The client portal: how it works

The client portal is a branded sign-in page for your contacts. A contact signs in on your workspace's own address, finds the files and requests you shared with them, downloads them, and uploads files into a folder of their own. This article covers what must be on for the portal to work, how to give a contact access, how they sign in, what they see, and what to do when a sign-in fails.

What has to be on

The portal works only when all three of these are true. Tarkle checks them each time someone opens it.

1. Your organization is on Pro or Agency. The client portal is not included on Free. Compare the plans on pricing, or read which plan includes the client portal.

2. The Enable client portal switch is on. You find it in Settings, on the General tab. It is on by default. Turning it off closes the portal for everyone: a contact who opens it sees "Client portal is not available for this workspace." Each contact's own portal access stays as it was.

3. The contact has portal access turned on, as described in the next section.

Give a contact access

1. Open Contacts and click the contact's name.

2. Open the actions menu on the contact's page and click Enable portal access.

The first time you turn access on, Tarkle emails the contact an invite. The invite is sent once: turning access on again later does not send it. To send it again, use Resend invite. For a walk through the whole set up, read how to invite your first client to the client portal.

On Free, the action opens the upgrade dialog instead.

The sign-in email

The invite email shows your workspace's name and logo. Its button, Sign in to the portal, opens your workspace's sign-in page, on your verified custom domain or on the workspace address on tarkle.com. The email does not hold a code. Tarkle sends one separately, when the contact asks for it on that page.

How a contact signs in

1. Open the sign-in page, from the invite email or from the workspace address.

2. Enter the email address and click Continue with email.

3. Tarkle emails a 6-digit code. The page then reads "Enter the code sent to" and asks for the code. Each code is valid for 10 minutes.

4. The portal opens. If the contact has set up a second step, they complete it first, as described below.

The sign-in page shows the code screen for every email address, so it never reveals whether an address belongs to a contact. A new code replaces the one before it. On the code screen, Resend code sends a new code, and Change email goes back to the email field.

Each wrong code shows "That code did not work. Check it and try again." After five wrong codes from one network address, that address has to wait a few minutes. After 30 wrong codes in total, the code stops working, and the contact clicks Resend code to get a new one. Asking for codes is limited to 5 requests per email address and 20 per network address in 10 minutes.

If nothing arrives, the address is not a contact with portal access, portal access is off, the Enable client portal switch is off, or the organization is on Free. In each case the page still shows the code screen, but no email is sent. Ask the contact to check their spam folder too.

Second step (authenticator app or passkey)

On Personal profile, the Multi-factor authentication card lets the contact turn on an authenticator app or a passkey. When one of them is on, the portal asks for it after the emailed code and before it shows anything. The page reads "Confirm it is you to open" your workspace, then asks for the code from the authenticator app, or offers Use a passkey.

Passkeys work only on tarkle.com. On a custom domain, a contact whose only second step is a passkey is told to sign in on tarkle.com or to add an authenticator app.

Staying signed in

Turning portal access off ends the contact's access at the next request, even when their browser still holds a session.

What the contact sees

The sidebar has Home, Files, Shared and Requests, and they are always there. Brands appears when brand pages are assigned to the contact or their organization may create them. Feedback appears when feedback boards are shared with them. The Search button finds their transfers, requests, files and folders. The name at the bottom of the sidebar opens a menu with Personal profile and Log out. A contact who belongs to an organization also sees Settings and Members in that menu.

Transfers that expired or were burned, requests that are completed or expired, and deleted items are not shown.

Downloading

The only action on a file in the portal is Download. The portal has no action to rename, move, delete or share files. A file that was shared only through a view-only transfer appears without that menu, so it cannot be downloaded.

Uploading

The upload menu and the Folder button on Home place files and folders in the contact's own folder. Tarkle names the folder after the contact, for example "Jane Smith (uploads)", and creates it the first time they open the portal.

• Each contact has a 5 GB upload limit by default. Only what they uploaded themselves counts toward it, never the files you sent them.

• The room they have is the smaller of their remaining limit and what is left of your workspace storage.

• Their uploads are kept in your library, in that folder, and count toward your workspace storage.

• When they have no room left, they see a message that they can't upload more right now, and that they should ask you to make more room.

When the portal cannot be shown

Troubleshooting

Related articles

• Which plan includes the client portal?

• How to invite your first client to the client portal

• How do contacts see boards in the client portal?

• How do I share a brand page with a client?