What's new in ADAdmin

Pupils get more tries before sign-in locks their account

Pupils can now get their password wrong 15 times in 15 minutes before their account is locked for 15 minutes, instead of 10. Staff stay at 10, and the lock still lifts by itself.

Where: Realsmart sign-in

Fixed: pupils with no preferred name now get an account

A pupil whose preferred first name or surname is blank in your MIS now comes through with their legal name, instead of being skipped at every import.

Fixed: group changes are never made through someone else's alias

If the address Realsmart holds for someone is only an alias on another person's Google account, the sync now leaves group memberships alone instead of changing the other person's groups. The user's Logs tab shows the change was withheld and names both addresses.

Where: Users → Edit user → Logs

Fixed: people get their group roles back when they're made active again

Making someone active again after a suspension in the last 90 days now gives them back the role they had in each group, such as Manager or Owner, in groups from your MIS as well as the ones you added by hand.

Where: Users → Edit user → Status

Big group removals now wait for you

If a sync is about to take far more people out of your Google or Microsoft 365 groups than usual, it now pauses those removals and shows a card on your Dashboard. Put the groups right and the pause ends by itself, or, for Google groups, choose Let removals go ahead.

Where: Dashboard

Fixed: common passwords such as Password1 are now refused

Some well-known passwords on the blocked list, such as Password1 and admin123, were wrongly accepted. They're now refused everywhere a password is set.

Where: School settings → Password

Your own apps launcher in the admin

The My apps menu at the top of the admin now opens your own Launchpad apps, in your pinned order with your own links, so you can get to Google, Microsoft and your school's other apps without leaving the admin.

Where: Top bar → My apps

News from Realsmart in the Realsmart bar's bell

Pupils, staff and admins now have a bell in the Realsmart bar. Realsmart uses it sparingly for things worth knowing, such as new features, with a link to a short guide. It's separate from the admin bell, which still only shows problems at your school.

Where: The bell in the Realsmart bar

Pupils and staff change their own password and photo in Profile

Everyone now has a Profile page, opened from the Realsmart bar, to change their password and photo and choose a light or dark look. It follows your school's password policy and picture switches, so if you've switched student pictures off, pupils can't change theirs. Your own admin profile links to it.

Where: School settings → Password and School settings → Profile (the rules Profile follows)

Timetable and Coming up on the Launchpad

Pupils and staff now see what's on now and next in the Realsmart bar, today on their Launchpad and a My week page, from your Wonde or SOS timetable. A Coming up row lists Google Classroom work due (with handed-in counts for teachers) and Smart Parents events. Switch the timetable and Coming up on or off separately for pupils and staff.

Where: School settings → Launchpad

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The new Launchpad: people arrange their own apps and links

The Launchpad has a new design. Pupils and staff can pin their favourite apps to the top, drag apps into their own order, add their own links and choose a look and background, all starting from the order you set for the school. Personal layouts lets you choose what people can change, and a person's Launchpad tab shows their layout and can reset it.

Where: Apps → Personal layouts, and Users → Edit user → Launchpad

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Schedule parent notices and see who has read them

When you write a parent notice you can now choose Schedule for later and pick a date and time up to a year ahead, then change it, send it now or cancel it back to a draft. Every linked parent now finds the notice in the app even if push notifications are off, and the report shows who has and hasn't read it.

Where: Smart Parents → Notifications

Events with sign-up in Smart Parents

Create school events that parents see in the Smart Parents app, take sign-ups per child or once per family with a number of places and a closing time, and see who is coming with a CSV export. Publish and tell parents sends the event out as a notice, so it reaches every linked parent.

Where: Smart Parents → Events

Smart Parents app coverage by class

See, class by class, how many pupils have a parent on the Smart Parents app and how many parents would get a push notification, sorted by least covered first. Open a class to spot pupils with no parent on the app, or open a pupil to see their parents and whether a notice would reach their phone.

Where: Smart Parents → App coverage

Show apps to governors, observers and Ofsted separately

Governors, observers and Ofsted now have their own Visible to toggles on each Launchpad app, so you can, for example, show an app to governors only. Until you change them, they follow the staff setting, so nothing moves on its own.

