Hi All,
A search of the community yielded the same question but no definite answer.
I have created a view on Airtable, shared it so users can search and find info that they need. Problem - filtering, grouping, and search work only on desktop or laptop browsers. None of those options are available on mobile devices.
Is there a workaround or some way to get at least the filter and search to work on a mobile device?
Thanks in advance.
Regards,
usha
Best answer by ScottWorld
I have checked with different mobile devices and browsers. Embedding a view seems to not have filter, group, sort, or search options.
Oh wow, I’m so sorry. I stand corrected! I’ve never noticed that before!
This seems to be a gigantic omission from Airtable!
I didn’t realize that embedding mobile views doesn’t give the option for the toolbar at the top. Considering that the majority of Internet traffic comes from mobile devices, this doesn’t even make sense to me.
In my personal opinion, this is a huge bug in Airtable, so be sure to report it to support@airtable.com.
There are 2 workarounds to this issue:
1. CLUNKIER WORKAROUND: One workaround is that you can ask people to switch to the “Desktop Browser View” within their mobile web browser. I don’t know how to do this on Android, but on iOS, you can click on the little “aA” icon on the lefthand side of Safari’s toolbar, and choose “Request Desktop Website”. That will tell Airtable that you’re using a desktop browser instead of a mobile browser. Although I’m assuming that Airtable will then fetch the desktop embed view, which might not fit into your mobile screen. But it might.
2. MUCH BETTER WORKAROUND (but it costs extra money):
Use an external interface/portal app for Airtable, all of which offer mobile friendly views. A few of the leading customer portals are Noloco, JetAdmin, Softr, Pory, and Glide.
Noloco is probably the most powerful & customizable one.
The CEO of Noloco gave a demonstration of his product on this Airtable podcast episode.
I also give a brief tutorial of Noloco on this Airtable podcast episode.
And I also presented a full one-hour webinar on Noloco called Building a Client Portal on Noloco powered by Airtable.
p.s. If you have a budget for your project and you’d like to hire an expert Airtable consultant to help you with any of this, please feel free to contact me through my website: Airtable consulting — ScottWorld
You need to download the Airtable mobile app.
Thanks @ScottWorld. Unless I am missing something, that seems to be for Airtable admins?
I am looking for filter and search options for users to search views directly on Airtable or embedded into a web page.
Regards,
usha
+20Thanks @ScottWorld. Unless I am missing something, that seems to be for Airtable admins?
I am looking for filter and search options for users to search views directly on Airtable or embedded into a web page.
Regards,
usha
Ahh, embedding views into a web page is a completely different question than your first question about mobile devices.
If you’re trying to embed a view in a web page, you would just need to turn on “Show View Controls” on the page where you create the embedding code.
Regarding your other question about mobile devices, the mobile app is for ALL collaborators on a base, not just creators. But yes, embedding a view is different than sharing your base with collaborators.
Also, I’d like to clarify my answer from above that might have made it inadvertently seem like filtering/grouping/sorting/searching are only available within the mobile app. This was not my intention, as filtering/grouping/sorting/searching is also available from mobile web browsers as well.
However, if you’re using the native Airtable interface (i.e. NOT embedding a view), Airtable’s native interface doesn’t work properly in mobile web browsers, so the mobile app is the preferred way of using Airtable’s native interface on a mobile device (i.e. NOT embedding a view).
Since you ARE embedding a view, you shouldn’t have any problems.
Ahh, embedding views into a web page is a completely different question than your first question about mobile devices.
If you’re trying to embed a view in a web page, you would just need to turn on “Show View Controls” on the page where you create the embedding code.
Regarding your other question about mobile devices, the mobile app is for ALL collaborators on a base, not just creators. But yes, embedding a view is different than sharing your base with collaborators.
Also, I’d like to clarify my answer from above that might have made it inadvertently seem like filtering/grouping/sorting/searching are only available within the mobile app. This was not my intention, as filtering/grouping/sorting/searching is also available from mobile web browsers as well.
However, if you’re using the native Airtable interface (i.e. NOT embedding a view), Airtable’s native interface doesn’t work properly in mobile web browsers, so the mobile app is the preferred way of using Airtable’s native interface on a mobile device (i.e. NOT embedding a view).
Since you ARE embedding a view, you shouldn’t have any problems.
Thanks @ScottWorld.
I have checked with different mobile devices and browsers. Embedding a view seems to not have filter, group, sort, or search options.
See attached screenshot for the two different embed experience - one with the desktop and another with the mobile.
Best,
usha
+20I have checked with different mobile devices and browsers. Embedding a view seems to not have filter, group, sort, or search options.
Oh wow, I’m so sorry. I stand corrected! I’ve never noticed that before!
