This is so nice to see! Will it also be possible to filter records by id now? I mean the filter parameter:

I know with the metadata api I can get this name from the id, but that is still a bit wonky. This is really an issue for me.

Initial highlights from my quick glance: you can now programmatically create bases, tables, and fields. You can also programmatically add a comment to a record. Those will definitely come in handy.

Is there any thought on adding the ability to create new Views via the Web API (or Scripting/Blocks APIs)?

Wow!! Thanks so much, @SeanKeenan! :grinning_face_with_big_eyes:

Today is a gigantic day with lots of tremendous improvements across the board!! :clinking_glasses:

And the new metadata capabilities are huge! :partying_face:

Also — you guys did a really nice job with the new API docs, too!

I nominate @SeanKeenan for president!!

p.s. Thanks for keeping around the old functionality where the API docs dynamically change based on our own bases, tables, and fields!

Assuming you mean Record ID, could you create a Formula field with {Record ID} and sort by that field?

As for the updates: amazing! Really appreciated and will save power users an incredible amount of time.

Formula fields are not supported by the API, and oddly, formula fields are also not supported by the Airtable mobile app.

Which usecases do you know where automating a base creation via API calls is more relevant than Copy pasting an existing base.

Am I correct in reading, that View API calls won’t return an array of visible fields within that View - and that, if I’m mistaken and they do (or the feature will be introduced eventually?), that this particular VIEW API is limited to enterprise accounts only? … I read this announcement really, really, really hoping that I could finally query and return a View’s visible fields - but it seems that this isn’t the case.

Regardless, there’s still lots of good things for me to get through here, thank you for the announcement - and would appreciate any info regarding my query on returning visible fields from a view via API calls.

Thank you for this wonderful list of new features!

I think this is one of my favorites as well! It will make it so much easier to like to documentation when answering questions on this forum.

I noticed that the new name for this API is “Web API” versus “REST API”. Thanks for giving thought to the naming.

Where can we see the documentation for this, and how does this affect billing? Are service accounts “free” or will there be charges for service accounts?

Thanks for this headsup. Will Airtable also be generating a tool where we can see what services have been using an API key in the past month/year/time frame? People setup automations/integrations that use an API key, and then forget what those integrations are.

The new webhooks feature looks really powerful. To clarify, this is a system where we can register a webhook that Airtable will call when the conditions are met? It seems like this has a bit of overlap with automations, but also opens up possibilities that are not available with automations.

• It looks like webhooks can detect the deletion of a record. Is this correct?



• It looks like webhooks can detect schema changes. Is this correct?

Are there charges or limits related to webhooks. For example, are there limits on the number of times a webhook will be called? Other than the fact that webhooks only last for 7 days and there is a max of 10 per base, what is the motivation to use automations instead of webhooks?

Will this allow us to show comments in a field in the table?

Would be great to see comments at a glance in the table, rather than have to go into the record model.

Airtable Web API the same rate limit applied, and by “same”, I believe they mean “shared”.

Yea, it is able to watch the metadata api, and detect deletions:

Would it be possible to add to the Metadata API a read on Automations?

So as to be able to extract the configuration of an automation (especially for documentation purposes, Changelog, etc.). Thanks !

To clarify, I believe that the web API rate limit applies to calling the web API, regardless of endpoint. However, I was asking about any limits in the other direction for webhooks. If I register a webhook to watch for data changes in a particular field, are there any limits that I should be aware of regarding how often or how many time that webhook will be called? For comparison, an automation that watches a single line text field will fire for every key press. If a webhook watches for changes in a text field, will the webhook be called for every key press?

It looks like the webhook payload can even include the previous cell data or previous field definition!

Hello @SeanKeenan,


I just added a question for this before a couple of days ago and now it’s available.


Thanks a lot. t3:

No, I mean the field ids for the filterbyformular parameter (okay, I wrote “sort”, which was wrong):

How does this impact platforms like Softr / StackerHQ? Does this mean they should be using tokens to connect to Airtable?

Currently I create an “API user” account and then use the API keys for this account to connect to other platforms or for low code integrations through JS. Does it mean that going forward I should create a token and access the API’s through this token?

Will there be a charge to these tokens?

Amazing update, with this we should be able to dramatically improve the customer experience at Fintable !

Important question here, when user API keys will get depreciated.

Wow, very good news!

This is amazing news! Our team will definitely investigate this and see how we can improve the user experience for Pro Backup. Restoring comments, tables and bases has been requested by so many of our customers.

Should this beta be listed on this support page?

I find this support page about personal access tokens to be confusing. Here are the first two paragraphs.

Personal access tokens (now available to all users in open beta) are used to authenticate requests to Airtable’s API when developing an integration for yourself, your client, or for your company.

Personal access tokens act as your user account, and should be kept secret and not shared with any third-party services or integrations.

These two paragraphs are at odds with each other. The first paragraph says personal access tokens are for developing integrations. Yet the second paragraph says personal access tokens are not to be shared with integrations. How can one use a personal access token in an integration without sharing that token with the integration? The vast majority of integrations involve third party services.

Thank you for your kind words Scott, it means a lot to the team (and me) - and it really has been a huge team effort, I’m just the one that made the post!!

Plus - you don’t want me running for president, if that happens you’ll have one less person working on Airtable!

Especially with some API’s which aren’t quite “REST” (like webhooks) we felt it was the right time to update the name!

Here is the help center article! They are free, however there is a limit to the number of service accounts allowed on an enterprise (limit is 30).

We’re still working through exactly what our plan will be, but wanted to give early notice as soon as possible. We hear you, rest assured that we will try to make this transition as seamless as possible!

One of the biggest differences is their form factor! Webhooks require more setup, hosting your own code, but allow more flexibility - or building external services. Automations have a powerful user interface, integrate with more than Airtable, and don’t require running your own servers (or even understanding code!)

Yes to all of the above

Those are the only limits, webhooks can also be refreshed anytime during those 7 days to reset this timeout.

Thanks for this explanation.

Automations = low floor


Webhooks = high ceiling

Automations = configuration completely within Airtable


Webhooks = requires interactions “outside of Airtable” (typically a server, but could be a glue factory), a subset of the web API

Of course many of the features in webhooks are features that people on the floor would like to have in automations: access to previous record values, triggers for when records are deleted, triggers for schema changes. I am sure that Airtable knows that people want this.

Haha, great point!

@SeanKeenan Question: The new API documentation for comments says that we can tag users by either email or User ID. But then it goes on to say that the User ID can only be retrieved by Enterprise users who are using the Enterprise API. This is actually not true… there are several different ways to retrieve the User ID through the API which do not require an Enterprise account.