Skip to main content

OneDrive for Business

This article applies to: Office 365 Productivity Bundle


Get Started

To access your OneDrive for Business space, sign in to Cornell Office 365 at outlook.cornell.edu.
Click the App Launcher icon in the upper left (it is made up of nine squares), and Select the OneDrive tile.

To create a new document, click + New, then choose the file type. To open a file or folder, click on its name.
To share a document, while viewing it in Office Online, click on + Share, enter the people you would like to share it with and whether they should be able to edit or just read, then click + Share.

To go back to an earlier version of a document, while looking at the list of documents, hover over a document, then click the circle to the left of its name. Select ... from the menu above the list, then click Version history.
To retrieve a recently deleted document, click Recycle bin in the left-hand menu.

An Office 365 Document Storage and Collaboration Solution

OneDrive for Business is a personal document and file storage hub for Cornell's Office 365 service. It's easy to upload, download, and share files. You can also create, view, and edit documents online using the integrated Office Online applications, Word, Excel, and PowerPoint. For those times you need the complete set of Office features, you can open your files in the full version of the applications and save them to your hard drive or back to the cloud.

Cornell OneDrive for Business provides a place for Office for iPhone, iPad, and Android to store their files, where they will then be available to any computer or device through apps or a web browser. OneDrive for Business also can sync your cloud storage with your Windows or Mac computer.

Because OneDrive for Business is connected to your status at Cornell, everything stored in it will be deleted should you leave the university. For this reason, it's best to use it to store materials that are for your own personal business use, like OneNote notebooks, and store things that will be important for your unit or other groups at the university indefinitely in a SharePoint Online site. 

Graduating, resigning, retiring, or otherwise leaving Cornell? Find out what changes to expect for your Cornell OneDrive account.

Service Details

Storage Space and File Type and Name Restrictions

Each person is allocated a total of one terabyte (1 TB), approximately one thousand gigabytes. The size limit for individual files is two gigabytes (2 GB).

To see how much space you're using:

  • While viewing OneDrive for Business through Outlook on the web, click the gear icon, then select Site settings.
  • On the Site Settings page, under Site Collection Administration, click Storage Metrics.
  • In the top right corner, you'll see how much space you're using.

For university guidelines for file storage, see the University Regulated Data Chart.

The following file types cannot be uploaded:

  • .ashx
  • .asmx
  • .json
  • .soap
  • .svc
  • .xamlx

For a more complete description of various restrictions, see support.microsoft.com/kb/2933738.

File names can't contain the following characters:
/  \  :  *  ?  "  <  >  |  #  %
Also, do not start a file name with a tilde (~).

Shared Document Editing

You will be able to see who else is editing shared documents. When you open a shared document in Outlook on the Web, you will see a color-coded flag and the name of the person.

OneDrive Sync Client

The OneDrive Sync client works with these operating systems:

  • Windows
  • Mac
  • iOS
  • Android
When setting up OneDrive sync, make sure to only sync as much content from OneDrive as your device has room to store. See Microsoft's Choose which OneDrive folders to sync to your computer.

View more information about OneDrive Sync.

View more information about OneDrive Sync errors.

For More Help

Microsoft's help is available by clicking the Question Mark icon in the upper-right corner of the browser window.

About this Article

Last updated: 

Tuesday, October 11, 2022 - 12:10pm

Was this page helpful?

Your feedback helps improve the site.

Comments?