AWS member account not joining the organization

Question

Recently invited a new AWS account to join your AWS Organization as a member account. However, the account is not showing up as a connected member in the AWS Organizations console, and it is unable to manage it from the management account.

usXCloudSec · Accepted Answer

Check if the member account is **already part of another AWS Organization**. An AWS account can only be a member of one organization at a time. If it's still associated with a previous organization, it must leave that organization first before it can be invited and successfully joined to a new one. Once the account has left the old organization, you can resend the invitation and complete the connection.

re:Post Agent · Answer

Based on your description, there are several potential reasons why your invited AWS account is not showing up as a connected member in your AWS Organization:

1. The invitation may not have been accepted yet. When you invite an account to join your organization, the account owner must explicitly accept the invitation before it becomes a member.

2. If the account you're trying to invite is currently a management account (root account) of another organization, it cannot accept invitations to join your organization. The account would first need to:
- Remove all member accounts from its current organization
- Delete its organization
- Only then can it accept an invitation to join your organization

3. Similarly, if the account is already a member of another organization, it must first leave that organization before it can accept your invitation.

4. There might be an issue with the "all features" enablement process in your organization. When you enable all features, this operation can take some time and requires all member accounts to respond. During this period, you might not be able to invite new accounts to join the organization.

5. Due to AWS's eventual consistency model, changes in organization structure may not be immediately visible across all endpoints due to data replication and caching.

For invited accounts, remember that unlike accounts created within your organization, invited accounts do not automatically get the OrganizationAccountAccessRole created. You'll need to manually create this role in the invited account after it joins to properly manage it from the management account.

If the issue persists, I recommend checking if the invitation is still pending in the AWS Organizations console and confirming with the account owner that they've attempted to accept the invitation.  
**Sources**  
[Account stuck in root organization | AWS re:Post](https://repost.aws/questions/QUCKyXhLWnTM2hME8uqjYogA/account-stuck-in-root-organization)  
[Troubleshooting AWS Organizations - AWS Organizations](https://docs.aws.amazon.com/organizations/latest/userguide/orgs_troubleshoot.html)  
[Creating OrganizationAccountAccessRole for an invited account with AWS Organizations - AWS Organizations](https://docs.aws.amazon.com/organizations/latest/userguide/orgs_manage_accounts_create-cross-account-role.html)

AWS member account not joining the organization

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