What is the Difference Between a User and a Sub‑Account in Vultr?

reference slug: platform/other/sub-accounts

In Vultr, users and sub-accounts serve different purposes for managing access and resources across your infrastructure. Understanding the distinction helps you choose the right setup for your team or organization.

Users

Users are secondary logins added to your primary Vultr account. When you invite a user:

• They sign in with their own credentials.
• You can assign them specific permissions, like managing servers, viewing billing, or deploying new instances, based on your operational needs.
• All users share the same billing account and access the same pool of infrastructure unless explicitly restricted by permissions.

This setup is ideal for teams working within the same environment, where the goal is to collaborate securely without sharing the root login. Refer to the Manage Users documentation to learn how to invite users and assign permissions.

Sub‑Accounts

Sub-accounts are standalone Vultr accounts created under a Parent Account. Each sub-account:

• Has its own isolated infrastructure, deployments, and settings.
• Operates independently but is billed through the Parent Account.
• Can have its own users and API keys, separate from the Parent Account.

This approach is best suited for organizations that want to separate environments, for example, by department, project, or client, while maintaining centralized billing and account ownership. To learn how to create and manage sub-accounts, see the Sub-Accounts documentation.

Use users to delegate access within the same account, and sub-accounts when you need full separation between projects or teams.