Link to other base

[John_Bacino]

So happy that someone finally filled the void left by Dabble DB.

One of the features I found most useful there, but can’t seem to do in Airtable, is linking to entries in another Base. Often, one will have multiple bases which handle distinct aspects of a business or project, but in which one piece of data overlaps.

Example: A political campaign may want Bases for contacting voters, managing events, and recording donations. Those are distinct domains which need their own Bases, but which could benefit from linking parts of them together. For example, it would be great to link donations to the event they occurred at, or voters to donations, or record who attended each event.

In Airtable at present one has to either cram all of those bases into one, or foregoe the linkage which makes this software so great. It may seem like a small thing, but once you can link bases, the sky is really the limit.

[Adnan_Ahmed]

Unfortunately, and very frustratingly for 5 years now, you can’t do that. It’s all or nothing. If you allow someone to be able to edit one table, they will be able to:

• view ALL tables in that base
• view ALL fields
• view ALL views

You can restrict if they can edit specific fields by using field edit permissions.

So weird that Airtable is just silent on this. Just hope Microsoft Lists is a good alternative when it launches, because I’m getting the heck outta here

[Michela_Caruso]

Hi guys,

Airtable is really a great product, my congratulations. The perceived weakest point of Airtable is blocks connection. I don’t know if it’s a strategy decision or just a technical matter you would solve later. In the meanwhile I though a simple shortcut.i In this case the problem is mainly customer perception, since you could put all the tables in a base. Therefore, if you could just add a tag field associated to each table, so you could group by the tables and see the table in multiple “sub-bases”.
Just an example, you are designing your startup organization tool on airtable. You would have a “sub-base” for accounting, for hr, operations, communication and so on, you could use a same table (as contancts) for many sub-bases, or still make a complete summary report.

Thanks,

Luigi

[Kellie_Parker]

Hey! I am throwing my support in here for linking between bases. I am new to Airtable but not to social media or digital asset managers. I am using Airtable to manage the social media assets and calendars of a non-profit that I am working with. I am using two bases - the Digital Asset Manager and the Social Media Calendar. Both of which are base templates that were provided by Airtable and SHOULD work together seamlessly. I should be able to look in the DAM and see all the times that asset was used on the social media calendar. I should be able to write a post in the SMC and have it pull in an asset that exists in the DAM.

I’m incredibly disappointed that I can’t do this. I know there are lots of use cases for Airtable but honestly, for these two bases in particular, this is basic, essential functionality. Not being able to do this is cutting the usefulness of this tool in half, at least. It’s also doubling my work because I have to upload an asset in two different places.

Please consider implementing this at your earliest convenience.

[Rita_Derry]

A super important feature tbh.
I echo the sentiments expressed by all from 2015 to date. Looking forward to this feature release :slightly_smiling_face:

[Rohit_Kalro]

I was thinking of using more of Airtable. But finding an easier way of linking between databases in Notion. So I am thinking of upgrading my notion membership since it does linking between bases. Was able to create separate databases for people, projects, tasks & meetings. And link between them to create dashboards and linked records. Feel like Notion has a better flexibility but Airtable is more user friendly but missing important features.

Notion costs $4 instead of $10. So that potentially is some money saved. Weighing the pro’s and con’s in my head. Might actually start using Notion instead of Airtable.

[Luiz_Schmidt]

Thank you, will look into Notion too. This is too critical to be missing from Airtable.

[mexicano_en_Rus]

It is disappointing that in 5 years asking them for a function and they have never integrated it. I’m leaving here to check Coda and Fibery :roll_eyes:

[Emily_Kennard]

Did they solve for this? :crossed_fingers:t3:

[Kelby_Price]

Hey @Andrew, you mentioned in Jan '16 this was on your roadmap.

Giving you (co-founder of the company) the benefit of the doubt … that this would take rocket science (per ScottWorld above) and a complete re-work of the product … how about NOT taking that approach?

Just go build (or buy) a super simple “sync” solution … roll it up with your product … put the “feature” at the paid tier and let’s try something. Your customers are not necessarily saying “I want it instantaneous, I want it bullet proof, I want it 2-way, etc.” Consider channeling your inner “mvp” mentality from way back in 2012 and try something simple.

Also, @Howie, I hope you can back him up … I’m sure your thinking around we’re a “design-driven company” focused on “elegance” has evolved a bit since 2016 … I suspect we’re going to look back on 2020/COVID/no-code with some perspective - and I’m hoping Airtable can be a part of that.

Cheers.

[Nikolas_Chapoup]

How can’t it be there 4 years later?

The feature would be a game-changer. Currently only I (the CEO) use airtable and would love to use it with my whole org, but this is a breaking point.