Main column not allowing me to convert type to Single Select

[DN1]

Sorry for the newbie question. I imported an excel file into Airtable. My main column (far left column in image) I would like to convert it to Single Select. In the second screenshot you will see that it does not allow me to do so.
I tried then to create a new column from scratch and create each value with the color coding, with the intention of deleting or hiding the original column on the far left, but it doesn´t allow me to do that either.

How can I make this work?
Thanks!

Airtable reddit 1|411x269

[JonathanBowen]

Hi @DN1 - unfortunately, you can’t do this. Not all field types are available for selection on the primary field of a table. Generally, it is good practice to make the primary field unique if you can and although Airtable does not enforce this 100%, I guess they are trying to remove the obvioiusly non-unique field types like single selects for the primary field.

[DN1]

Hi Jonathan
Thanks.
I tried a work around and shifted between columns in the original Excel file I uploaded so that I can convert the relevant column into a single select. however, itstead of using “column A” in my Excel sheet as the unique field, they added an extra column with no values so it still doesn´t solve my problem (see image). Any idea how to solve that? In this case, I would like the Media Outlet column to become the unique column on the far left.
Thanks!

[JonathanBowen · Accepted solution]

I think this is because the primary field is set to a number so if you try to import a string (media outlet) into that it won’t be accepted.

Change the primary field to single line text and copy and paste the media outlet values into it (or try running the import again).

[DN1]

Thank you Jonathan! Yes, that worked!