> ## Documentation Index
> Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://docs.oncortex.ai/llms.txt
> Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further.

# Shared brains

> Where teams build knowledge together, deliberately

A shared brain is a memory your team builds together: the company knowledge base, a client project, a product area. A shared brain is simply a brain with more than one member; the member list decides who can see it and what each person can do.

## Nothing arrives by accident

Nothing flows into a shared brain on its own. Every write names its destination brain explicitly, whether it comes from a person working in the inbox, an agent acting on someone's instruction, or a connected tool pointed at that specific brain. An agent can only write to brains its person can write to, checked live on every call, and when someone captures without naming a destination, it goes to their own brain, not a shared one.

For something to appear in a shared brain, someone with Write access put it there: directly, through their agent, or by [promoting](/brains/promoting) it from their own brain.

## Members and roles

People are added to a brain with one of four roles:

| Role      | In plain words                                                                       |
| --------- | ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ |
| **Read**  | Can browse pages, search, and read the inbox. Cannot change anything.                |
| **Write** | Everything Read can do, plus add to the inbox, file items, and create or edit pages. |
| **Admin** | Everything Write can do, plus manage members and brain settings.                     |
| **Owner** | Everything Admin can do, plus delete the brain. Every brain has an owner.            |

Your agents inherit these roles: an agent connected by a Reader can only read the brain, whoever asks it to do otherwise.

## Creating one

Creating brains is a workspace admin action. From **Brains**, an admin creates a new brain, gives it a name and a description (write the description for your agents: it is how they decide what belongs there), picks a [template](/brains/templates) that matches what it is for, and adds members. A brain for a new teammate can also be created automatically from their [invite](/teams/workspaces). It starts empty; its inbox works exactly like any other.

## Try it

1. Have a workspace admin create a shared brain called "Team Handbook" using the Company template.
2. Add a teammate with the Write role.
3. Drop a document into its inbox and watch it become the brain's first page.