Stack role bindings

Stacks can receive role bindings to perform operations with elevated permissions, similar to how users, API keys, and IdP groups receive permissions through Spacelift's RBAC system.

Stack role attachments replace the deprecated Administrative flag, providing a more flexible, auditable, and powerful approach to granting stacks elevated permissions.

Why use stack role attachments

Stack role attachments offer significant advantages over the deprecated administrative flag:

Cross-space access

Administrative flag limitation: Can only create resources in the stack's own space and subspaces.

Role attachments advantage: Can attach roles to sibling spaces, enabling horizontal access across the space tree. In the example below, a stack in ChildSpace1 can be granted access to ChildSpace2:

graph TD
    A[root] --> B[ChildSpace1]
    A --> C[ChildSpace2]

Fine-grained access control

Administrative flag limitation: All-or-nothing approach - grants full Space Admin permission with every available permission.

Role attachments advantage: Use custom roles with specific permissions (for example, only context:create and workerpool:create).

This means a stack can create contexts and worker pools, but cannot manage any other resources, such as policies or webhooks.

Enhanced audit trail

Administrative flag: Basic audit trail with stack actor information.

Role attachments advantage: Audit trail webhooks include role information in the actor_roles field (array of role slugs).

This provides better visibility into what permissions the stack was using when performing actions. See the audit trail documentation for details.

Modern RBAC consistency

Role attachments align stacks with the broader role-based access model already used by users, IdP groups, and API keys, providing a consistent permission management experience across all actors.

Assign roles to stacks

Prerequisites

To attach a role to a stack, you need:

• StackManage permission (or Space admin permission as fallback) to the stack's space
• Space admin permission to the binding space (the space where the role will be effective)

Why both permissions are required

Creating a role binding that grants permissions to a space effectively allows the stack to act in that space. To prevent privilege escalation, you must have admin access to both spaces: the space where the stack resides and the space where the role will be effective.

Using the Web UI

1. Navigate to the stack's Settings page, then choose Roles on the left
2. Click Manage Roles on the top right
3. In the sidebar, select the desired role and the target space
4. Click Add

Using the Terraform provider

Use the spacelift_role_attachment resource:

resource "spacelift_space" "devops" {
  name            = "devops"
  description     = "A space for devops engineers"
  parent_space_id = "root"
}

resource "spacelift_stack" "devops_admin" {
  name        = "Admin stacks for Devs"
  repository  = "stacks-for-devs"
  space_id    = spacelift_space.devops.id
  description = "Only has permissions to create another stacks in the dev space"
  branch      = "main"
}

resource "spacelift_role" "stack_creator" {
  name        = "Stack creator"
  description = "A role solely for managing stacks"
  actions     = ["STACK_MANAGE"]
}

resource "spacelift_space" "dev" {
  name            = "dev"
  description     = "A space for development stacks"
  parent_space_id = "root"
}

resource "spacelift_role_attachment" "stack_creator_to_devops_admin_stack" {
  stack_id = spacelift_stack.devops_admin.id # (1)
  role_id  = spacelift_role.stack_creator.id # (2)
  space_id = spacelift_space.dev.id # (3)
}

1. The stack receiving the role attachment.
2. The role to attach to the stack.
3. The target space: this is where the role will be effective.

In the above scenario, the devops_admin stack will have the Stack creator role effective in the dev space, allowing it to create and manage stacks within that space.

For more information, see the Spacelift Terraform provider documentation.

Permission cascading

Role attachments cascade down to child spaces, similar to how the administrative flag worked:

graph TD
    role{{ Role }}
    parentSpace[ParentSpace]
    childSpace1[ChildSpace1]
    childSpace2[ChildSpace2]
    grandchildSpace[GrandchildSpace]

    role ~~~ parentSpace
    role e1@-. Attached to .-> parentSpace
    e1@{animate: true}
    parentSpace --> childSpace1
    parentSpace --> childSpace2
    childSpace2 --> grandchildSpace

If a role is attached to ParentSpace, the same role will be effective in ChildSpace1, ChildSpace2, and GrandchildSpace as well.

Root space caution

Since the root space is the parent of all spaces, attaching roles to it affects all spaces in your account. Use this with extreme caution and only when necessary.

Root space restriction

You can only assign a role to the root space if the stack itself is located in the root space. This restriction prevents unintentional access elevation - a stack in a child-of-root space cannot be granted permissions that cascade to all spaces in your account. If you need a stack in a child space to access resources across multiple spaces, attach roles to specific spaces rather than the root space.

Administrative flag

The administrative flag is deprecated in favor of role attachments, but it still works and takes precedence over them:

• If administrative = true, any attached roles will be completely ineffective
• You must set administrative = false for role attachments to take effect
• This is critical for migration - disable the administrative flag after creating role attachments

See Migration from administrative flag for how to move off the flag.

Policy integration

Policies can react to stack role attachments through the stack.roles field in policy inputs. This enables policy-based logic based on what roles a stack has attached.

