Hive metastore table access control

Hive metastore table access control is deprecated, replaced by Unity Catalog (deprecated May 2024).

Hive metastore table access control → Unity Catalog

The pre-Unity-Catalog governance model, where privileges on Hive metastore tables were defined and enforced per workspace by the cluster running the query rather than centrally.

• It arrived in July 2018 as a single checkbox, and only High Concurrency clusters were allowed to show it. 🔗
• Databricks' own docs open by calling it a legacy data governance model, then recommend Unity Catalog in the next breath. 🔗
• It is still switched on by default for Standard access mode compute, quietly outliving its own deprecation notice. 🔗

⚠ Limitations: Privileges are workspace-local rather than account-wide, and a cluster configured for table ACLs only cannot reach Unity Catalog data at all. 🔗

Category

Data governance

Deprecated

May 2024🔗

Also known as

Table ACLs, Table access control, table ACL

Verified

2026-08-20