Connecting SharePoint to AlphaSense

Connect your SharePoint to automatically sync your notes and search for insights

With AlphaSense, you can set up a live one-way connection with your SharePoint account and apply AI-powered search to your notes.

This article contains:

• Prerequisites for SharePoint Workspace Connection

• Choosing a Connection Type
• Connect and Configure SharePoint
• Admin Consent Steps (via Microsoft Entra)
• Syncing and Managing Your Content
• Searching Across Your SharePoint Content in AlphaSense
• Disconnecting Your SharePoint Account
• Additional Items to Note
• SharePoint Connections FAQs
• SharePoint Workspace Connection FAQs

Prerequisites for SharePoint Workspace Connection

Connecting SharePoint to AlphaSense requires a one-time approval from your Microsoft 365 tenant administrator. Once an admin has granted consent for your organization, anyone at your company can connect their SharePoint account without encountering the "Need admin approval" screen.

• If you're an IT administrator setting this up for your organization, complete the Admin Consent Steps (via Microsoft Entra) section below before rolling SharePoint out to your users.
• If you're an end user and you've hit the "Need admin approval" screen, share the Admin Consent Steps (via Microsoft Entra) section with your IT team — they only need to do this once for your whole organization.

Note: Admin consent is required once per organization, not once per user.

Choosing a Connection Type

When you connect to SharePoint, you'll choose between two connection types depending on whether you're syncing content for yourself or for your whole organization.

1. Sharepoint Individual Connection

Best for: A single user who wants to sync their own SharePoint content into AlphaSense.

What gets synced: Content from the Documents and Site Assets libraries on any SharePoint sites and subsites you personally have access to.

Who can see it: Only you, by default. You can manually share synced content with colleagues inside AlphaSense.

What's required:

• You sign in with your Microsoft Work account.
• Your tenant administrator must have granted consent for AlphaSense, either tenant-wide (Part 1 above) or by approving your individual consent request (Part 2 above).

With an Individual Connection, you have full control over how your synced content is shared within AlphaSense. Once the connection is established, you can choose to keep your content private or share it with others, based on the sharing settings you configure during folder sync setup.

AlphaSense offers four sharing preferences:

• Private: Content is only accessible to you and remains hidden from other team members.
• Select Individuals: You can explicitly choose which team members have access to your synced content.
• Select Group: You can create groups in AlphaSense, add relevant team members, and configure content to be shared with those groups.
• Default Setting: You can set any of the above options as your default, ensuring that all incoming content is automatically shared according to your preferred configuration.

2. Workspace Connection

Best for: Rolling SharePoint out to your whole organization so that everyone sees the SharePoint content they're entitled to, with permissions mirrored from SharePoint.

What gets synced: Content from the Documents and Site Assets libraries across the connected SharePoint sites and subsites.

Who can see it: Anyone in your AlphaSense workspace who has Can view (or higher) access to the original site or subsite in SharePoint. Native SharePoint permissions are always respected and cannot be overridden inside AlphaSense.

What's required:

• The user setting up the connection must be a site owner (or have site-collection administrator rights) on the SharePoint site being connected. Without that level of access, the connection completes, but no sites will be available to sync.
• A one-time tenant admin consent for AlphaSense.
• Depending on your organization's setup, AlphaSense uses one of three Microsoft access levels, described below.

With a Workspace Connection, permissions mirroring is enforced. This means AlphaSense automatically mirrors the access permissions from your SharePoint instance. Users will only see sites and documents they are authorized to access in SharePoint, ensuring secure and controlled content visibility.

Sharing permissions cannot be changed within AlphaSense for Workspace Connections, as they are entirely managed through SharePoint by your IT administrators.

Workspace Access Levels

For Workspace connections, AlphaSense supports three levels of SharePoint access:

In every case, an individual user only ever sees content they already have permission to view in SharePoint — these access levels control what AlphaSense as a service is allowed to fetch, not what any individual sees.

Scopes Used in Different Connections

Connect and Configure SharePoint 

The following walkthrough uses an Individual Connection with Full Access as the example. The screens for a Workspace Connection are nearly identical.