Where: Apps → All apps, and MAT overview → App defaults

Choose the DfE password standard

You can now switch your school to the DfE cyber security standard: at least 12 characters for staff and 8 for students, no need for a mix of capitals and numbers (so passphrases work), and staff passwords checked against known data breaches. The same rules apply wherever a password is set, in the admin and at sign-in.

Where: School settings → Password → Password policy

Stronger protection for sign-in and stored passwords

We've tightened how sign-in is checked and how passwords are stored behind the scenes. There's nothing for you to do, and nothing changes in how you or your users sign in.

Holiday pauses: switch pupils' sign-in off for the school holidays

List your holiday dates once, for all pupils or chosen year groups, and Realsmart switches pupils' Realsmart, Google and Microsoft sign-in off on the first day and back on after the last. Pupils stay active, in all their groups and Google Classrooms, and your MIS sync keeps running, so there's no need to suspend anyone or turn sync off. Paused pupils show a Paused badge on the Users page, and you can resume a pause early at any time.

Where: Users → Holiday pauses

Fixed: groups you added by hand come back when a suspended user is reactivated

Since late August, suspending someone takes them out of all their groups and classes. If you then reactivated them, groups you had added by hand were lost for good; they are now noted at suspension and put back once the person is active again.

Where: Users

Admins always use 2FA, with grace days and trust-wide 2FA defaults

Admins now always use two-factor authentication and can't be exempted; each admin has 14 days from their next sign-in to set it up, and the Password tab lists admins who haven't yet. You can also choose how many days people get to set up 2FA once it's required, and trusts can set staff and student 2FA defaults once and apply them to every school.

Where: School settings → Password, and MAT overview → 2FA defaults

Limit how long sign-in sessions last

Tick Limit how long sign-in sessions last to sign staff out after a set number of hours or after a period of doing nothing, and sign students out at the end of the school day. It's off by default, so people stay signed in until they sign out, exactly as before.

Where: School settings → Password → Sign-in sessions

Personal colour themes

Pick a colour theme for the admin on top of light or dark mode: Realsmart (the default), Ocean, Grape, Orchid or Graphite. It changes buttons, links and highlights for you only, and every theme keeps text readable.

Where: Top bar appearance menu → Colour theme, or My profile → Appearance

Fixed: saving the Teaching staff tab could mark every member of staff as non-teaching

If your school uses the job-title list to decide who counts as teaching staff, saving that tab in the new admin could make the next MIS import treat all staff as non-teaching, which affected the teaching and non-teaching staff groups. This is fixed and affected settings have been repaired.

Where: School settings → Teaching staff

Dashboard and Sync status load much faster for Microsoft schools

Schools that sync to Microsoft Entra could wait 20 seconds or more for the dashboard and the Sync status page. They now open in around a second.

Where: Dashboard and Sync status

Help guides written around what you want to do

We've added 13 new guides written around common tasks and problems, such as adding a teacher to a Google Classroom, corrected steps that had gone out of date, and made guides easier to find by searching.

Where: Help

Warn before opening other websites after sign-in

Switch this on and, when a sign-in link leads to a website that isn't part of Realsmart or your school, people see a short page naming the site before they go on. It's off by default.

Where: School settings → Password → Other websites

Stop a nested group's members getting the parent group's email in Google

When you put one group inside another, you can now choose No email for it, so its people can still post to the group without being copied into every message sent to it. Gets email remains Google's normal behaviour.

Where: Groups → a group → Members → nested group's Google email

Choose the order of apps on your school's panel

Drag tiles, or use the arrows, to set the order apps appear on your school's Launchpad panel, and reset to the default at any time. Trusts can set one order and apply it to every school, choosing whether to keep schools that have set their own.

Where: Apps → Ordering, and MAT overview → App defaults → Ordering

Fixed: profile pictures that didn't stay on

A profile picture is now saved as soon as it finishes uploading, rather than waiting for a second click, and if an upload stalls or fails you're told why instead of being left with a picture that disappears.

