that "Anyone with the link can view" is popular on Google Drive. You can share it with people who don't have an account. You want re-sharing to happen. You don't want to manage all the viewers.

Why not just make it public? Maybe you don't want the public to see issues or other GitHub features you are using. Maybe you want anyone to access the main branch, but not your development branch.

A related feature request is 32813.

[kimukook]

Some of the journal/conference requires that the paper submitted also come along with the authors' GitHub repo which contains the numerical simulation. I would like my repo to stay private before the publication, but visualizable to reviewers with a link so that they could see my results and code.

[jbellUIC]

As an instructor, my students have a strong desire for this feature.

I set up github repositories for them to use for their semester projects, both for them to share files among the group and for turning in their work for grading purposes. I want to keep the repositories private to prevent copying, either from students in the current semester or from past semester projects.

But the students would like to show their work to prospective employers when job hunting, for which they would put a link on their resumes for example. The "invitation to clone" model doesn't really work in this situation, but the "anyone with this particular link can view" would.

[KatayR]

Please please PLEASE IT'S 2024

[abdulahaddf]

As of now it's a mandatory feature.
anyone with the link can view the repo.

[ginqus]

please add this, it would be so useful

[quangsiDev]

please add this, that would be so useful

[PsyBrainy]

please add this!

[MsRiaCayde]

This feature would be beneficial to anyone searching for a position in the Tech field. The ability to share private repos with potential employers would allow users to upload project source code for (in my case) Game Design without compromising your project or release.

[ankit-gautam23]

The most secure way is to invite users as collaborators on your repository. This gives them specific access levels (read, write, etc.) based on your needs.

[ossup0v]

please add this!

[alnahian2003]

still not added? please add this feature. Thousands of people would get benefit from it

[xgloom]

This would be a great feature.

I would want to be able to see that there are active links-giving-access though and be able to revoke those at any time.

[vinayak071005]

Why is this still not a thing!! I am guessing security concerns? But we can restrict the pull requests to modify the private project by anyone so I don't see the point as to why they did not add the feature yet!

Please provide this feature.

[ananya183]

Desperately need this!

[TeigheThorsen]

I, too, would really like a share feature for anyone with a link to view a private repo.

[jaredgoedhart]

https://gist.github.com/ could be a solution to your problem.

[rcfduarte]

How is this not possible yet?

[Kamil777]

🧩 wt., 15 lip 2025, 15:12 użytkownik Renato Duarte ***@***.***> napisał:

…

How is this not possible yet? — Reply to this email directly, view it on GitHub <#44506 (comment)>, or unsubscribe <https://github.com/notifications/unsubscribe-auth/AHZHCZ67VZG66BDIG6ELTHD3IT42PAVCNFSM6AAAAAAT5AV5T6VHI2DSMVQWIX3LMV43URDJONRXK43TNFXW4Q3PNVWWK3TUHMYTGNZWGQ3TQMI> . You are receiving this because you are subscribed to this thread.Message ID: ***@***.*** com>

[LCI2Code]

Github doesn't seem to want to evolve; this need exists, like others.

Most of the most popular requests remain unaddressed or completely ignored.

Github claims to be community-driven, but clearly the community doesn't seem to interest them.
It's no surprise that many are abandoning the ship for alternative, more "reactive" solutions.

[Arnavjain2503]

you can try this one out :
gitshare.onrender.com/

[Aurthur07]

That's actually a really interesting idea! A temporary share link for private repos would be super useful for code reviews, demos, or sharing work with clients without having to add them as collaborators or make the repo public.
Google Drive's approach with time-limited or view-only links could work well here maybe with options to set expiration dates or restrict to read-only access. Would definitely save a lot of hassle in certain scenarios!

[Welding-Torch]

It's late 2025, come on GitHub team. Make this happen, or state a reason for why you're not implementing it.

[goody81]

Please help as my phone is hacked and

[itcarroll]

Reported.

[crbyxwpzfl]

pls

[pochicake]

Still nothing? Disappointing...

[usmanamin3254]

GitHub doesn’t let you share private repos via a simple link like Google Drive. To give someone access, you need to invite them as a collaborator or use an organization with controlled permissions.
It would definitely be a handy feature, but GitHub likely avoids it for security reasons—private repos often contain sensitive code. For now, inviting collaborators is the safest way to share.

[reach-Harishapc]

i guess its going to issue on Security

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I was thinking lately about the possibility of sharing my private repo with someone by a link I give it to him, so he can see it without making it public (a similare thing when you want to share a file from your google drive, you switch the General Access from Restricted to Anyone with the link and then you get a link you can give it to anyone to see your file).

I Think it will be a cool feature to have. What do you think ?

[itcarroll]

Where do you see this activity, please?

[reach-Harishapc]

Oh, sorry for the confusion — I didn’t mean any specific activity.
I just meant that GitHub might not add this feature because of potential security concerns — allowing public access links to private repos could be risky if not properly managed.

[ajaykumarreddy-k]

At the moment, GitHub doesn’t have a feature like that. Private repositories can only be accessed by collaborators you explicitly add, or by members of an organization with the right permissions.