This seems to be a gigantic omission from Airtable!
I didn’t realize that embedding mobile views doesn’t give the option for the toolbar at the top. Considering that the majority of Internet traffic comes from mobile devices, this doesn’t even make sense to me.
In my personal opinion, this is a huge bug in Airtable, so be sure to report it to support@airtable.com.
There are 2 workarounds to this issue:
1. CLUNKIER WORKAROUND: One workaround is that you can ask people to switch to the “Desktop Browser View” within their mobile web browser. I don’t know how to do this on Android, but on iOS, you can click on the little “aA” icon on the lefthand side of Safari’s toolbar, and choose “Request Desktop Website”. That will tell Airtable that you’re using a desktop browser instead of a mobile browser. Although I’m assuming that Airtable will then fetch the desktop embed view, which might not fit into your mobile screen. But it might.
2. MUCH BETTER WORKAROUND (but it costs extra money):
Use an external interface/portal app for Airtable, all of which offer mobile friendly views. A few of the leading customer portals are Noloco, JetAdmin, Softr, Pory, and Glide.
Noloco is probably the most powerful & customizable one.
The CEO of Noloco gave a demonstration of his product on this Airtable podcast episode.
I also give a brief tutorial of Noloco on this Airtable podcast episode.
And I also presented a full one-hour webinar on Noloco called Building a Client Portal on Noloco powered by Airtable.
p.s. If you have a budget for your project and you’d like to hire an expert Airtable consultant to help you with any of this, please feel free to contact me through my website: Airtable consulting — ScottWorld
I have checked with different mobile devices and browsers. Embedding a view seems to not have filter, group, sort, or search options.
Oh wow, I’m so sorry. I stand corrected! I’ve never noticed that before!
This seems to be a gigantic omission from Airtable!
I didn’t realize that embedding mobile views doesn’t give the option for the toolbar at the top. Considering that the majority of Internet traffic comes from mobile devices, this doesn’t even make sense to me.
In my personal opinion, this is a huge bug in Airtable, so be sure to report it to support@airtable.com.
There are 2 workarounds to this issue:
1. CLUNKIER WORKAROUND: One workaround is that you can ask people to switch to the “Desktop Browser View” within their mobile web browser. I don’t know how to do this on Android, but on iOS, you can click on the little “aA” icon on the lefthand side of Safari’s toolbar, and choose “Request Desktop Website”. That will tell Airtable that you’re using a desktop browser instead of a mobile browser. Although I’m assuming that Airtable will then fetch the desktop embed view, which might not fit into your mobile screen. But it might.
2. MUCH BETTER WORKAROUND (but it costs extra money):
Use an external interface/portal app for Airtable, all of which offer mobile friendly views. A few of the leading customer portals are Noloco, JetAdmin, Softr, Pory, and Glide.
Noloco is probably the most powerful & customizable one.
The CEO of Noloco gave a demonstration of his product on this Airtable podcast episode.
I also give a brief tutorial of Noloco on this Airtable podcast episode.
And I also presented a full one-hour webinar on Noloco called Building a Client Portal on Noloco powered by Airtable.
p.s. If you have a budget for your project and you’d like to hire an expert Airtable consultant to help you with any of this, please feel free to contact me through my website: Airtable consulting — ScottWorld
Thanks @ScottWorld. Requesting the desktop version of the site was the perfect workaround.
I do agree that this seems like a big omission since most access to data will be from mobile browsers.
Thanks Again,
usha
+20Thanks @ScottWorld. Requesting the desktop version of the site was the perfect workaround.
I do agree that this seems like a big omission since most access to data will be from mobile browsers.
Thanks Again,
usha
That’s great to hear! 
+20Thanks @ScottWorld. Requesting the desktop version of the site was the perfect workaround.
I do agree that this seems like a big omission since most access to data will be from mobile browsers.
Thanks Again,
usha
By the way, iOS also lets you request the desktop website AUTOMATICALLY for whatever site you’d like.
Tap on that little “aA” icon again, and choose “Website Settings”. Then, you can set it to always request the desktop website for that site.
Thanks @ScottWorld.
I have checked with different mobile devices and browsers. Embedding a view seems to not have filter, group, sort, or search options.
See attached screenshot for the two different embed experience - one with the desktop and another with the mobile.
Best,
usha
Hi folks - I'm opening this thread back up because it doesn't seem we've gotten to any resolution.
I too am looking for a way to make my tables searchable from mobile devices by users without direct Airtable access. I have the tables embedded on pages within a wordpress site, which is fine for anyone using a desktop, but for my guys in the field, the tables come up without controls, like the preview on the right above.
I also tried the miniExtensions so-called solution, but did not find that to be at all useful.