1: Open the AlphaSense Integration Center and click Connect SharePoint.

• Navigate to https://research.alpha-sense.com/integration/sharepoint and click Connect SharePoint. You can make the connection via any active AlphaSense Licensed User.

When making the connection: The user making the connection will see all content they are entitled to see within the source system and have the ability to ingest any of that content. By default, no content is ingested until directed by the user.

2: Choose Full Access or Reduced Access.

• Full Access displays all SharePoint sites and folder structure you are permitted to within your organization, but you still need to select the specific sites and folders you want to sync.
• Reduced Access displays only the sites/folders you manually enter, and you will still choose the specific folders to ingest during setup.

For this walkthrough, we select Full Access and click Continue.

3: Choose your connection type.

• You will be asked to select between the individual or workspace connections discussed above.

4: Sign in with Microsoft and review access.

• You will be prompted to log in with your Microsoft credentials. After logging in, review the access details. What happens next depends on whether you have admin rights in your identity provider:
• If you have admin rights: select the "Consent on behalf of your organization" checkbox and click Accept at the bottom. The connection will proceed.
• If you don't have admin rights: you will be asked to provide a reason for the request, and your IDP administrator will receive a notification to approve it. The approving admin's procedure is documented in the Admin Consent Steps (via Microsoft Entra).

5. (Sites.Selected) Enter the site URLs to grant access to.

Skip this step if you are setting up an Individual Connection, or a Workspace Connection with the Sites.Read.All scope. In those cases, AlphaSense can already see every site you have native access to and will show them in the site picker without any URL entry. Proceed directly to the next step.

• If you are setting up a Workspace Connection with the Sites.Selected scope by selecting Reduced Access shown below, an extra step is required before AlphaSense can show you any sites. 
• On the SharePoint Connection Page in AlphaSense, paste in the URL of each SharePoint site.

• Enter one site URL per line. Use the root site URL only — for example, https://<tenant>.sharepoint.com/sites/Deals. Sub-sites, document libraries, and folder paths are not valid entries.
• Only the sites listed here will appear in the site picker in the next step.
• From here, follow the standard sync setup flow in the Integration Center — select the sites and folders to ingest, configure sharing (Individual Connections only), apply company and topic tags, and click Confirm & Sync to start ingestion. Track progress under Integration Center → Monitoring.

Admin Consent Steps (via Microsoft Entra)

There are two admin-consent scenarios for SharePoint:

• Part 1 — Granting admin consent for the entire organization (proactive, before any user connects)
• Part 2 — Approving an access request from a user (reactive, when an individual user clicks "Request Approval" from the AlphaSense connection flow)

Part 1: Granting admin consent for the entire organization

An IT administrator with Global Administrator or Cloud Application Administrator privileges can grant tenant-wide consent using these steps:

• Log into Microsoft Entra: Sign in to the Microsoft Entra admin center using your corporate administrator credentials.
• Navigate to Enterprise Apps: In the left-hand navigation menu, expand the Identity section, click on Applications, and select Enterprise applications.

• Find the AlphaSense-Sharepoint application: Use the search bar to look up AlphaSense-Sharepoint and click on the application name from the results list to open its overview page.
• Open the Permissions settings: Under the Security section in the left-side menu of the application page, click on Permissions.

• Grant admin consent: Click the blue button labeled "Grant admin consent for [Your Organization Name]". This will open a Microsoft authentication pop-up window.

• Confirm and finalize consent: Authenticate with your admin account if prompted. On the permissions review screen, select the checkbox that says "Consent on behalf of your organization" and click Accept.

Why this matters: Checking the "Consent on behalf of your organization" box ensures that individual team members can instantly connect their SharePoint accounts to AlphaSense without encountering the "Need admin approval" screen.

Part 2: Approving an access request from a user

Once the admin consent workflow is configured and an end user or service account has raised a request from the AlphaSense connection flow, an approving Entra admin completes the following steps. The request remains pending until an approver acts on it; until then, the AlphaSense connection cannot complete.

