This feature is definitely on our roadmap. Unfortunately it’s a pretty big undertaking for technical reasons, and we haven’t had the chance to tackle it yet. We hear and appreciate your feedback on this though, apologies for not acknowledging it earlier.
Hey, just checking in on this feature as it’s been 1 year since you confirmed that linking between bases was on the implement list. Do we have any news on how far away this is yet? :slightly_smiling_face:
This feature would be really helpful. Any potential dates for when it is coming?
+1 - Thanks for the great tool!
We’re managing orders and customers in a single base, and it would sure be helpful to break them apart…then the customer base could become customer/marketing for specific campaigns and the orders base could be broken down even further without having so many total records in a single base.
Excited for this one!
Wow - so many messages & people asking for interlinking of bases to keep their data nicely separated and ordered, yet no action from Airtable. Also, it would be really helpful to have finer permissions, like being able to protect some columns from certain user groups.
In order to do this viably, they would need to completely overhaul their pricing model, since all of the tier limitations are “per Base” - that’s probably the biggest barrier preventing this from happening.
For sure another +1 here for all the above reasons.
As for the pricing model issue, I hear what you’re saying, but the effort of designing a new payment schema (and the possibility of alienating some users) seems tiny compared to the massive increase in design possibilities that come with base-to-base linking.
I’m keeping my fingers crossed for this one.
+1 !!! this is a must request
I can see how this would be very useful - I can also see how it may be very difficult for Airtable to achieve (depending upon how the system is structured).
The same end could be served by having the ability to hide parts of the base depending upon users (actually Groups would be better) - and only display the whole base to it’s designer / admin. In this way it would be workable to build much larger solutions in Airtable with everything in one base. (And in this way it would make the current pricing model work better for Airtable as well).
In order to do this viably, they would need to completely overhaul their pricing model, since all of the tier limitations are “per Base” - that’s probably the biggest barrier preventing this from happening.
I must see something different than you. Every one of the packages on the pricing page say “Unlimited Bases”.
Just to jump on the bandwagon… I have a base simply called “data” that tracks our customers, contacts, endpoints, etc. I would like to have another base for “Tasks” and be able to reference all the tables in the other base. I could create a Tasks table in the main base, but I don’t necessarily want to expose all that to other users, plus it’s really started to get busy. Logically, they just seem like they should be separate.
Hi @Airtable team. Adding some more background from a new user.
The main reason I want to be able to use linking between bases is so that I can use a single member / user database across multiple bases.
One of our use cases is for Airtable to manage internal tasks and priorities. There is a single employee list that is used across a wide range of bases: task lists, roles and responsibilities, training processes, editorial calendars, etc. It’s not practical for all this to live in one base but neither is it practical to create multiple lists of employees and try to keep these all in sync. Granular permissions would be nice also, but wouldn’t solve our particular need.
Hope this helps :slightly_smiling_face:
Phil
… just to chime in: I see that something like this looks obvious and straightforward, but opens a can of worms around permissions, access rights, and no end of other questions.
However, I would say that this is a +1 feature I would love to see.
I ASSUMED this would already be a feature. Now I’ve got several disparate Bases and no way for them to talk to each other. :cry:
+1
Another user who would gain a lot of benefit from this feature.
Clearly, this is a very popular feature request! As Andrew said above, it’s certainly something that we are thinking about, though there are a variety of technical hurdles that would need to be cleared first. Since this is a huge undertaking, we want to make sure that we approach this in the correct way. Any specific ideas on how and why you’d want linked bases to work would be greatly appreciated!
Based on your responses, it seems like there are at least few reasons why one might want to link across bases, all of which raise interesting questions that we need to consider going forward:
-
Linking across bases could work as a form of granular permissioning (e.g. the Sales team has access to the sales base, and the PR team has access to the PR base, and though they might be able to see selected data from the other team’s base, they wouldn’t necessarily be able to alter it or read all of it). If this is your main reason for wanting cross-base linking: would your needs be met by Airtable implementing more granular permissioning controls at the table level or even the field level (e.g., password protected/hidden/redacted tables/fields that certain users are not allowed to see)? Is it more important to you that different users have access to different bases for privacy reasons (i.e. it’s mission critical that certain users don’t see certain bits of information), or for convenience reasons (i.e. I don’t want all users to see everything in one big base because not all of that data is relevant to their interests)?
-
Using linking across bases in order to create a manager/“master” base, which draws information from a number of sub-bases. Would your needs be met in this case by some sort of reporting functionality that takes information from many bases, or is it particularly important that this information takes the form of another base?
-
(Please correct me if I’m wrong about this.) A general sense that a large base with many tables feels cramped—that you have to “cram” what feels like too much data into one place. If this describes you, can you articulate why you feel this way? Is it because of how a base with many tables looks? Is it because of loading times? Is it because you feel like having too much information in one place is overwhelming?
Other considerations: How would you like linking across bases to interact with permissions? Say there are two bases, A and B. A user has access to Base A but not access to Base B, and Base A includes links to Base B. What should the user see when they look at Base A? How would linking across bases work with editing? Should you be able to edit the contents of Base B while in Base A, or should you have to go to Base B first?
There are so many things to say about linking bases, but this is enough for now, I think. :grinning_face_with_smiling_eyes:
My use cases end up being mostly #3 (cramped with too many tables) and some of #2.
Some information I use is needed in almost all of my bases; I use a ‘art studies’ checklist sort of base, and it bleeds into many of my projects but isn’t related enough to list every time.
Aside from that, for most of my issues, this might be resolved just by being able to group or tag tables together.
