If you’ve searched for a “User Access Review Template,” chances are your organization is either preparing for an audit or trying to get ahead of one. And if you’re like most teams, the first thing you found was a spreadsheet — a User Access Review Excel Template with a few tabs, some color-coded cells, and a lot of manual work waiting for you.
We talk to a growing number of organizations that are migrating away from exactly this kind of template — moving from static Excel workbooks to Squarum, a purpose-built User Access Review platform. Before we explain why, let’s look at what a typical User Access Review Excel Template actually contains.
What’s Inside a Typical User Access Review Template
Most User Access Review templates follow a similar structure, usually spread across several tabs:
1. Document Control A cover sheet capturing organization name, department/team, document owner, author, version number, status (often “Draft”), creation and review dates, classification level (typically “Confidential”), and distribution restrictions.
2. Version History & Approval Sign-Off A table tracking each revision — version number, date, description of changes, who changed it, who reviewed it, and who approved it. This is paired with a formal sign-off block requiring names and signatures from the security team, Legal/DPO, the CISO or Security Lead, and an executive sponsor.
3. Quarterly User Access Review Sheet The core of the template — a row-by-row list of users, including full name, username/email, department, system or application, access role, access level, business justification, approver, review date, action required (Retain, Revoke, or Downgrade), and notes. This is where the actual review work happens: someone manually checks whether Jane in Engineering still needs Full Admin on AWS, or whether Alice in Finance should have had her QuickBooks access revoked after moving to Marketing.
4. Role Access Matrix A grid mapping roles or departments (CEO, CTO, CISO, Engineering, Sales, Finance, HR, Marketing) against systems (AWS, GitHub, Salesforce, QuickBooks, BambooHR, Jira, Confluence), color-coded by access level: Admin, Write, Read/Write, Read, or No Access. This is meant to serve as the baseline “who should have what” reference.
5. Access Removal Log A final tracking sheet for documenting every access removal — full name, username, system, role removed, removal date, reason, ticket/evidence reference, and who completed the action.
On paper, this looks thorough. In practice, it’s a lot of manual overhead for something regulators expect to be a repeatable, evidence-backed control.
Why an Excel User Access Review Template Doesn’t Make Sense in 2026
Excel templates were a reasonable starting point when User Access Review was a once-a-year checkbox exercise. But access governance today is continuous, cross-system, and auditor-scrutinized — and spreadsheets simply weren’t built for that. In 2026, with free, faster, and purpose-built alternatives like Squarum available, sticking with a manual template creates more risk than it removes.
Here’s what changes when you move from a User Access Review Excel Template to Squarum:
1. Multi-User Collaboration
Excel templates are typically owned and updated by one person, emailed around, and version-controlled by filename (“UAR_v3_final_FINAL.xlsx”). Squarum allows multiple reviewers — department managers, system owners, the CISO — to work on the same review simultaneously, with clear ownership per system and per user.
2. Automated Notifications
A spreadsheet doesn’t remind anyone that a quarterly review is due, or that an approver hasn’t responded. Squarum automatically notifies reviewers and approvers, tracks outstanding actions, and escalates overdue reviews — so nothing slips through a missed calendar reminder.
3. Unchangeable, Audit-Proof Records
This is the biggest gap. An Excel file can be edited, backdated, or overwritten with no trace — which is exactly the kind of thing auditors flag. Squarum locks completed reviews into an immutable audit trail, so every “Retain,” “Revoke,” or “Downgrade” decision, along with who approved it and when, is permanently and verifiably recorded.
4. Automatic Access Data Sync
Instead of manually pulling user lists from AWS, GitHub, Salesforce, and BambooHR into a spreadsheet, Squarum connects directly to your systems and keeps access data current — eliminating the stale, manually-updated Role Access Matrix problem entirely.
5. Built-In Compliance Mapping
Where a template leaves you to interpret whether your process satisfies GDPR, HIPAA, SOC 2, ISO 27001, NIS2, or CCPA/CPRA, Squarum structures reviews around the specific evidence auditors expect for each framework.
The Bottom Line
A User Access Review Excel Template can technically get you through one audit cycle. But as access sprawls across more systems and reviews become a recurring, board-level expectation, manual spreadsheets become a liability rather than a control. Organizations migrating to Squarum aren’t just saving time — they’re closing an audit gap that Excel was never designed to close.
Ready to retire your User Access Review template? See how Squarum replaces spreadsheets with a continuous, audit-proof access review process.
Frequently Asked Questions
Is it okay to use Excel for User Access Review when preparing for a certification?
Not really. Auditors increasingly expect access reviews to be backed by evidence that can’t be altered after the fact — something a spreadsheet can’t guarantee, since cells can be edited, backdated, or overwritten with no trace. Purpose-built tools like Squarum are designed to close this gap: once a review is completed, the record is locked and immutable, giving auditors the tamper-proof evidence they’re looking for.
Is there a cheaper or better way to do User Access Review than an Excel template?
Yes — though the savings show up in total cost of ownership, not in tool cost. An Excel template may be “free,” but every review cycle still costs hours of manual data pulling, chasing approvers, and reconciling access lists by hand. Platforms like Squarum automate that work, so reviews take a fraction of the time and the ongoing cost of running them drops significantly, even accounting for the platform fee.
Where can I download a User Access Review Template for Excel?
There are several sources online offering free templates, but we intentionally don’t link to them. We don’t think Excel is the right tool for User Access Review in 2026 — and that belief is exactly why we built Squarum in the first place.