1: Navigate to Enterprise Apps in the Entra admin center.

• Sign in to https://entra.microsoft.com as a configured reviewer and open the Enterprise apps blade.

2: Open Admin Consent Requests and select the AlphaSense-Sharepoint entry.

• In Enterprise apps, choose Admin consent requests from the left rail. Locate the row for AlphaSense-Sharepoint (screenshot is for reference only) in the My Pending list and click it.

3: Click "Review permissions and consent."

• From the request details pane on the right, click Review permissions and consent to open the Microsoft Permissions requested screen (screenshot is for reference only).

4: Review the listed permissions and click Accept.

• Carefully review the scopes the application is requesting (these match the scope profile chosen at connection time). 
• If the scopes are correct for your security posture, click Accept. The request will close, and the AlphaSense connection workflow will be able to complete.

Syncing and Managing Your Content

Syncing Your Content:

• Select the Folders you want to sync.
• You also have the ability to select files that are not contained within folders.
• Select "Manage Tickers & Tags" to easily bulk select and tag your content prior to syncing. This helps streamline the process of sharing materials for individual connections.
• Select the sharing permissions for each folder.

Data Syncing Process

AlphaSense performs an automatic sync with Sharepoint to keep your files up-to-date. The system runs periodic syncs approximately every 15 minutes to ensure that newly added files or recent changes to existing files are captured. How the sync works:

• Data Change: Any changes made in Sharepoint (such as adding or updating files) will automatically be reflected in AlphaSense during the next scheduled sync.
• Permissions Change: If permissions are modified in Sharepoint, these changes will be applied once a day with a separate re-crawl sync process.

Managing your Added Documents:

• AlphaSense integration configuration page allows for management of user permissions, folder hierarchies and labeling. 
• Click into Manage Configuration to make any necessary changes.

Monitoring Added Documents

• AlphaSense integration monitoring tracks the progress and details of integrations in real time to ensure everything is on course for optimal ingestion. 
• Click into Monitoring to get a central view of documents details and status.

Reconciling added documents

• AlphaSense integration reporting equips you with the tools for better understanding, management and optimization of your uploads. 
• Click into Reports to get an audit of all content added with the ability to download a report.

Searching Across Your SharePoint Content in AlphaSense

The documents you add are processed through our AI algorithms and are made available almost immediately in platform. AlphaSense’s AI will automatically tag your documents and you will be able to search across internal content and apply AlphaSense’s AI search & discovery tools to a discrete set of documents for project-based work.

To search across SharePoint content, use the Quick Filters in the sidebar and scroll to Internal Content and then select "SharePoint".

Disconnecting Your SharePoint Account

• Click Disconnect.

Upload Actions

Metadata Customization:

• Users can add or remove Tags & Tickers as metadata at the folder level during the ingestion process, offering flexibility in how content is categorized and retrieved.

Folder Synchronization:

• Users can synchronize entire folders, including all contained documents. Synchronization is exclusively folder-based, with direct file selection not available.

Additional Items to Note

Automated Sync for Existing Folders

• Folders and sites that have been synced will automatically undergo periodic synchronization to ensure the content remains current.

Manual Addition for New Folders

• To synchronize new folders and sites from SharePoint, users must manually add them, initiating the synchronization process.
• File Size Limitation
  There is a maximum size limit of 100 MB for individual files, ensuring efficient data management and transfer.
• Supported File Types
  SharePoint integration supports specific document extensions, including .pdf, .html, .htm, .txt, .doc, .docx, .xls, .xlsx, .ppt, .pptx, .msg, .eml, .csv, .xlsb, .xlsm, .one, .tsv, and .ods, catering to a broad range of content types.

Account Sync Exclusivity

• To ensure data integrity, each SharePoint account can be synchronized with only one AlphaSense account at a time, prohibiting simultaneous user connections.
• These requirements are designed to optimize the integration process between SharePoint and AlphaSense, enhancing document management, content accessibility, and collaboration capabilities within the platform.

