What is a read-only board?
A read-only board can be read, searched and exported, and nothing on it can be changed by anyone, person or assistant. It happens when a team plan ends, and when a board is shared by link.
Last checked
A read-only board is one that can be looked at but not changed. In fenbs that happens in two different ways, for two different reasons, and it is worth knowing them apart.
When a team plan ends
A team board whose plan has run out — the paid month plus a few days of grace — goes read-only for everyone on it: people and AI assistants alike. Every change is refused with a sentence that says why and what fixes it. Nothing is deleted, search still works, and everything can still be taken out. Renew, and it is writable again the same minute. A personal board never goes read-only for this reason: it falls back to the free plan instead, writable up to 50 open tasks.
When a board is shared by link
Settings has “Share a read-only link”. Anyone with the link sees the board’s name and each live task’s title, kind, lane and priority — and nothing else: no notes, comments, files, people or history. They cannot change anything, because the page is not given the means to. The people on the board carry on working it as before; the link is a window, not a door.
Why the refusal is a sentence
A read-only refusal is written for a person and for an assistant to relay: “Your board is read-only because its fenbs plan ended on 3 September. Subscribe to make changes again — nothing on it has been deleted.” A button that silently does nothing would leave an assistant guessing, and guessing is how it loses your trust.