How to create dynamic groups in Microsoft Entra ID. Every organization runs on people and the tools they use. As teams grow, so does the challenge of keeping access accurate, secure, and up to date. Manually managing group membership doesn't scale. That's where Microsoft Entra dynamic groups come in, turning identity management from a manual chore into an automated system. In this video, we'll show you how to create, validate, monitor, and govern Microsoft Entra dynamic groups. Before we begin, be sure to subscribe to NinjaOne's IT Video Hub and our YouTube channel for more tech content like this. Before getting started, make sure you have the appropriate Microsoft Entra ID licensing that supports dynamic groups, along with global administrator or groups administrator permissions. What are dynamic groups? Dynamic groups in Microsoft Entra ID use rules based on user or device attributes to automatically manage membership. They're commonly used to scale Intune assignments, conditional access policies, and automated provisioning. Their setup is straightforward, but at scale, complexity creeps in. Let's walk through Microsoft's best practices so your dynamic groups stay predictable, secure, and easy to manage. How to create Microsoft Entra dynamic groups. Step one: choose your group type and scope. Every setup starts with a choice, what kind of group you're building and what for. In the Microsoft Entra admin center, navigate to Groups, All groups, and select New group. Security groups handle app permissions, conditional access, and Intune configurations. Microsoft 365 groups power collaboration, Teams, SharePoint, Outlook. Next, choose your membership type, dynamic user or dynamic device. As you name your group, remember that consistent descriptive names make governance easier down the line. Security groups support dynamic users or dynamic devices, not both in the same group, while Microsoft 365 groups support dynamic users only. Step two: write the membership rule. Next comes the logic, the rule that decides who joins and who doesn't. Entra ID gives you two ways in. Rule builder for simple, drop-down driven conditions. Rule syntax editor for more advanced expressions. Every added condition adds processing time and maintenance overhead, so start simple and add complexity only when you need it. Step three: validate before you deploy. Before a rule goes live, put it to the test. Use the Validate rules feature to preview results against selected users or devices. Confirm the right people or devices show up and check the edge cases, users with blank or missing attributes that could slip through the cracks. Step four: monitor evaluation and sync. Dynamic groups don't update instantly. When an attribute changes, Entra ID queues a reevaluation, and in larger or hybrid tenants, that can take time. Keep an eye on two things. The last membership change. The dynamic rule processing status. If something shows as a processing error, revisit the rule syntax or check whether the attributes still exist in your directory. Step five: automate the audit. Manual monitoring only goes so far, so connect to Microsoft Graph. Pull every dynamic group and its rule and export the results to CSV, to JSON on a schedule that works for your team. Step six: govern for the long term. Finally, assign an owner to every dynamic group and track every rule change like you would a code change. Run regular audits, archive old rule versions with a timestamp, and link it all back to your change management system for full traceability. Dynamic groups take the manual guesswork out of identity management, but the payoff comes from creating efficient rules, validating them before deployment, and maintaining them through regular governance. That's how MSPs turn Microsoft Entra dynamic groups into dependable infrastructure. For more information, check out our official blog post on creating dynamic Microsoft Entra groups, linked in the description below.