Resource Hierarchy (Organisations, Folders, Projects)

Google Cloud Platform organises all resources within a clearly defined hierarchy. Understanding this hierarchy is fundamental because it determines how you manage access control, apply policies, and organise billing. Every resource you create in GCP — a virtual machine, a storage bucket, a database — lives inside a project, and projects can be organised within folders and an organisation.

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The Four Levels of the Resource Hierarchy

The GCP resource hierarchy has four levels:

Organisation
└── Folder (optional, can be nested)
    └── Project
        └── Resource (VM, bucket, database, etc.)

Level	Description
Organisation	The root node of the hierarchy, representing your company or institution
Folder	An optional grouping mechanism for projects (can be nested up to 10 levels deep)
Project	The fundamental organising entity in GCP — all resources belong to a project
Resource	The actual GCP services you use (VMs, buckets, databases, etc.)

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Organisation