Where: My profile, and Users → a user

Pick the Smart Parents app's colour

Choose one of twelve colours, or enter your own, for the Smart Parents app's accent when parents look at a child at your school. A live preview shows how it will look, and colours that would be hard to read are refused.

Where: Smart Parents → Settings → App colour

Add people from your trust's other schools to a group

Trust admins can now add staff from any school in the trust they can access to a group, without asking support. The member picker also now shows each account's email address and flags suspended accounts, so you can tell look-alike accounts apart.

Where: Groups → a group → Members → Add member

Acceptable use policy at sign-in

Write your acceptable use policy, choose whether learners, staff or everyone must accept it when they sign in, and optionally ask again each academic year. A report shows who has and hasn't accepted, with filters and a CSV export, and you can ask everyone to accept again after a change.

Where: School settings → Acceptable use policy

Fixed: changing a username now renames the Google and Microsoft account too

Changing someone's username on their edit page could leave their existing Google or Microsoft account behind and create a new, empty one. The cloud account is now renamed with them, and a new username that's already taken in Google or Microsoft 365 is refused before anything changes.

Where: Users → a user → Details

Assign Microsoft 365 licences automatically

Microsoft schools can now have the nightly sync give students and staff a Microsoft 365 licence, choosing one licence for students and one for staff from those your tenant owns, and optionally take it back when someone leaves. Licence rules let a group or a single person have a different licence, and a page shows who gets which licence and why.

Where: Entra sync → Settings → Licences

Name the mentors who can reset passwords

Instead of letting every mentor reset pupils' passwords, you can leave Mentors can reset passwords off and pick just the mentors who should be able to.

Where: School settings → Password

Parent notices rebuilt in the new admin

Write parent notices in the new admin with a cover picture, formatted text and up to five attachments, then follow each one in a report of who it reached. The Notifications tab now opens on an overview of recent sends, drafts waiting and how many families have the app.

Where: Smart Parents → Notifications, or Add parent notice in the sidebar

MAT overview pages work for large trusts

The MAT dashboard, Sync queue, Test connection, Recent activity and other trust-wide pages could time out for large trusts; they now open in a few seconds. Quick run across a trust also now offers Google and runs Active Directory and Apple with each school's own settings.

Where: MAT overview

See a group's Classroom status and make it active

A group's Classroom tab now shows the course's status at the top and explains what it means for students. If a current classroom is still Provisioned or Archived, Make active switches it on, and a reminder on the group's other tabs points you there.

Where: Groups → a group → Classroom

Clearer forms and buttons

Every text box now has a visible edge, with its hint and any error underneath, and secondary buttons look like buttons rather than plain text. Delete and other destructive buttons are outlined in red and still ask you to confirm.

Change how one person's name appears in Google

Google schools can now choose a different display name for one person, such as a title and surname, without changing the school-wide setting. Each option shows the name it will produce.

Where: Users → a user → Details → Google display name

Entra sync issues page and group email addresses

A new Issues page groups Microsoft Entra sync problems into one line each, with who is affected and a plain-English fix, and each person's page now shows their Entra result. Schools can also give Microsoft 365 groups email addresses on their own domain by uploading their own Exchange Online app.

Where: Entra sync → Issues, and Entra sync → Settings → Group email addresses

Create Google Classrooms as active

Tick Create classrooms as active and new Google Classrooms are ready for students straight away, instead of waiting for the teacher to accept them. It's off by default.

Where: Google Workspace → Classroom

Classroom parents: filter the list and approve everyone at once

The Classroom parents page now has search and filters (year, registration group, approval and what Classroom reports), and you can select every matching learner across all pages to approve or remove in one go. Each Classroom status, including Couldn't check, now explains what it means.

Where: Classroom parents

Hand out logins by registration group

Printed QR login cards now come out grouped by registration group, each starting on a new sheet. The Export page can produce a CSV or printable sheets of student usernames by registration group, and teachers who can reset passwords now have the QR code actions on the Reset passwords page.

