Create a Hub Site in SharePoint Online

Recently, we were setting up an intranet portal using SharePoint Online for a client. They have more than 10 sites, including both team sites (HR, Finance, Sales) and several communication sites (such as Marketing).

We suggested creating a SharePoint hub site and associating the department sites for a logical connection between related sites. It helps unified navigation, consistent branding, consistent user experiences, and integrated search capabilities across associated sites within your SharePoint.

In this tutorial, I will explain everything about SharePoint hub sites, including how to create a hub site and associate it with SharePoint team sites and communication sites. How to set up navigation bar, theme, logo, etc.

What is a SharePoint Hub Site

A SharePoint Hub Site is like a central hub that connects and organizes a group of related SharePoint sites — such as department, project, or regional sites — under a common structure.

Think of it as a “container” or “umbrella” that brings together multiple sites with shared navigation, branding, and search capabilities.

According to Microsoft, a Hub Site helps you connect and organize related sites based on attributes like department, division, region, or project.

How does the SharePoint Hub Site work, and what are its Advantages?

Before hub sites, SharePoint used a hierarchical site collection model — meaning you had a “parent” site with “subsites” underneath. This structure was rigid and hard to reorganize as companies evolved.

With modern SharePoint, Microsoft moved to a flat architecture where all sites are independent. Hub sites were introduced to logically connect those independent sites — without creating a technical dependency.

So, instead of nesting sites inside each other, you can associate them to a hub site dynamically.

Here’s how the SharePoint hub site works:

1. You designate one site as the Hub Site.
   This is typically a communication site that serves as the “home” for a department, region, or major initiative.
2. Other SharePoint sites are associated with the Hub.
   For example:
   • HR site, Payroll site, Recruitment site
   All can be associated with the HR Hub Site.
3. Shared Navigation:
   When sites are connected to a hub, they share a common top navigation bar — making it easier for users to move between related sites.
4. Consistent Branding:
   The hub’s theme and logo are automatically applied to all associated sites, ensuring a consistent look and feel.
5. Scoped Search:
   When you search within a hub, results come from all associated sites — not just one. This creates a unified search experience.
6. Roll-up Content:
   You can display news, events, or documents from all associated sites on the hub’s homepage. This gives users a single view of what’s happening across the department or project.

Continue reading; I have demonstrated all these things below in practice.

Here are a few important points you should remember about the SharePoint hub sites:

• Choose a communication site or a modern team site for hub creation; classic team sites show hub navigation and settings only on modern pages.
• Sites already linked to another hub can’t be converted into a hub site.
• You can create up to 2,000 hub sites per organization (including hub-to-hub associations), but there’s no limit on associated sites.
• Associating a site with a hub doesn’t change permissions; ensure users associating sites have proper access to the hub.
• SharePoint hub sites do not store content centrally — content remains on associated SharePoint sites.

Create a Hub Site in SharePoint

In our organization, we have various departments like HR, IT, Sales, Marketing, and Finance. So I have created multiple teams and communication sites in SharePoint for all the departments. Below, you can see the site names and their corresponding URLs that I have created.

Now, as per our requirement, we need to create a hub site in SharePoint Online and associate all the above sites with it.

First, we need to create the SharePoint hub site, and then we can associate it with the team or communication sites.

To create a SharePoint hub site, first, you need to create a SharePoint team or communication site, and then you need to register the site as a SharePoint hub site.

Note: Always prefer to create a communication site instead of a team site, as team sites have restricted access.

Create and Register a SharePoint Communication Site as a Hub Site

1. First, open the SharePoint admin center and then navigate to Sites > Active Sites.
2. Then, click on +Create and create a communication site. For our requirement, I have created a communication site named “Enterprise Service Hub”.
3. Once the site is created, it will be listed under Active Sites. Now select the site you created, from the command bar, click on Hub > Register as hub site, like in the screenshot below:

4. Then it will open the “Register as hub site” dialog box.  Provide the Hub Name (which we can later change). Click on Save. Then, in the “People who can associate sites” with this hub, you can enter the user names, so that only those people can associate a SharePoint site with this hub site.

Once you click on the Save button, it will create the SharePoint hub site.

