How to use less automation runs in Airtable for bulk actions

Here’s an Airtable trick how you can significantly reduce number of automation runs if you do some kind of bulk changes:

Let’s say that for every new record in table A you need to create a record in table B.

For example you’re importing 500 Contacts and for each you want to also create a record in Leads table.

You could have an automation with a trigger `When a record matches conditions`, detect a specific type of contact with no Lead record linked and then create the record.

But that’s 500 automation runs. That’s the monthly limit on Free plan. Pro plan has 25K limit, 500 out of that can still be significant.

There’s a way to have just 1 automation run in this specific case, IF all of these created or updated records are linked to some kind of parent record (a common ancestor).

For example, perhaps these 500 contacts are linked to same company or project.

If that’s the case, you can create a rollup field on that common ancestor record and then, with the automation, react to that rollup field being changed.

So instead of reacting 500 times to 500 created or changed records. The automation reacts to counter number being changed.

Then in the automation you likely do Find Records and find all these relevant records where the relationship is empty, add a repeating group and create a new record for each.

Instead of 500 automation runs, there’s 1 automation run with a repeating group.

Originally published at https://www.linkedin.com.