Example: Reject Space Admin role usage

Rego v1Rego v0

package spacelift

reject_with_note contains "Don't use the Space Admin role!" if {
  some role in input.stack.roles
  role.id == "space-admin" # (1)
}

package spacelift

reject_with_note["Don't use the Space Admin role!"] {
  role := input.stack.roles[_]
  role.id == "space-admin" # (1)
}

1. Role slug. Use either "Copy Slug" button in the UI or the spacelift_role data source to retrieve it.

Multiple roles

Stacks can have multiple role bindings:

• Different roles in different spaces for varied access levels
• Multiple roles in the same space (permissions are additive)
• Combinations of Space Admin in own space and Reader in other spaces

Example: Multiple role attachments

# Admin access to development space
resource "spacelift_role_attachment" "dev_admin" {
  stack_id = spacelift_stack.platform.id
  role_id  = "space-admin"
  space_id = "development-space-id"
}

# Read access to production space
resource "spacelift_role_attachment" "prod_reader" {
  stack_id = spacelift_stack.platform.id
  role_id  = "space-reader"
  space_id = "production-space-id"
}

External state access

External state access allows you to read the state of a stack from outside authorized runs and tasks. See the documentation here for further details.

In order for your stack to access another stack's OpenTofu/Terraform state, the stack needs the stack:state-read and stack:state-download actions on the target stack's space. This can be achieved by attaching a role with those actions to the stack for the target stack's space.

Example:

resource "spacelift_stack" "consumer" {
  # Properties are omitted for brevity
}

resource "spacelift_role" "state_reader" {
  name    = "state-reader"
  actions = ["STACK_STATE_READ", "STACK_STATE_DOWNLOAD"]
}

resource "spacelift_role_attachment" "state_reader" {
  stack_id = spacelift_stack.consumer.id
  role_id  = spacelift_role.state_reader.id
  space_id = spacelift_stack.provider.space_id
}

resource "spacelift_stack" "provider" {
  # Properties are omitted for brevity
  terraform_external_state_access = true
}

Note

The Space writer and Space admin roles also include stack:state-read and stack:state-download.

Migration from administrative flag

The administrative flag is deprecated in favor of role attachments, but it still works and there's no cutover date: nothing breaks if you keep using it. Migrating to a Space Admin role attachment is recommended to unlock the advantages role attachments offer (cross-space access, fine-grained permissions, and a richer audit trail) and to align stacks with the rest of the RBAC model.

Because the flag takes precedence over role attachments, migration is a two-step process: attach the role first, then disable the flag.

Note

The Space Admin role is a built-in system role, so you don't need to create it manually, it already exists in your Spacelift account.

Step-by-step migration guide

1. Identify stacks with administrative flag

List all stacks with administrative = true in your account. You can do this through the Spacelift UI (by filtering on the stacks page) or by searching your OpenTofu/Terraform code for the administrative attribute.

2. For each stack, create role attachment

Attach the Space Admin role to the stack using the stack's own space as the binding space:

Using the Terraform providerUsing the Web UI

data "spacelift_role" "admin_role" {
  slug = "space-admin"
}

resource "spacelift_role_attachment" "stack_admin" {
  stack_id = spacelift_stack.management.id
  space_id = spacelift_stack.management.space_id
  role_id  = data.spacelift_role.admin_role.id
}

1. Navigate to the stack's Settings page, then choose Roles.
2. Click Manage Roles on the top right.
3. In the drawer, select the Space admin role and the stack's own space as the target.
4. Click Add.

Assuming your stack is in the dev space, the role attachment will grant Space admin permissions in the dev space:

3. Remove the administrative attribute

Once you've verified the role has been attached, remove the administrative attribute:

resource "spacelift_stack" "management" {
   name           = "Management Stack"
-  administrative = true
}

Warning

The administrative flag takes precedence over role attachments. While administrative = true, the attached role is ignored. You must either set administrative = false, or remove the attribute entirely (recommended) for the role attachment to take effect.

4. Verify the role attachment

After disabling the flag, verify that the stack can perform the same operations as before. Trigger a tracked run and ensure it succeeds.

Rollback procedure

If you need to roll back during migration:

1. Set administrative = true again
2. The administrative flag takes precedence, so role attachments will be ignored
3. Test that everything works as before
4. You can leave the role attachments in place and try migration again later

Adjust policies if necessary

If any of your policies reference the stack.administrative field, update them to use the stack.roles field instead. For example:

Rego v1Rego v0

# Old policy:
deny contains "Administrative stacks are not allowed" if {
  stack := input.spacelift.stack
  stack.administrative == true
}

# Would become:
deny contains "Administrative stacks are not allowed" if {
  some role in input.stack.roles
  role.id == "space-admin" # (1)
}

# Old policy:
deny["Administrative stacks are not allowed"] {
  stack := input.spacelift.stack
  stack.administrative == true
}

# Would become:
deny["Administrative stacks are not allowed"] {
  role := input.stack.roles[_]
  role.id == "space-admin" # (1)
}

1. Role slug. Use either "Copy Slug" button in the UI or the spacelift_role data source to retrieve it.

Edge cases

Stack moving between spaces

When a stack moves to a different space, existing role bindings remain unchanged. This is intentional and important for Terraform provider stability.

If you want to update role bindings after moving a stack, you need to explicitly modify the role attachments.