5. When you click on the site, you can see a message stating, “This site has been registered as a hub site” under the Hub tab, as shown in the screenshot below.

After this, we can associate any site with this hub site.

Associate SharePoint Sites with the Hub Site

Once you are registered, the next step is to associate the sites(Team sites and Communication Sites) with the Hub Site. There are two ways to associate a SharePoint site with a Hub site.

• From the SharePoint site
• From the SharePoint admin center

From the SharePoint site

Here are the steps to associate a SharePoint site with a Hub site from the SharePoint site itself.

1. Open the SharePoint site that you want to associate with a hub site. Then, from the Gear Icon, click on Site information.

2. Under the Hub site association, select the hub site you want to associate with, then click Save. Here, I selected my hub site “Enterprise Service Hub”.

Once you click on the Save button, the site is associated with the hub site. You can view the hub site in the command bar of the associated site, as shown in the screenshot.

From the SharePoint admin center

We can also associate a SharePoint site with a hub site from the admin center.

Follow the steps below to associate a SharePoint site with a Hub site from the SharePoint admin center.

1. Open the SharePoint admin center, then navigate to Sites > Active site.
2. Select the site (which you want to associate), then on the command bar, click on Hub > Associate with a hub.

3. It will open an “Edit hub association” dialog box.  Then select a Hub name (you wanted to associate with) and click Save.

Once you click on the Save button, the SharePoint site is associated with the hub site. Open the associated site, and you will see the hub site in the command bar.

Setting up the SharePoint Hub Site Navigation

Now, we can set up the navigation in the SharePoint hub site so that all the associated sites have the same navigation.

Here are the steps to create a SharePoint Hub site Navigation :

1. Open the main SharePoint hub site and from the top navigation bar, click on “Add link” as shown in the screenshot below.

2. It will open the “Edit hub navigation” dialog box. You must select “Link” from Choose an Option, then paste the link of the associated site into the Address field, and provide an associated site name under display name. Then, click the OK button and then click Save.

Then, that link will be added to the Hub site Navigation. The associated site name will appear on the Hub site’s navigation bar as shown below.

You can also edit the navigation links using the Edit option in the SharePoint hub site navigation bar.

3. If we click on Edit, we will navigate to the “Edit hub navigation” dialog box. Here we can edit the navigation as we like. If we have too many links, we can also create sub-links by clicking on “Make Sub Link“. We can also remove the link from the navigation by clicking on “Remove“. We can also move these labels up and down by clicking on “Move up” and “Move down“. Once all the modifications are done, click on Save.

Once we click Save, we can see the associated site names in the Hub Sites navigation bar. In the same way, I added all the remaining associated SharePoint sites, and the navigation bar looks like the screenshot below.

Now, if we click on the site names in the navigation bar, it will direct us to their corresponding SharePoint sites.

Now, if you navigate to any SharePoint site that is associated with this hub site, the above navigation bar will appear. Here is a screenshot from my HR site.

Once the sites are associated with the main SharePoint hub site, then the theme in the main SharePoint Hub site is applied to all the associated sites. Therefore, if we visit the associated sites to change the theme, we cannot make the change. It shows as per the screenshot below.

Setting Up SharePoint Hub Site Logo

SharePoint Hub site logo helps us with consistent branding, user recognition, and a professional appearance. To set up a Logo for your SharePoint Hub site, follow the steps given below:

1. Open the main SharePoint Hub site. Then, from the Gear icon, click on Hub site settings.

2. It will open a “Hub site settings” dialog box. Then, click on “Upload“, and you will navigate to the Media Library. Select an image, then click on Save.

Once we click on save. The logo appears on the SharePoint Hub site as shown below.

Now, when I open any associated SharePoint site (HR Portal), the main Hub site logo appears as shown in the screenshot below.

Check out Change SharePoint Site Logo and Thumbnail

Setting Up SharePoint Hub Site Theme

Themes give a Professional look to the Sites. It also helps all the associated sites to look similar to the hub site. To set up a theme, follow the steps below.

1. Go to the main SharePoint Hub site. Then, from the Gear icon, click “Change the look.”

2. It will navigate to the “Change the look” dialog box. Then, click on the Theme.

3. It will navigate to the “Theme” dialog box. Choose any theme (which you like). Then click on Save.

Once you click Save, the theme will be updated.

