Model groups

Groups

Models can be grouped under a common designation with a shared owner. For example, you could group together all models owned by a particular team, or related to modeling a specific data source (hubspot).

• Groups transforms implicit relationships into explicit groupings with a defined owner. By defining interface boundaries between groups, you can create a cleaner, less entangled DAG.

• This approach allows you to designate certain models as having "private" access, intended for exclusive use within that group. Other models will be restricted from referencing or depending on these private models. Eventually, these private models won't be visible to other teams relying on your project—only the "public" models will be accessible.

A group is a collection of nodes within a dbt DAG. Groups are named, and every group has an owner. They enable intentional collaboration within and across teams by restricting access to private models.

Group members may include models, tests, seeds, snapshots, analyses, and metrics. (Not included: sources and exposures.) Each node may belong to only one group.

Declaring a group

Groups are defined in .yml files, nested under a groups: key.

models/marts/finance/finance.yml

groups:
  - name: finance
    owner:
      # 'name' or 'email' is required; additional properties allowed
      email: [e-mail]
      slack: finance-data
      github: finance-data-team

Adding a model to a group​

Use the group configuration to add one or more models to a group.

Project-level

dbt_project.yml

models:
  marts:
    finance:
      +group: finance

Model-level

models/schema.yml

models:
  - name: model_name
    config:
      group: finance

In-file

models/orders.sql

{{ config(group = 'finance') }}

select ...

Referencing a model in a group

By default, all models within a group have the protected access modifier. This means they can be referenced by downstream resources in any group in the same project, using the ref function. If a grouped model's access property is set to private, only resources within its group can reference it.

models/schema.yml

models:
  - name: finance_private_model
    access: private
    config:
      group: finance

  # in a different group!
  - name: marketing_model
    config:
      group: marketingmodels:
  - name: finance_private_model
    access: private
    config:
      group: finance

  # in a different group!
  - name: marketing_model
    config:
      group: marketing

Each model can only belong to one group, and groups cannot be nested. If you set a different group in that model's YAML or in-file config, it will override the group applied at the project level.