Create a notebook by using the Google Cloud console

Learn how to create a Colab Enterprise notebook and run its code on a default runtime by using the Google Cloud console. This page also describes how to rename, upload, and delete a notebook.


To follow step-by-step guidance for this task directly in the Google Cloud console, click Guide me:

Guide me


  1. Sign in to your Google Cloud account. If you're new to Google Cloud, create an account to evaluate how our products perform in real-world scenarios. New customers also get $300 in free credits to run, test, and deploy workloads.
  2. In the Google Cloud console, on the project selector page, select or create a Google Cloud project.

    Go to project selector

  3. Make sure that billing is enabled for your Google Cloud project.

  4. Enable the Vertex AI, Dataform, and Compute Engine APIs.

    Enable the APIs

Required roles

To ensure that your user account has the necessary permissions to create a Colab Enterprise notebook and run the notebook's code on a runtime, ask your administrator to grant your user account the Colab Enterprise User (roles/aiplatform.colabEnterpriseUser) IAM role on the project. For more information about granting roles, see Manage access to projects, folders, and organizations.

Your administrator might also be able to give your user account the required permissions through custom roles or other predefined roles.

Create a notebook

To create a Colab Enterprise notebook by using the Google Cloud console:

  1. In the Google Cloud console, go to the Colab Enterprise Notebooks page.

    Go to Notebooks

  2. In the Region menu, select the region where you want to create your notebook.

  3. Next to Files, click  Create a notebook.

    Your new notebook appears on the My notebooks tab.

When you finish the tasks that are described in this document, you can avoid continued billing by deleting the resources that you created. For more information, see Clean up.

Run code in the default runtime

To run a Colab Enterprise notebook's code on the default runtime, do the following:

  1. In the Google Cloud console, go to the Colab Enterprise Notebooks page.

    Go to Notebooks

  2. In the Region menu, select the region that contains your notebook.

  3. On the My notebooks tab, click the notebook that you want to open.

  4. Hold the pointer over the code cell that you want to run, and then click the  Run cell button.

  5. If this is your first time connecting to a runtime with end-user credentials enabled, a Sign in dialog appears.

    To grant Colab Enterprise access to your user credentials, complete the following steps:

    1. In the Sign in dialog, click your user account.

    2. Select See, edit, configure, and delete your Google Cloud data... to grant Colab Enterprise access to your user credentials.

      The checkbox is next to a statement
      that says, "See, edit, configure, and delete your Google Cloud data and see the
      email address for your Google Account."
    3. Click Continue.

After your runtime starts, Colab Enterprise connects to the runtime and runs the code in the cell.

Rename your notebook

To rename a Colab Enterprise notebook:

  1. In the Google Cloud console, go to the Colab Enterprise Notebooks page.

    Go to Notebooks

  2. In the Region menu, select the region that contains your notebook.

  3. Next to the notebook that you want to rename, click the Actions menu, and then select Rename.

  4. In the Rename notebook dialog, change the name of the notebook, and then click Rename.

Upload a notebook

To upload a notebook to Colab Enterprise:

  1. In the Google Cloud console, go to the Colab Enterprise Notebooks page.

    Go to Notebooks

  2. In the Region menu, select the region where you want to upload your notebook.

  3. Next to Files, click  Upload notebook file.

  4. In the Upload notebook dialog, in the Select notebook field, click Browse and select the notebook that you want to upload.

  5. Optional: In the Notebook name field, edit the name of the notebook file.

  6. Click Upload.

    Your notebook appears on the My notebooks tab.

Clean up

To avoid incurring charges to your Google Cloud account for the resources used in this tutorial, either delete the project that contains the resources, or keep the project and delete the individual resources.

  1. In the Google Cloud console, go to the Manage resources page.

    Go to Manage resources

  2. In the project list, select the project that you want to delete, and then click Delete.
  3. In the dialog, type the project ID, and then click Shut down to delete the project.
To delete a Colab Enterprise notebook:
  1. In the Google Cloud console, go to the Colab Enterprise Notebooks page.

    Go to Notebooks

  2. Next to the notebook that you want to delete, click the Actions menu, and then select Delete.

  3. In the Delete dialog, click Confirm.

What's next