Collaborate in Lucid

Locate others with collaborator cursors

Collaborator cursors are available in Lucidchart and Lucidspark.

Collaborator cursors allow you to see exactly where on a document your collaborators are working in real-time. To locate a collaborator's cursor, click their icon in the top-right corner of the canvas. Each collaborator's icon will display their profile image or initials. Hover your cursor over a collaborator’s icon to see their full name.

If you are collaborating with more than 20 people, collaborator cursors are only visible for those actively collaborating—idle cursors are hidden for performance purposes. Additionally, inactive cursors for collaborators who are following a presenter are hidden.

Hide collaborator cursors

If you don’t want to see collaborators’ cursors on a Lucid document, follow these steps:

1. Click the Collaboration Tools icon at the top-right of the document.
   • If you have active collaborators in the document, open this menu by clicking the arrow to the right of the collaborator icons in the top-right corner of the document.
     
2. Click Settings at the bottom of the panel.
3. Toggle off “Show cursors”.

Invite others to follow you 

This feature is available in Lucidchart and Lucidspark. 

To invite others to follow you as you work on the canvas, follow these steps:

1. Click the Collaboration Tools icon at the top-right of the document.
   • If you have active collaborators in the document, open this menu by clicking the arrow to the right of the collaborator icons in the top-right corner of the document.
2. Click Invite others to me.

Using this feature invites all collaborators in the document to follow you as you navigate a document and see exactly what you are seeing in real-time.

A banner at the top of the page will indicate that you’re presenting your view to collaborators. To stop, click Stop in the banner.

Follow a collaborator

This feature is available in Lucidchart and Lucidspark. 

To follow a collaborator:

1. Click the Collaboration Tools icon at the top-right of the document.
   • If you have active collaborators in the document, open this menu by clicking the arrow to the right of the collaborator icons in the top-right corner of the document.

2. Select the collaborator you want to follow. 

You will then follow them and see exactly what they are seeing in real-time.

A banner at the top of the page will indicate that you’re following that collaborator. To stop following the collaborator, click Stop in the banner.

If a collaborator invites you to them, you will receive a notification that your collaborator invited you to follow them. To accept and follow their cursor, click Join now. If you don’t want to follow their cursor, click on the X.

If you edit the canvas while following a collaborator, your view of the presenter will automatically be paused. After you finish editing, a five second timer will begin, and you'll automatically rejoin their view once the timer expires.
 

Live emoji reactions for followers

When you are following a collaborator on a Lucidspark board, you will see a bar of emojis at the bottom center of your screen. To send an emoji, click on the emoji from that bar. Reactions sent are visible to the collaborator you are following, as well as any other users that are following that collaborator.

To disable live emoji reactions:

1. Click the Collaboration Tools icon at the top-right of the document.
   • If you have active collaborators in the document, open this menu by clicking the arrow to the right of the collaborator icons in the top-right corner of the document.
2. Click Settings.
3. Toggle off “Show reactions".

Chat with collaborators using cursor chat

To enable cursor chat in Lucidchart or Lucidspark, press “.” on your keyboard. You can also use the following hotkeys: “Ctrl + /” on PC or “Command + /” on Mac.

The character count limit is 120. Once you use one of the hotkeys mentioned above to enable cursor chat and then type in your message, it will persist for about 20 seconds and will be visible to all collaborators on the Lucid document. To clear the message sooner, you can click on an object or the canvas. To replace your chat with a new message while one is live, click “Enter” and type in your new message.

Enable collaborator colors

Collaborator colors are available in Lucidspark. 

To help identify collaborators and their work on a Lucidspark canvas, use collaborator colors. To enable collaborator colors, follow these steps:

1. Click the Collaboration Tools icon at the top-right of the document.
   • If you have active collaborators in the document, open this menu by clicking the arrow to the right of the collaborator icons in the top-right corner of the document.
2. Toggle on “Collaborator colors”. 

Each collaborator is assigned their own color, which styles their icon, cursor, freehand drawing, and sticky notes.

Set a preferred collaborator color

To set a preferred collaborator color for your Lucid account, follow these steps:

1. Open a Lucid document. 
2. Click your Profile image or initials in the top-right corner.
3. Select My color.
4. Choose a color from the available options.

The color you select will be set as your preferred collaborator color. Anytime you join a new Lucid document, you will be assigned that collaborator color as long as it is available. 

Note: A preferred collaborator color will not be applied if the color is already in use on a board. This functions on a first-come first-served basis. If your preferred collaborator color is already in use, you will be assigned another available collaborator color.

Add a color legend to your view

To easily identify the colors assigned to each collaborator, add a legend by toggling on “Color legend” on the Collaborator Tools panel. This legend only appears for you—other collaborators will need to add it to their canvas separately. From the color legend, you can edit your own color and your collaborators’ colors by clicking the  circle next to a name and selecting a new color from the options. 

Remove a collaborator color from legend

When a collaborator closes the Lucidspark board, their name next to their collaborator color will be grayed out. To delete an inactive collaborator color, hover your cursor over the collaborator’s name and click the trash can icon that appears. If the deleted user reconnects to the board, they will be assigned a new collaborator color.

Show authors on sticky notes

Showing authors on sticky notes is available in Lucidchart and Lucidspark.

Lucid’s author feature allows you to display the name of a sticky note’s creator in the bottom-right corner of each sticky note. If edits are made by different collaborators, you can see who last modified the sticky note by hovering over the author’s name.

On all sticky notes

To show the author of all sticky notes on a board, toggle on "Show authors" by following these steps:

1. Click the Collaboration Tools icon at the top-right of the document.
   • If you have active collaborators in the document, open this menu by clicking the arrow to the right of the collaborator icons in the top-right corner of the document.
2. Click Settings.

3. Toggle on “Show authors”.

   • You can also toggle on “Show avatars” to see each collaborators’ profile image or initials on the sticky note.

   

On a specific sticky note

To show the author of a single sticky note without enabling it for the entire document, follow these steps:

1. Right-click a sticky note.
2. Click Show Author.

Follow the same steps to hide author names on specific sticky notes.

Add comments and assign tasks

In addition to the real-time collaboration features covered above, Lucid also offers commenting and assigning tasks. Check out the Add comments and assign tasks to collaborators article for details.

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