Where: Users → QR codes, Export, and Reset passwords

Don't allow login

Stop someone signing in to Realsmart at any time without changing their status, so their Google, Microsoft, Apple and Active Directory accounts are left as they are. Allow login at any time lifts it again.

Where: Users → Login options, or a user's Login window card

Who is in the classroom, and course clean-up

A group's Classroom tab now always lists who is in the Google Classroom, with any gaps against the group explained. The Classroom courses report shows when each course was created and lets you select every matching course to change its status or delete it from Google.

Where: Groups → a group → Classroom, and Classroom reporting → Courses

Compare a group with Google or Microsoft, and check it now

A group's Cloud tab now compares the members recorded in Google Workspace or Microsoft Entra with the Members tab, explains each difference, and has Check now to re-read the group from the platform.

Where: Groups → a group → Cloud

Sync pages lead with what worked

The dashboard, Sync status and Logs now open on how many changes applied, and count problems by cause rather than by every repeat, so one broken group no longer shows as thousands of errors. Red is kept for syncs that genuinely failed.

Where: Dashboard, Sync status and Logs

Easy-to-type passwords for young pupils, and learners-only password changes

The password wizard can now create passwords made of simple words that young pupils can type, and can change learners' passwords in a group without touching the staff in it.

Where: Import → Password import

Suspended users are taken out of their groups and classes

Suspending someone now also removes them from their groups, so a pupil who has left no longer lingers in your group lists, Google groups or Google Classrooms.

Where: Users

The Classroom tab shows which Google Classroom a group is linked to

A group's Classroom tab now names its linked Google Classroom at the top, and no longer says a linked group is unlinked.

Where: Groups → a group → Classroom

Add someone to a group from their own page

A user's Memberships tab now lets you add them to a group directly, and adding one person no longer re-syncs the whole group.

Where: Users → a user → Memberships

Choose which pre-admission pupils to set up

Pre-admission pupils are now chosen rather than added automatically, grouped by the year they were born into so you can set a year group for a whole batch. You can see the username each pupil will get before approving, including pupils your MIS never marks as accepted.

Where: Data → Incoming learners and mentors → Learners

Calmer colours across the admin

Buttons, links and highlights now use a calm indigo instead of red, so healthy screens no longer look like they're full of warnings. Red is kept for real errors.

Nested groups, cloud members and Classroom search are back on the group page

The group page in the new admin again lets you put groups inside other groups, see the group's members in Google or Microsoft, and search for a group's Google Classroom. You can also add the members of one group to every selected group in one go.

Where: Groups → a group

Reactivate last year's classrooms in bulk

See each group's previous Google Classroom and its status, then reactivate or archive any number of them at once, filtered by their status in Google.

Where: Google Workspace → Classroom → Last year's classrooms

The new admin is now the default

When you sign in you now land in the rebuilt admin automatically. The classic admin is still there if you need it, and the bug icon in the bottom-right corner lets you report a problem or switch back.

Choose exactly what each admin can do

Reduced admin access is now enforced, not just hidden: open an admin's Access tab to pick Full or Reduced, then fine-tune individual permissions such as resetting passwords or changing sync settings. Trust admins can also see and limit every admin's school access in one place.

Where: Users → an admin → Access, and MAT overview → Admin permissions

See what's coming from your MIS before it arrives

MIS sync can now run in preview, showing exactly which learners, staff, groups and pre-admissions would come in, and why anyone is held back, without importing anything. Trusts can see the whole trust's incoming data at once.

Where: Data → MIS sync preview

Trace a user across the trust, and merge accounts in any school

Trust admins can search one username and see that person's sync activity across every school in a single timeline, with one-click fixes. Merging duplicate accounts is no longer trust-only, and trusts sharing one Google domain are protected from schools removing each other's group members.

Where: MAT overview → User log trace, and Users → Merge users

End of year area

A new End of year area shows your school's provisioning window as a timeline, explains in plain English what happens at the end of term, and lets you set the resume date and what happens to Google Classrooms. It also includes a tidy-up that lets you review before deleting, and a review of Google accounts that aren't in Realsmart.

Where: End of year