Open the SharePoint Hub site, and we can see the theme colour that we selected, as shown in the screenshot.

Here, you can also see the theme in the associated SharePoint site that is similar to the main SharePoint hub site.

Check out Save A SharePoint Site As A Template

Search Within a SharePoint Hub Site

Search within the SharePoint hub site enables you to search for documents across all sites. For this, you open the SharePoint hub site. At the top, you can find the “Search across sites” option. Here, you can find the necessary documents.

Display Events in the Hub Site From All SharePoint Sites

We can also display all the events from the associated SharePoint sites in one place on the hub site home page.

Here, I have created a few events in all the associated SharePoint sites and then used an Events web part to display those events in the Hub site home page.

Follow the steps below to display all the events on the hub site home page.

1. Open the SharePoint Hub site, then click on Edit.

2. You will navigate to the Edit page. There, you can see the “Web Parts” dialogue box. Click on See all web parts. Select Events Icon.

3. It will navigate to the events page. Click on Edit properties. Then you will get an “Events” dialog box. Select “All sites in the hub” as the source.

4. Click on Republish.

4. Now, you can view all the events from the associated SharePoint on the main Hub site, as shown below.

Check out Create Outlook Calendar Events Using Power Automate

Disassociate Site from SharePoint Hub Site

If you don’t want a site to be a part of the SharePoint hub site, you can disassociate it from the main SharePoint Hub site.

There are two ways to disassociate the site from the SharePoint Hub site.

• From the Associated Site
• From the SharePoint Admin center

From the Associated Site

To remove the associated site from the hub site from that site itself, you can use the steps below:

1. Open the SharePoint Associated Site (Team site or Communication site) from the Gear icon, then click on Site Information.

2. It will navigate to the “Site Information” dialog box. Under ‘Hub site association’, select ‘None‘. Click on Save.

Once you click Save, the associated site will be disassociated from the Hub site.

3. Once you navigate to the site that you have disassociated from the hub site, from the Gear icon, select ‘Site Information‘. You will navigate to “Site Information” dialog box. Then under Hub Site Navigation, you can see “None,” as shown in the screenshot.

From the SharePoint Admin Center

U can also disassociate the associated site from the hub site using the SharePoint admin centre. Then you can follow these steps.

1. Open the SharePoint admin center > Sites > Active Sites.
2. Select the SharePoint-associated site, then on the command bar, click on Hub. Click on Change Hub Association.

3. Then you will navigate to “Edit Hub Association Page “ dialog box. Under the select a hub, select None. Then click on Save.

Once you click Save, the associated site will be disassociated from the Hub site.

4. Once you navigate to the site that you have disassociated from the hub site, from the Gear icon, select ‘Site Information‘. You will navigate to “Site Information” dialog box. Then under Hub Site Navigation, you can see “None,” as shown in the screenshot.

Unregister a SharePoint Hub Site

If we don’t want the SharePoint Hub site, then we can also unregister it. Here are the steps to disassociate the SharePoint Hub site.

1. Open SharePoint Admin Center, then navigate to Sites, click on Active sites.
2. Select the Hub Site (which you want to disassociate) from the command bar, click on “Hub”, then click on “Unregister as Hub Site”.

3. It will navigate to the “Unregister as hub” site dialog box. Then click on Ok

Once you click on Ok, the hub site will be disassociated.

When you click on the site, in Site Info, under the Hub Association, you can see ‘None‘, as shown in the screenshot below.

Conclusion

In this tutorial, I explained what a SharePoint hub site is and the advantages of using a hub site. I have also shown how to create a hub site in SharePoint Online and associate SharePoint sites with the main hub site. Do you still need help with the SharePoint hub site? Do let me know in the comments below.

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Bijay Kumar

After working for more than 18 years in Microsoft technologies like SharePoint, Microsoft 365, and Power Platform (Power Apps, Power Automate, and Power BI), I thought will share my SharePoint expertise knowledge with the world. Our audiences are from the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom, Australia, New Zealand, etc. For my expertise knowledge and SharePoint tutorials, Microsoft has been awarded a Microsoft SharePoint MVP (12 times). I have also worked in companies like HP, TCS, KPIT, etc.