How to Create Hub Sites in SharePoint Online: Step by Step (2024)

Hub sites in SharePoint Online are a new way to organize related sites together into centralized portals based on organizational attributes such as projects, concepts, teams, departments, divisions, regions, etc. A SharePoint Hub site can have both modern team sites and communication sites associated with it. Hub sites provide a common navigation structure, look and feel, logo, and search across associated sites. This article will guide you through the process of creating a Hub Site in SharePoint Online, including the steps for setting up a hub, and connecting existing sites to the hub.

Table of contents

  • What is Hub Site in SharePoint Online?
  • Features of Hub Sites in SharePoint Online
  • Step 1: Create Hub Site in SharePoint Online
  • Step 2: SharePoint Online: Connect the Site to Hub

Hub site brings consistency across sites from the top to down. When a team site or communication site is associated with a hub site, it inherits common characteristics, such as:

  • Consistent look and feel – For all sites associated, get the branding from the hub site. The logo and theme of the hub site are pushed to all underlying sites. This allows you to maintain a consistent look and feel across your sites.
  • Common Global Navigation across all associated sites.
  • Scoped Search – If you search within the hub site, It searches for content on the current hub site and all the connected sites and displays the search results page.
  • Site Activities – All user activities done on the associated sites.
  • Content Roll-up – Automated aggregation and display of content from multiple sites: Consider the scenario that you are rolling out department intranet sites and want a single landing page where the entire organization can see a roll-up of the announcements from each department all at once. The News web part, sites web part, and highlighted content web part can be utilized in hub sites to get aggregate content from all the associated sites and display the roll-up on the hub site’s home page.

You can designate an existing site collection as a hub site or create a new site collection and convert it as a hub site. But there are no ways to create a hub site directly using the create site option because there is no specific template. A SharePoint Communication or Team Site can be promoted to Hub Site. Make sure you have SharePoint Online Administrator permissions (or above) in Microsoft 365 to create SharePoint hub sites. There are two steps involved in configuring Hub sites in SharePoint Online:

  • Step 1: Create or convert an existing site to a Hub site
  • Step 2: Associate site collections to the hub site

How to create a Hub Site in SharePoint Online Admin Center?

To enable the hub site in SharePoint Online, do the following:

  1. Login to New SharePoint Admin Center >> Click on “Sites” >> Active Sites from the left navigation.
  2. Click on the “Create” button.
  3. Pick Communication Site Template and choose “Topic” Site Design.
  4. Click Finish to create the site.

You can also create a new hub site with PowerShell, as:

#Connect to SharePoint OnlineConnect-SPOService -url "https://Crescent-admin.sharepoint.com" -Credential (Get-credential) #Create a modern team siteNew-SPOSite -Url "https://Crescent.sharepoint.com/sites/ITHub" -Owner "Salaudeen@CrescentIntranet.Onmicrosoft.com" -StorageQuota 2048 -Title "Crescent IT Hub" -Template "STS#3"

Register Hub Site in SharePoint Online

To register a Hub Site through SharePoint Online Admin Center, follow these steps:

  1. Navigate to the new SharePoint Online Admin Center.
  2. Click on Active Sites to see a list of all the site collections.
  3. Click on the check box next to the site that will become a hub >> Click on “Register as Hub Site” from the Hub Site menu.
  4. Fill in the name of the Hub and click on Save.

Create Hub Site in SharePoint Online using PowerShell

You can convert existing Sites to Hub Sites, but sites that are already associated with another hub can’t be converted to a hub site. To make the site a Hub Site using PowerShell script, make sure you have downloaded and installed the latest SharePoint Online Management Shell first. If you already have a previous version of the shell installed, uninstall it first and then install the latest version.

Connect the SharePoint Online Management Shell

Connect-SPOService -Url https://Crescent-admin.sharepoint.com

It will prompt user credentials, give the credentials and connect to the SharePoint admin site.

Register the Site as Hub Site

Register-SPOHubSite -Site https://Crescent.sharepoint.com/sites/Departments -Principals $null

If you need the Hub Site to be unregistered, the following PowerShell command can be used:

UnRegister-SPOHubSite "https://Crescent.sharepoint.com/sites/Departments"

You can also revert the hub site to the team site or communication site from the SharePoint Online Admin center. How many hub sites can be created in SharePoint Online? Well, You can create up to 100 hub sites for an organization. There is no limit on the number of sites associated with a hub site, and this enables a hub site in SharePoint Online.

