Body
Overview
This Knowledge Base article provides a comprehensive guide to understanding and using SharePoint lists as a foundational tool for team collaboration.
Lists
A SharePoint list is a flexible, web-based container for storing structured data within Microsoft 365, functioning similarly to an online spreadsheet or mini-database. It organizes information in rows (items) and columns (fields), allowing teams to collaboratively track tasks, assets, and processes in real-time.
Key Characteristics and Benefits of Lists
-
Collaboration: Multiple users can edit, sort, and filter data simultaneously.
-
Collection of Items: A list is primarily a collection of individual entries called "items".
-
Structured Data: It uses columns (or fields) to store specific types of data for each item, such as text, numbers, or dates.
-
Data Types: Supports various column types, including Text, Number, Date, Choice, Lookup, and Person.
-
Integration: Integrates with Microsoft Teams, Power Apps, and Power Automate for automation.
-
Metadata Storage: Lists are often used to store and manage metadata through uniquely identifiable "Content Types".
-
Customizable Views: Owners can define Views, which are named collections of settings for querying and displaying items in the list (e.g., sorting in alphabetical or numerical order).
SharePoint List vs. Excel:
Unlike Excel, SharePoint lists are built for shared, simultaneous use rather than individual, desktop-based calculations. They allow for better data integrity through field validation and unique, granular access controls.
Types of Lists
These are some examples of types of list that you use depends on the kind of information that you want to share.
- Announcements: Share news and status and provide reminders. Announcements support enhanced formatting with images, hyperlinks, and formatted text.
- Contacts: Store information about people or groups that you work with. If you're using an email or contact management program that's compatible with Microsoft technologies, you can view and update your contacts from your site in the other program. For example, you can update a list of all your organization's suppliers from an email program compatible with Microsoft technologies, such as Outlook. A contacts list doesn't actually manage the members of your site, but it can be used to store and share contacts for your organization, such as a list of external vendors.
- Discussion boards: Provide a central place to record and store team discussions similar to the format of newsgroups. If your administrator has enabled lists on your site to receive email messages, discussion boards can store email discussions from most common email programs. For example, you can create a discussion board for your organization's new product release.
- Links: Provide a central location for links to the Internet, your company's intranet, and other resources. For example, you might create a list of links to your customers' websites.
To learn more about the types of list available, click Introduction to lists.
🛠️ Create A List
-
You can create a new list from your SharePoint site home page or the Site contents page, select + New > List.
-
From the Create a list page, select one of the following options:
-
Blank list: Choose to start a list from scratch. Add a list Name, Description (optional), and select whether you want the list to appear in the left site navigation. When you're finished selecting options, select Create.
-
From existing list: Choose this option to save time and create a new list based on the columns in another list. Your new list will start with all the same columns, but it won't include any of the data from the original list.
-
From Excel: Choose this option to create a list based on an Excel spreadsheet.
-
From CSV: Choose this option to create a list based on a comma-separated values file.
-
Templates: Select a template, for example Issue tracker, to see what columns the template contains and scroll through sample data to see what it looks like. If you find a template you like, select Use template. If you don't see any you want, select Back to get back to the Create a list page. Learn more about how to create a list from a template or about the lists templates in Microsoft 365.
Notes:
- Visual updates for lists are gradually rolling out worldwide, which means that your experience may differ from what's described in this article.
- 2,000 lists and libraries combined per site collection is the limit (including main site and any subsites), after which you will receive error: Sorry, something went wrong. The attempted operation is prohibited because it exceeds the list view threshold. See SharePoint limits.
-
Provide a name and a description (optional) for your list. Depending on where you are creating your list, you will see a different screen at this step:
-
If you are creating your list from the Lists app, you will be able to choose to save the list either to My lists, or to one of your SharePoint sites:
-
If you are creating your list from a SharePoint site, you could choose to check Show in site navigation for the list to show in the site navigation.
-
Select Create. The blank list you just created is open and ready for you to use.
-
When your list opens, add an item to your list by either selecting + Add new item or Edit in grid view. (Grid view lets you add information freely to different rows or columns.)
-
To add different types of information to the list, select + Add column. To learn more, see Create a column in a list or library.
🛠️ Delete A List
- Go to the list you want to delete.
-
Select Settings, and then select List settings.
-
In the Settings page, select Delete this list.
- In the confirmation dialog, select OK.
Additional Resources