Data Capture

• AlphaSense will collect data from Sharepoint to generate faster results and insights. Supported file types include:
• Sites, Folders, Documents
  • Documents: Word files, Excel spreadsheets, PDFs, PowerPoint presentations.
  • Metadata: folder paths

View Access

• View permissions in SharePoint only support Azure AD groups for permission mapping and do not work with legacy SharePoint Site Groups.

SharePoint Connections FAQ's

What is a SharePoint Individual Connection?

• An Individual Connection allows you to sync Sites and Documents owned or accessible to you on Sharepoint. This connection is best suited for your personal use or when you want to control permissioning and sharing inside of Alphasense. This is suitable for clients who are testing AlphaSense within a defined user group, as well as for client content that is widely permissioned across their entire organization.

What is a SharePoint Workspace Connection?

• A Workspace Connection provides a centralized and consistent way for an organization to sync SharePoint content. This setup is managed and configured by IT administrators, ensuring controlled access and permissioning across the organization’s content.

How is content sharing managed in AlphaSense?

• AlphaSense offers flexible content sharing options based on the type of connection you use—Individual Connection or Workspace Connection.

How often does SharePoint content sync?

• Synced folders automatically refresh every 15 minutes to keep your content up to date. This 15-minute refresh applies to both individual and workspace connections.
• Additionally, for workspace connections, a full permissions recrawl runs once every 24 hours, scheduled to start at 10:00 AM IST (≈12:30 AM US Eastern Time), to ensure user access rights remain accurate and secure. Each recrawl only starts once the previous one has finished — for large-volume tenants, a single full permission sync can take multiple days, which defers the next cycle until it completes. For Workspace connections on the Full Control access level, permission changes are picked up incrementally during the 15-minute sync via Microsoft Graph delta APIs — the 24-hour recrawl does not apply.

Will newly created SharePoint folders sync automatically?

• Yes, as long as they are created within an already synced location. If your new folder is created inside a site, drive, or folder that you have already connected to AlphaSense, it will sync automatically during the next 15-minute refresh.
• However, if you create a completely new top-level folder or drive that sits outside of your current connected items, it will not sync automatically. In that case, you must manually add the new item by going to Manage Configuration in your SharePoint connection.

Can my organization have multiple SharePoint connections?

• No. Once a Workspace connection is established on your tenant, no other SharePoint connection — Individual or Workspace — can be created on the same AlphaSense tenant. The Connect SharePoint button will appear grayed out for all other users in your organization.
• If you need to set up a different SharePoint connection, the existing Workspace owner (typically the service account that created it) must first disconnect via Integration Center → Manage Configuration → Disconnect. After that, a new connection can be established.

What permissions are required to view SharePoint content in AlphaSense?

• For an Individual Connection: Synced content is private to you by default. If you want others to see it, you must share the content manually within AlphaSense.
• For a Workspace Connection: Anyone who has Can view, or higher access to the original SharePoint site or subsite can view that content in AlphaSense. AlphaSense mirrors your SharePoint permissions exactly — individual user grants, Azure AD security group memberships, and SharePoint-native groups are all honored at the site, library, folder, and file level. Native SharePoint permissions are always respected and cannot be overridden within AlphaSense.

I connected successfully, but my colleague can't see the content. Why?

• This depends on the type of connection you established:
  • Individual Connection: Synced content is strictly private to you by default. To make it visible to others, you must manually share it within AlphaSense.
  • Workspace Connection: Access is determined entirely by your existing SharePoint setup. Anyone with Can view or higher access to the original SharePoint site or subsite can view that content in AlphaSense. AlphaSense mirrors your SharePoint permissions exactly — individual user grants, Azure AD security group memberships, and SharePoint-native groups are all honored at the site, library, folder, and file level. Native SharePoint permissions are always strictly respected and cannot be overridden.
• To resolve this for a Workspace connection, update the user's permissions within SharePoint, and the change will be reflected in AlphaSense after the next 24-hour permissions recrawl. If your Workspace connection uses the Full Control access level, the change is reflected during the next 15-minute sync instead — there's no 24-hour wait.