Customize Hub Site Logo, Theme, and Navigation:
Now we have the Hub Site Ready! Change the Logo, Theme for the Hub Site based on your organization’s requirements.

  • Go to the Hub Site >> click Gear Icon > Hub Site Settings

Furthermore, edit the hub site navigation that appears on all associated sites (the hub navigation will appear only on modern pages, however!). All sites associated with the hub site will inherit these elements. Please note, when you customize the hub site after associating with any SharePoint Online sites, it could take up to two hours for the changes to propagate to associated sites.

We have the flexibility to move from one hub site to another if your organization changes the way you are structured. Let’s say we have a “Sales” site associated with the “Departments” Hub site and want to restructure it to “Operations” Hub. We can simply detach the site from the department’s hub and reattach the site to the Operations Hub without having to migrate our sites anywhere. To associate a site with a hub site, you can follow any of these three approaches:

Option 1: Associate Site to Hub from Office 365 Admin Center
In SharePoint Online Admin Center, click on the checkbox next to the site collection you want to associate with the hub, then from the Hub site drop-down menu, choose “Associate with a hub site” from the list of all the hubs you have in your tenant, choose one you would like to connect to and click “Save”.

Can I associate a hub site with another hub site? Yes, You can!

Option 2: Associate to Hub site using PowerShell
To add a site to the hub, use this PowerShell script:

Add-SPOHubSiteAssociation https://Crescent.sharepoint.com/sites/Sales `-HubSite https://Crescent.sharepoint.com/sites/Departments

This sets the hub site association for the given site collection. To set the hub site association for a SharePoint Online site collection using PnP PowerShell, use: SharePoint Online: Set Hub Site Association using PowerShell

Option 3: Connect to Hub Site from the Site Collection
To associate the hub site with the Site, do the following:

  1. Navigate to the root site collection that you want to associate with the hub.
  2. Click on Settings gear Icon >> Select Site Information.
  3. Choose the Hub Site Association and click on Save.

It is worth noting that this technique only works for site collections that have been modernized!

Once you connect the site with a hub, Navigation, Theme, and logo will be applied to the newly joined site. You won’t be able to associate a SharePoint Online hub site with another hub site. Moreover, You can’t associate a site with more than one Hub Site.

Any site owner can join the site to the Hub. To control who can associate their site with hub sites, use the following PowerShell command:

Grant-SPOHubSiteRights -Identity https://Crescent.sharepoint.com/sites/Departments -Principals John@TheCrescentTech.com -Rights Joins

That’s All!

SharePoint Online: Hub Site Navigation
Associating a site collection to the hub does not automatically add links to the Top navigation of the hub site! By default, only the link of the Hub Site appears on top. We need to build the rest of the Top Navigation manually in the hub sites. Here is how to do this:

  1. Navigate to the Hub Site
  2. Hover over to the Top Navigation area >> Click on Edit
  3. Click the “+” sign to add a new link.
  4. Click OK and Save.

Associated Sites will automatically contain a link back to the SharePoint Online hub site. You’ll also notice that you cannot change the theme of an associated site, since it will inherit the theme from the hub site.

SharePoint Online: Hub Site Permissions
When users associate their sites with a hub, it doesn’t impact the permissions of either the hub site or the associated sites. It’s important to make sure all users you allow associating sites with the hub have permission to access the hub.

Disassociate a SharePoint site from a hub site
You can disassociate your site from a SharePoint hub site when the association is no longer needed. Doing so will remove the hub site navigation bar from the top of your site. The look that your site inherited from the hub site will stay the same, and features such as additional navigation links, applications, or custom lists with specific columns that were added as part of the inherited hub site design will remain.

To remove the existing hub site association, select “None” in the Hub Site association drop-down list and Save. It will remove the navigation and logo, but it will not restore the original theme. We need to change the Theme/look and feel manually.

To get all hub-site associations in SharePoint Online, use this PowerShell script: PowerShell to Get All Sites Associated with the Hub Sites in SharePoint Online

Conclusion:

In conclusion, Hub Sites in SharePoint Online are a powerful tool for bringing together related sites and content into a centralized location. With Hub Sites, organizations can create a unified look and feel for their intranet and make it easier for users to find the information they need. Creating a Hub Site in SharePoint Online is a straightforward process that can greatly improve the organization and accessibility of your intranet. By following the steps outlined in this article, you can quickly and easily create a Hub Site in SharePoint Online, providing a more cohesive and user-friendly intranet experience for your organization.