As for permissions…
I see a need for a ‘can see’ and ‘can edit’, maybe ‘can comment’, ‘can add’ permissions for different bases, maybe for different tables or views. I can see ‘comments’ being a common base for that purpose, for that matter. I don’t see it as useful if those permissions aren’t held across linked bases and records.
I utilize Airtable to organize records for a small college. I agree that linking between table would be awesome. for the reasons stated above. However, for me, I could keep all of the information in a single base with some exceptions. Perhaps the exceptions can be remedied with current solutions. If so I apologize, if not, please consider…
-
If I could password protect a table while still sharing selected data fields with other tables that would address my need to exclude certain data while using other bits.
-
If #1 were possible the number of table “tabs” would make navigation between tables cumbersome. Perhaps the ability to link table names to a single table. That way I could create a “table of contents” for tables that are in a base. a TOC would contain the names of all of the other tables, sort and filter capabilities of course, so no matter how many tables I would have in a base I can find the specific tables I need without searching through the ever changing list…
I am new to AT but I must tell you it is an excellent product. If any of these capabilities are available and I just have not found them yet please disregard my note AFTER sending instructions on how to make it work.
Thank you for your efforts.
We are new to Airtable. We are a small business, currently using Smartsheet, and while it does work well, it has no relational data feature, so I was looking for a relational DB in the cloud. Airtable looks great and could easily replace Smartsheets, but to be worth the effort, we need the link to other base feature.
As very well analysed by @Katherine_Duh Katherine_Duh, feature 1 is permissions: tables requiring more confidentiality or safety would be in a base with very limited access.
Then 2: complex cross-base reporting
and 3 is correct, a base with too many tables becomes harder to use,
As a temporary step, making shared views permissions more granular would help a lot:
any view would be shareable for either view, edit, add, delete, edit view definition (or combinations)
YES!!! This is the single most wanted feature for me.
+1 from me.
Relatable bases, to summarise content from a master/complete/project base into a specific collaborators base showing assigned tasks (distilling collaborators tasks from many individual bases to a singular base) is a must for our business.
Use case: each base is a construction call forward sheet containing every task to complete a project (500 plus tasks). Tasks are assigned to multiple collaborators/companies or to company employees.
The database owner and some of its users need to see the complete base for each project, all task view, to assign, comment and adjust tasks, keep the singular base/project updated. Other employees only need see task assigned to them or their division (sales/admin/contracts/estimating/scheduling/site). Sharing filtered or grouped views could achieve the filtering of internal company information/viewing by internal company collaborators.
A collaborator has tasks on multiple bases/jobs, but does not need to see all the tasks in an individual base ) they get lost/confused/just don’t need to see everything.
Consequently, linking each base/project to an individual collaborator’s “summary base” that shows only those tasks they have been assigned from each “complete base” is essential in our workflow.
This way, each collaborator is provided a link/access to one “summary” base, that they can share to all of their employees, seeing, commenting and completing only those tasks assigned to them from multiple “complete/project” bases.
A many to one and one to many type database relationship.
Sort of like what we could do with MS Access SQL databases (when MS Access was all we had) :slightly_smiling_face:
Yes, this will improve the way we use Airtable and make even more versatile.
[And I have not read all the threads]
My suggestion is to make one base in a team the master/global base, with global bases that could be linked into other bases. In the specific project base one could link to e.i the master ‘employee’ base. This lives in the master bases and just appears in the other bases for linking records purposes.
Keep up the good work @Katherine_Duh et. al.!
I too see this feature as highly desirable as I often end up duplicating tables and data in different bases as I want yet other tables to be seperate.
To simplify this process would it be possible to set up a global base with only tables that would be shared by all bases.
Or in the intrim, give the ability to copy the structure of a table to another base. This would make the process a little easier.
Oh gawd, wether it’s this or shared views that allow sharees to edit would save me a TON of Zaps and work way better.
Since this is the number one feature I’d benefit from, I thought I’d add my use case for it.
As a professional musician I have two distinct areas of focus. Each have their own bases which I use to record my activities and use as CRMs.
These two focus areas are so distinc that they definitely have their own types of info, and benefit from being separate bases. But since essentially these activists all go through myself and are both in the music industry, there is some crossover, especially on the CRM side.
Two examples of this:
- I have records of session musicians I meet, and artists in similar styles, as well as artists I play on the same program with. Occasionally these cross focus areas, and I end up with a record in each CRM for that. Then, I can no longer see all records pertaining to that artist/venue/etc.
- In each CRM I have a locations table. This lets me see all venues, artists, media, media coverage, etc in a given city. Both CRMs have this though, and it’d be nice to have the same city records in each base. It’d also be nice to see all referencing records in both bases.
Thanks for all the amazing work you do on Airtable! No app has really changed my workflows so dramatically and as quickly. :blue_heart: :blue_heart: :blue_heart:
Adding my voice to the chorus—this would be hugely helpful as a way to organize HR and employee record data, without having to worry about granular permissions.
Or, if easier, you could add granular view/write/modify permissions on a table-by-table basis, and not worry about linking bases. Either one solves our problems and would be very helpful!!
+1million for this request. Actually, I’d settle for either a) ghost copies of tables in other databases or b) a Zapier trigger for updates to records instead of new. Not being able to link and only having a new record trigger makes things very hard and much more manual than it should be.
Simple permissioning won’t solve the problem either, as we really need to have certain data ghost between databases. For example, personal information needs to be available to HR as well as to Sales, and people shouldn’t have to move back and forth between bases to grab a simple mailing address. And, every time a mailing address gets updated in a personal information base, I shouldn’t have to manually update it in the sales database.
Is there an update to this feature? I have read the thread and it shows that it’s been ongoing for about 18 months now. Thank you!
PS - Love Airtable so far and this is my only huge complaint about what is otherwise an amazing product.