What happens if SharePoint permissions change after content is synced?

• For a Workspace Connection, AlphaSense strictly mirrors your SharePoint permissions, but updates are not instantaneous.
  • File and folder modifications (like editing or adding a document) are caught quickly during regular 15-minute sync refreshes.
  • Permission-only changes (like adding or removing a user's access to a folder without changing the files themselves) are not updated incrementally. Instead, AlphaSense updates these access rights during the full 24-hour permissions recrawl. Exception: Workspace connections on the Full Control access level pick up permission-only changes incrementally during the 15-minute sync via Microsoft Graph delta APIs — no 24-hour wait.

The sharing setup is correct and my colleagues are in the right groups, but they still can't see the documents. Why?

• If your SharePoint permissions are correctly configured, check the following:
• Confirm AlphaSense Account Email: Ensure your colleagues have successfully onboarded and logged into AlphaSense using the same professional email address that holds permissions in your SharePoint environment.
• Verify Microsoft Account Email Mapping: Check that their primary email address is correctly populated and matches exactly across both AlphaSense and your Microsoft 365/SharePoint directory. If they are logging into AlphaSense with an alias or a different format (e.g., user@domain.com vs user@subdomain.domain.com), AlphaSense won't be able to map their SharePoint permissions.
• Wait for the next permission recrawl: If permissions were recently added or modified in SharePoint, allow up to one 24-hour permissions recrawl cycle for the change to reflect in AlphaSense. This applies to Workspace connections on the Selected Sites and Read All Sites access levels. Workspace connections on the Full Control access level reflect permission changes during the next 15-minute sync.

I am not able to log in due to the “Need admin approval” screen. What should I do?

• When connecting AlphaSense to your SharePoint environment for the first time, your organization's Microsoft 365 Tenant Administrator must approve the connection.

I am not able to see the "Request admin consent" button on the login screen.

• Requesting admin consent for login is not enabled for your tenant. In this case, follow these steps: https://docs.google.com/document/d/15NEOZQzXLq78GKn2vJfXXk_twWmhCRmkuq5mvQiGB4s/edit?usp=sharing and then request admin consent.

How do I remove the AlphaSense-Sharepoint app's permissions?

• Step 1: Go to the AlphaSense-Sharepoint app from the Enterprise apps menu.

• Step 2: Revoke the relevant permission.

SharePoint WorkSpace Connection FAQs

Does AlphaSense support SharePoint Shared Connections?

• No, AlphaSense only supports Individual and Workspace connections for individual users and IT Admin respectively. To leverage mapping of permissions while syncing content , users can leverage a Workspace Connection, which ensures centralized access and permission mapping.

Can I sync all my SharePoint site content to AlphaSense?

• AlphaSense only syncs content from the Documents and Site Assets libraries for individual and workspace connections. This capability extends to both your main SharePoint sites and any subsites. Other SharePoint elements—including pages, conversations, and general site content—are currently not supported.

Can I sync my SharePoint Notebooks to AlphaSense?

• Yes! You can sync your SharePoint OneNote Notebooks to AlphaSense. To ensure they sync successfully, your notebooks must be stored in either the Documents or Site Assets library of your connected site or subsite.

What happens to my content when I disconnect my SharePoint connection?

• Disconnecting your sharepoint connection will trigger the deletion of all content synced through it in AlphaSense. When disconnecting, you are presented with the option to to retain inside Alphasense if desired.

To keep your content in AlphaSense while disconnecting the connection, simply check the retention checkbox (as shown below). If you choose this option, your content will remain available in search but will no longer appear under Monitoring or Reports in the Integration Center.

Why am I being asked to re-authenticate?

As outlined by Microsoft, there are several reasons why the SharePoint token used to establish the connection expires, halting any further content synchronization. To restore syncing, users must re-authenticate their account.

1. Simply click on the reconnecting app, which will launch the authentication workflow.
2. Make sure to select the same account used during the initial connection setup—otherwise, authentication will fail.

NOTE: token expiration only affects future syncs. Any content that was previously synced remains accessible within AlphaSense.