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How to Create Hub Sites in SharePoint Online: Step by Step (2024)

FAQs

How to Create Hub Sites in SharePoint Online: Step by Step? ›

SharePoint administrators can create hub sites in SharePoint in Microsoft 365. To create a hub site, a SharePoint admin changes an existing site to a hub site. A hub site links together sites based on a project, department, division, region, and so on.

Can you convert a SharePoint site to a hub site? ›

SharePoint administrators can create hub sites in SharePoint in Microsoft 365. To create a hub site, a SharePoint admin changes an existing site to a hub site. A hub site links together sites based on a project, department, division, region, and so on.

What is the difference between hub and site in SharePoint? ›

A hub is used organize sites with a shared theming, navigation, search and news roll ups. A home site serves as the top level portal with unique functionality like special SP mobile treatment, organizational news, tenant wide search, integration with SP start page, etc.

How many hub sites can SharePoint have? ›

An organization can have up to 2,000 hub sites. You might not need a hub site for every function and it's important to do some planning before you create hubs.

How to make a SharePoint site as a hub site? ›

Create a hub site in the new SharePoint admin center
  1. Select the site, select Hub on the command bar, and then select Register as hub site. Tip. ...
  2. Enter a display name for the hub site, and specify the individual users or security groups you want to allow to associate sites with the hub. Important. ...
  3. Select Save.
Apr 24, 2024

How can I tell if a SharePoint site is a hub site? ›

When a SharePoint administrator creates a hub site, they're converting an existing SharePoint site to a hub site. A hub site navigation bar will appear at the top of the site, but the home page and all site contents will remain the same.

What are the two types of SharePoint sites? ›

Foundationally, SharePoint has two different types of sites in the modern experience - communication sites and team sites. Each type of site has it's own set of templates that contain pre-populated content, pages, and web parts that can be customized to fit the needs of your organization.

Can a SharePoint site be associated to more than one hub? ›

Yes, you can create multiple SharePoint hubs for each department and connect them to the home intranet site with consistent global navigation and content roll-up. You can associate multiple hubs with each other to create a network of hubs that roll-up to each other to create connections and additional search scopes.

Can a hub site be a team site? ›

You can join any site into a hub site, including modern sites, classic sites, templates, team sites, and communication sites. You can locate hub sites from the SharePoint admin panel in the active sites menu. It will denote which is a hub.

What are the limitations of hub sites? ›

Hub Site Limits

Max of 2,000 Hub Sites per tenant. There is no limit on the number of associated sites per single Hub.

How to set up a hub? ›

Set up the hub
  1. Connect the power source to the hub. ...
  2. Connect the hub to the router using an Ethernet cable. ...
  3. Connect devices to the hub using Ethernet cables. ...
  4. Test the connection. ...
  5. Secure the connection (optional) ...
  6. Final Words.
Jan 24, 2023

How to enable hub navigation in SharePoint? ›

Show/Hide the navigation menu for a SharePoint in Microsoft 365 team site. If you have owner or admin permissions, you can show or hide the navigation menu for your team site. Select Settings, and then select Change the look. In the Navigation settings, select the toggle to turn Site navigation visibility on or off.

How do I create a site within a SharePoint site? ›

How to Create a subsite in SharePoint Online
  1. Go to your SharePoint online site.
  2. Click on Site Contents in the settings menu.
  3. At the Site Contents page, click +New and select Subsite.
  4. Fill up the information based on your requirements. ...
  5. Click Create.

How to create a site in SharePoint Online beginner tutorial? ›

Select + Create site on the SharePoint start page. Select whether you'd like to create a Team site or a Communication site. Select the template that you want to use to create your new site. Select Use template to begin creating a site from your selected template.

Who can unregister a site as a hub site in SharePoint online? ›

If you're a user who has SharePoint administrator or above permissions in Microsoft 365, you can make a hub site no longer a hub site (unregister it as a hub site).

How do I turn a SharePoint site into a subsite? ›

Navigate to the SharePoint site that will house the new subsite. Click Site contents on the left menu pane. At the top of the page, click New to expand the drop-down. Click Subsite from the menu.

How do I migrate a SharePoint site to another site? ›

Go to the Cloud Transfer page, select data in a SharePoint Online site documents library as the source, and select a location in another SharePoint site as the destination. Then click the “Transfer Now” button and MultCloud will immediately complete the SharePoint Online site-to-site migration.

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