Create SharePoint lists from other lists
Published May 05 2019 11:39 PM 71.2K Views
Microsoft

Changing the way business gets done – digital transformation – begins with great data. Microsoft 365 offers powerful tools for building workflows, automation and reporting – Power Apps, Power Automate, and Power BI. But you need a great place to store all that data.

 

Every month, millions of users turn to SharePoint lists to store critical business data.  Lists are secure, easy to use, and high capacity, with up to 30 million items in a single list.  Today, across Microsoft 365, SharePoint lists store billions of rows of data to house information for scenarios like customers, audits or emergency room availability and more across Microsoft 365.

 

Now, we’re making it easier than ever to get started with a list – by leveraging other lists as a starting point.

Create a SharePoint list from an existing list

Lists are shareable, secure, mobile friendly, easy to use and easy to customize. And as we previewed at SharePoint Conference 2018, we’re releasing new abilities to let you create new lists from an existing list. To do this, you start from the Site Contents page.

 

You can create a list from all existing lists within any site where you’re an editor.  When the new list is created, the entire list structure is copied, including forms, formatting, and custom metadata columns.  Note: Content from the existing list will not be copied.

 

Creating a list from other listsCreating a list from other lists

Next steps

Want to try this out now?  Head over to the Business Apps Resource Center for a demo.

 

We’ll start rolling out the new list creation experience to Targeted Release in mid May 2019.   You can share your feedback with us here on the TechCommunity, on UserVoice or at the SharePoint Conference.  As always, if you need more details you can find it on our Microsoft 365 Business Apps Resource Center

 

Thanks, Chris McNulty, senior product manager - Microsoft

 

[Update: April, 8th, 2020] "List from Excel" was previously shared in this blog post, but delayed from release. Thus, we removed mention of "List from Excel" as we prepare a unique announcement on "List from Excel" and pare this one down to solely highlight "List from existing list" - and minimize confusion to anyone reading this blog post going forward.

57 Comments
Silver Contributor

"you can select a table from your most recent Excel files in SharePoint or OneDrive"

So, you can't select an Excel workbook from your local drive?

Brass Contributor

All your files should be on OneDrive or SharePoint anyway Smiley Wink
This feature was long waited. Helps a lot.

Microsoft

I have some questions for the "list from list" (as I see it a shortcut for saving the list as template then using the template to create a new list):

  • will this allow to create lists with content already (like save as template with content)?
  • Will it work with source list that have more than 5000 items? (it was impossible to save those lists as template)
  • How about using list from other sites/site collection (let's say within a site collections in the same Hub and assuming the same content types are available on both)?

Thanks!

Copper Contributor

Excellent!

This finally makes "Import from Excel" a really valuable feature!

Copper Contributor

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Copper Contributor

Glad to see this being added. I cannot tell from the demo -- are the internal column names on the newly created table going to match the column display name? I've used "quick" methods to add columns to lists, but ended up with internal column names like t0gh and frankly the couple of minutes I saved creating the table have been more than blown by the time I spend consulting my column cross-reference table when I'm writing some code that reads/updates the list through the REST API. 

Copper Contributor

COOL!!! 

Brass Contributor

Brilliant! This makes the work with Excel lists much easier. This was a really good improvement Chris!

Brass Contributor

Yay!! Cannot wait to me hands on this. Smiley Very Happy

Copper Contributor

When's this getting rolled out?

Brass Contributor

What's the difference between this and the IMPORT FROM SPREADSHEET app? I know that this requires IE running activeX but it still works.

Brass Contributor

@David1972 I think the answer to you question in your question. It works in modern browsers without a need for ActiveX.

Overall, I think it's supposed to be a little "smarter" too by detecting and giving you the option to set the column types. I personally have had issues getting the "Import from Spreadsheet" version working since we moved to O365. 

Brass Contributor

@Mike Hatheway but we still have to keep IE around for all those other weird quirky things that SharePoint still won't let us do in any other browser (like open the file explorer!)

;)

Brass Contributor

@David1972  : I have heard whispers that the new chromium-based version of Edge that is in Dev preview will have a "run in IE11 mode" when it's necessary.  Fingers crossed!

Silver Contributor

It's no whispers. They officially announced and showed (in a video) this at Build 2019 keynote :) Although, there were no details in what mode exactly would it work. Some may need IE9 or even IE7 modes with an additional Compatibility settings. So it might not replace IE11 or Enterprise Mode completely.

Silver Contributor
Brass Contributor

How is this feature different from the "import Spreadsheet" app on sharepoint. I use this often and works well. 

Brass Contributor

@Olga Melo : I believe the main difference is that it works in modern browsers without a need for Internet Explorer or ActiveX. There is also a confirmation screen for data types (pictured above).  

Iron Contributor

Hi, @Olga Melo.

I've compared the different Import/export options for SharePoint below and agree with @Mike Hatheway that this option makes it more compatible for modern Web browsers since Import requires IE.

 

https://twitter.com/fredyano/status/1123236885365776384

 

Fred

 

Brass Contributor

When would that be available? I am in targeted users group, its July - but still no sight of this option :( 

Iron Contributor

@Chris McNulty - Hi just wondering if there is an updated time frame for the create from Excel feature? We are a Targeted Release Org

Thanks 

Copper Contributor

Hello everyone, Saketa has an Excel importer that works really well importing Excel data into SharePoint and provides advanced capabilities like field mapping, full, incremental or append loads and scheduled loads. Try it if it is helpful. It is available as a standalone tool and a free trial is available from the Saketa SharePoint Migrator suite. 

