Grouped by more than 3 fields

Is it still limited to 3 group choices? Is there a workaround?

I agree…why only 3 fields? I actually need to group down to 4 levels. Is there a way to do this?

If this is your table:

And you want to group by Colour/Shape/Size/Weight, you could add a formula field that combines two of the four attributes, e.g. Colour/Shape:

Then created a grouped view which groups by:
- Colour/Shape
- Size
- Weight

If you do this, you’ll see a warning in the grouping config:

Obviously, you won’t be able to disassociate Colour and Shape grouping in this view on the fly, but if you want this just create another view where it is grouped by Shape/Size/Weight (for example).

Not perfect, but maybe useful as a workaround

JB

I appreciate the thoughtful reply. I was more wondering this from a developer / design perspective though. Why would Airtable build this with a limitation of 3 fields for grouping? Why have any limitation at all? And, no, pivot tables are not a viable alternative for what we’re doing.

Does it cause more overhead on the servers when you have more then 3 levels of grouping? Is there some bandwidth limitation? Just curious why they would pick this arbitrary number.

When adding records, I am finding that the number of groupings typically needs to equal to the number of filters so that records don’t “disappear” from a view (when all fields don’t match the criteria of the filter). When the groupings match the filter, the record is added seamlessly without and disruption.

I’d also love to be able to group by more than 3 one day.

@Katherine_Duh is it proper practice to tag you or someone from Airtable with suggestions like this? Or do you have a team that monitors discussions for suggestions?

Thank you!

I also would like to advocate for more than group by max of 3. I can’t use the computed field method for the reasons listed above. In computer science, the special numbers are 0, 1, and 2. At 3 and above it’s generally all the same in terms of the logic (though UI could add challenge).

This limit really does hamper legitimate uses of the product and cannot be rationally explained to my stakeholders. This is a common use-case for your users who want to use AirTable, but who may start looking elsewhere because it seems like a “silly” constraint. As a software developer, I’m sure my systems have lots of silly constraints as well, but when customers identify pain points, they get fixed. I hope you’ll do the same, knowing full well that you’ve had an aggressive road-map for quite some time and that your users admire your tenacity.

So, in spite of the strong advocacy of this position, well done and keep it going!
Andrew

I just abruptly learned that there is a limit of 3 for groups… +1 from me to increase the max.

I’m adding my vote here to improve this feature and have more than 3 fields to group. Thank you in advance!

Really need +1 Group here too.

+1
I fell in love with Airtable because of the multi-level grouping feature…
And now that I actually try to move in and move my data from Excel to Airtable, I find this stupid limitation… What??

In Excel I can group data by as much levels as I want, but then it’s with a Pivot Table and that is considered a “report”, so I can only view my data and not edit them… → Annoying.
So you need to work in 2 tabs simultanously: one for editing, one for viewing…

Now I move to Airtable and I get the suggestion… “Why not use a Pivot Table?”

For Christ’s sake… - I hate Pivot Tables!

Just give us unlimited levels of grouping. Or, like… At least 10 levels.

Thanks!

Can we get grouping to 4 levels in 2023? 

From a project management viewpoint... limiting to 3 grouping fields when needing to see hierarchy relationships mid-convo with very technical developers and engineering is critical. This helps foster good convo. I need to see this hierarchy... if you cant deliver this Airtable then can you build us an extension that can? At least give us 10 (I'll even be grateful for 5), but I dont believe any good project plan would/should exceed 10

+1 for more than three grouping options! 🙏

No post since 2021, have we decided we no longer need this? Because I would like it. Is there a logical reason why it's not possible?