Hot off the press, it’s just been announced that permissions on profiles will be 'end of life' in the Spring ’26 release. This gives us plenty of notice to move to permission sets for our existing profiles where we have assigned profile permissions.
For some time now, we’ve known that changes are coming to Salesforce profiles and permission sets. It’s been clear that permission sets are the direction of travel – so it’s been a matter of time to see when these changes will be made.
Profiles will still exist, but most permissions on profiles will only be available in permission sets.
Our profiles will still control the following:
- Setting the default Record type and App (but assignments will be on a permission set)
- Page Layout Assignments
- Login Hours
- IP Ranges
And permission sets will be available for:
- User Permissions
- Object Permissions
- Field Permissions
- Record Types
- Apps
- Tabs
Whilst we might have three years for us to start considering the migration of permissions from profiles to permission sets, it’s best to get started now if you can! If you’re currently creating new profiles or assigning new permissions – be sure to use permission sets rather profiles (if you’ve not already been doing so!).
Coming soon Salesforce is releasing a new feature called User Access Policies; from here you’ll be able to migrate your users from profiles to permission sets. Whilst it’s a currently a closed beta program in Spring ’23, it should hopefully be available to all in the not too distant future.
On top of this - you also might want to prevent permissions being assigned via profiles, and this feature should be available in the Spring ’24 release - giving you another two years to be ready without concerns over more profile permissions being assigned as you migrate.
Another tool that will make your life easier, is a change to the field creation wizard. When you currently create a field, you choose the profiles it is available for. There is another beta program that you can enable so that you can set field level security using permission sets instead of profiles. This should be live (generally available) in Summer ’23. If you want to switch on the beta program now though, go to Setup | User Management Settings.
If you want more information or help with migration, just contact us!