I just need people to be able to enter data from one field and pull up the entire record from a particular view in a table - surely there's a way to do that!?
Thanks,
Shawn : )
Hi folks - I'm opening this thread back up because it doesn't seem we've gotten to any resolution.
I too am looking for a way to make my tables searchable from mobile devices by users without direct Airtable access. I have the tables embedded on pages within a wordpress site, which is fine for anyone using a desktop, but for my guys in the field, the tables come up without controls, like the preview on the right above.
I also tried the miniExtensions so-called solution, but did not find that to be at all useful.
I just need people to be able to enter data from one field and pull up the entire record from a particular view in a table - surely there's a way to do that!?
Thanks,
Shawn : )
I actually found a solution to this - I've been building an app on pory.io, which enables me to create an easy-to-use interface for my team so they can access, search, add, edit, and remove airtable data on a granular basis without having to be all up in the back end.
Here's what it looks like:
Each one of those records opens up into a detailed view that can contain any and all data from the record, including images and buttons that I've set up with prefills to help make processing inventory easy.
Yesterday I tested for the first time using the app to:
I used jotforms, zapier, and esignature.io to generate the bills of sale and lading, but everything else is done through buttons on the app interface - like these on the marketing page:
So yes, it is possible to use Airtable as a back-end data management system while making the front end easy to use for members of your team who are not savvy enough to be editors or collaborators on the base itself.
OH - and this thread was about mobile, so yes - it works on their phones, and the information is so much easier to read and work with than it was trying to use the airtable app.
Has anyone found a solution to this in Airtable only? I don't want to have to design a new interface when I'm already embedding. It's so crazy that this hasn't been addressed - if ANYONE needs search and filter and sort, it's mobile users!
I have checked with different mobile devices and browsers. Embedding a view seems to not have filter, group, sort, or search options.
Oh wow, I’m so sorry. I stand corrected! I’ve never noticed that before!
This seems to be a gigantic omission from Airtable!
I didn’t realize that embedding mobile views doesn’t give the option for the toolbar at the top. Considering that the majority of Internet traffic comes from mobile devices, this doesn’t even make sense to me.
In my personal opinion, this is a huge bug in Airtable, so be sure to report it to support@airtable.com.
There are 2 workarounds to this issue:
1. CLUNKIER WORKAROUND: One workaround is that you can ask people to switch to the “Desktop Browser View” within their mobile web browser. I don’t know how to do this on Android, but on iOS, you can click on the little “aA” icon on the lefthand side of Safari’s toolbar, and choose “Request Desktop Website”. That will tell Airtable that you’re using a desktop browser instead of a mobile browser. Although I’m assuming that Airtable will then fetch the desktop embed view, which might not fit into your mobile screen. But it might.
2. MUCH BETTER WORKAROUND (but it costs extra money):
Use an external interface/portal app for Airtable, all of which offer mobile friendly views. A few of the leading customer portals are Noloco, JetAdmin, Softr, Pory, and Glide.
Noloco is probably the most powerful & customizable one.
The CEO of Noloco gave a demonstration of his product on this Airtable podcast episode.
I also give a brief tutorial of Noloco on this Airtable podcast episode.
And I also presented a full one-hour webinar on Noloco called Building a Client Portal on Noloco powered by Airtable.
p.s. If you have a budget for your project and you’d like to hire an expert Airtable consultant to help you with any of this, please feel free to contact me through my website: Airtable consulting — ScottWorld
While this is great for internal use when you can advise people to view in desktop mode, it is not a solution for businesses who want to make it easy for visitors to take action without extra steps that most won't bother with. A list of jobs or products, for instance, needs to be searchable without making site visitors read instructions and change browser settings. Geesh, Airtable, get this done please!
+20Yeah, it’s a major drawback to Airtable.
Sadly, I had 2 clients leave Airtable over this issue. They switched to FileMaker, which is the database language that I specialized in for 30 years. (If you need a referral to a great FileMaker developer, just reach out to me through my Airtable consulting website.)
If you decide to stick with Airtable, the only way to workaround this problem is to use an external interface/portal app for Airtable, all of which offer mobile friendly views that can be embedded.
A few of the leading customer portals are Noloco, JetAdmin, Softr, Pory, and Glide.
Noloco is probably the most powerful & customizable one.
The CEO of Noloco gave a demonstration of his product on this Airtable podcast episode.
I also give a brief tutorial of Noloco on this Airtable podcast episode.
And I also presented a full one-hour webinar on Noloco called Building a Client Portal on Noloco powered by Airtable.
p.s. If you have a budget for your project and you’d like to hire an expert Airtable consultant to help you with any of this, please feel free to contact me through my website: Airtable consulting — ScottWorld
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