Data Quality

Catch Duplicates Before They Spread

New form submission comes in. The Duplicate Finder checks email, name, and phone against 10,000 existing records. Match found? The record gets flagged. No duplicates slip through.

Set Up Duplicate Detection

Sound familiar?

CRM Administrator

Your contact table has 3 entries for the same person with different capitalization and one typo in the email. Merge campaigns go to all three.

Nonprofit Director

Donors submit the form twice because the confirmation page was slow. Now you have duplicate donation records and incorrect totals.

HR Manager

Job applicants apply through multiple channels. You have 4 records for one candidate across different tables.

What it does

1

Multi-field matching

Match on email, name, phone, or any combination. Exact match or fuzzy matching for typos and variations.

2

Real-time checking

Every form submission is checked against existing records before the new record is finalized. Immediate detection.

3

Configurable actions

Flag duplicates with a checkbox, add a note, link to the original record, or prevent the duplicate from being created.

4

Fuzzy matching

Catches near-duplicates. 'Jon Smith' matches 'John Smith'. 'jane@gmail.com' matches 'Jane@Gmail.com'.

How to set it up

1

Choose matching fields

Select which fields to compare. Email is the most reliable, but you can add name, phone, or company for multi-field matching.

2

Set matching rules

Choose exact match, case-insensitive match, or fuzzy match for each field. Set a similarity threshold for fuzzy matching.

3

Configure actions

Decide what happens when a duplicate is found: flag with a checkbox, add a note, link to the existing record, or block creation.

4

Enable detection

Turn on the finder. It checks every new submission against your existing records and takes the configured action.

Going deeper

Matching modes

  • Exact match (fastest, strictest)
  • Case-insensitive comparison
  • Fuzzy matching with similarity score
  • Multi-field combined matching

Actions on match

  • Flag with checkbox or single select
  • Add note with link to original record
  • Link records together in a linked field
  • Block duplicate record creation

Advanced options

  • Ignore specific domains (gmail.com, etc.)
  • Custom similarity threshold (0-100%)
  • Match across multiple tables
  • Batch scan for existing duplicates

Frequently asked questions

How fast is the duplicate check?

Milliseconds for exact matching, under a second for fuzzy matching against tables with up to 50,000 records.

Can it merge duplicates automatically?

It flags and links duplicates. Merging is a manual step where you decide which record to keep and which data to merge.

Does fuzzy matching catch typos?

Yes. It uses string similarity algorithms. 'Jonh' matches 'John', 'janedoe@gmal.com' matches 'janedoe@gmail.com' at the right threshold.

Can I run it on existing records?

Yes. Batch-scan your entire table to find and flag existing duplicates. Great for cleaning up historical data.

More processor tools

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Verify email addresses are real and deliverable.

Text Processor

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Related reading

Delete Duplicates Without a Unique Key

Manual methods for deduplication when you don't have a unique field.

Remove Duplicates at Scale

Strategies for cleaning large Airtable tables with thousands of records.

Remove Duplicates in Lookup Fields

Handle duplicate values in lookup and rollup fields.

Volunteer Registration

Prevent duplicate volunteer signups across events.

Explore by industry

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