Putting Today's Date and time when making a record

[Jon_Balenski]

I was able to automatically update a record with a “need to start” status when created, but I’d also like it to automatically put today’s date in as well. I’m just not sure what I should be typing in the date field. I tried typing Today, but that didn’t work.

I’m going to admit to being a total novice here so please feel free to spell it out to me like I’m five.

[kuovonne]

Welcome to the Airtable community!

You don’t need to use an automation to put in the date that a record was created. That information is available in a formula field that uses the CREATED_TIME() function or a created time field.

If you want to include the current date as part of a longer text string, you will need to use a scripting action that uses JavaScript to detect the current date.

[Jon_Balenski]

Ok. So there’s no way to use the new automation function for this? I’m surprised it even lets me pick a date/time field then.

[kuovonne]

What you want can be done with automations, but it isn’t as simple as you would like.

You can update a date field with an automation, but where is the date coming from? Currently the “Update record” action can only update fields with fixed data, data from the record, or data from a linked record.

You could create a new formula field that returns the current date, and update your date field with that formula field.

Eventually, the “Update record” might have the ability to put in a formula that provides the current date, but automations is still a very new platform and that doesn’t exist yet.

However, since you can get the date a record was created without automations, why do you need an automation to get it?

[Tuur]

In my case because it’s a default value / date that can be overwritten.

Formulas for values would a great addition. :slightly_smiling_face:

[kuovonne]

Eventually Airtable will probably allow formulas for values in automations. Until then, we need to put the formulas in a formula field or similar.

Here is one way to do put the date/time a record was created in an editable field using automations:

atmosphere.kuovonne.com

Set “today” as a default date – Atmosphere by Kuovonne

[Jakub_Tyrakowsk]

Hi There, I found this article looking for a solution to a similar problem. What I did in the end is I created a new column in the base with the CREATED_TIME() formula and hid it, and then used data from this column in the “Update Record” automation.

[Ambroise_Dhenai]

I wanted to do something as simple as using a “NOW()” date. I couldn’t use a CREATED_AT() value which is in the past for my use-case.

[KennethDreyer]

Did anyone find a workaround for this? That doesn’t involve unnecessary fields…

[Dan_Ott]

To do this for the current date:

• Create a “run a script” action
• Paste the following code as the action:

  output.set("date", new Date().toISOString())
  

• Now you can select date from this action and use it to populate date fields.