 

Good Luck.

Copper Contributor

Sites to select source/reference lists from, appear quite randomly. I'm owner of a few sites but I don't see all of them when I choose list. What is the selection criteria?

Iron Contributor

We have started seeing this feature in our targeted release tenant, but strangely it only shows up in Microsoft Edge. Google Chrome still shows the "classic modern" experience for a new list. Works in the standard version of Edge and the new Chromium version

Deleted
Not applicable

Anyone getting this error upon attempting to import from Excel?

 

1.png

I'm not sure how to troubleshoot this. All I can say is that it seems to fail on most site collections (classic) but the same list works on a few select ones (class and modern). Any idea what this could be related to?

 

Thanks!

Iron Contributor
Has anyone gotten a response on the release date? I am on targeted release, but none of my users are. I can see it, but they can't.

I've come to find out it's actually live in my First Release when I thought it wasn't..... The trick is where to launch to get to it. You must go to "Site Contents" Then click new list from that page to get the new experience. If you click New list from the sites homepage you will get old experience. Maybe you will be able to see it there as well. 

Iron Contributor
@ChrisWebb - That is the same experience I get - choosing New List from Site Contents - but I am the only one in my organization on Targeted Release. Everyone else is on Monthly Channel for Office updates and they don't see it yet.

Sorry, read your message wrong. Have not seen a release date. It's usually 60-90 days after showing up in first release. 

Brass Contributor

Hi,

 

Can I do this from PowerShell or c#

 

Thanks

 

Steen Jakobsen

Brass Contributor

Data ?

 

How do I get data copied and incrementally updated from the "source lists" to my newly created list based on criteria?

Source list has approx 150.000 items and I only want items changed or created within the last 6 months - approx 30.000 items

Also, I want this transfer/update to happen every day on an incremental basis?

 

Any feedback is most appreciated thanks :)

 

// Steen

Copper Contributor

I'm getting the new look but not from Excel option yet. I am trying it under Site Contents. I added myself to be added to the targeted release two days ago. I really want this feature it would make things much more convenient to create lists.

Copper Contributor

@ParaChris, I have the same problem. The weird thing is that I saw the create list from Excel a few days ago, but now it is not available anymore. Anybody knows what can be the reason?

Iron Contributor

@Andras Kovacs I have the same thing. The funny thing is that I created a list from Excel perhaps 2 weeks ago, and now it is gone! 

There doesn't seem to be any news as to why it was removed. Hope they put it back soon!

Silver Contributor

That's a common thing with MS rollouts unfortunately. They announce something, push it, then probably find issues that they didn't test for and pull it back quietly (maybe trying to avoid PR backlash).

Brass Contributor

I think the main issue with SharePoint Lists and for that matter Libraries (and it worsening immensely now that the new Create List feature rollout and it gets easier to create lists) is the complete absence of viable automated methods for creating, updating and deleting list and library items  - Interactively and in bulk (scheduled,Incremental or once and as part of automation processes)

 

If you want to do anything beyond the manual primitive "Quick Edit" (where you, by the way, lose all audit information like ModifiedBy, LatestVersion, etc.)  you can either start coding heavily or use Flow.

The latter is almost useless because of lack of just about everything to with audit override, criteria, useful logging, performance, interactive previewing, interfaces to external data & other lists on other SP platforms and tennants. (I know the data gateway works for a little bit of that - believe me I have tried!)

Yes, you can do bits and small pieces with flow but it's like driving an old car from the 1950 ties .. and nowhere near the daily requirements in real-world production environments. AND what about SP on perm...!!!

 

And again - please don't give that "bull..t" about how great flow is. It is simply evidence that, that someone claiming anything in that direction simply the doesn't have a clue or has never tried in real-world heavy production scenarios. 

 

SO --- We started coding the tool/utility that MS should have done from the very beginning of Lists & Libraries. And we plan to make it PUBLIC!

 

// Steen .... (the otherwise happy and gentle person) :)

 

Brass Contributor

I'm looking forward to trying out the Create from Excel.

The create from other list works awesome.

 

Can it be done from code? (PowerShell or c#)

 

I'm working on an easy way automate conditional updates to existing list items without having to do it manually in "Quick Edit". 

And without changing ModifiedBy or create a new version.

 

Iron Contributor

I was able to try out the "create list" functionality today and here is what I noticed:

 

  1. This does NOT seem to work across BPOS and Non-BPOS site collections. For example, I have an old site collection that has XXXX-portal1...at the beginning of the URL. These are the original site collections from the initial launch of Microsoft's online services...way before Office 365 existed. These URL's used to have XXX.microsoftonline.com...in the URL until MS renamed all of them around 2016/2017. Nevertheless, you can't use this method to create a new list in another site collection that doesn't match the source URL. So If I want to copy a list from XXXX-portal1.sharepoint.com....to XXXX.sharepoint.com....It says something went wrong. Ultimately we have 2 root sites. One with portal1 in the URL and one without....if we try to copy a list between another site that is doesn't match the beginning of the URL...it won't show any lists available
  2. I was only able to see the "from lists" option. I did not see the "from excel" option

 

Deleted
Not applicable

@Michael Malloy, I mentioned on 7/31 that it wasn't working for me on classic and only a few select modern. Today, I'm not seeing "from Excel" anymore as well. The feature rollout might have been halted.

Brass Contributor

Hi Florian,

 

True the Excel feature is not there. Also the "from other lists" does not include any data.

I have an elegant free solution that I can provide for you and anyone else interested :)

 

Just shoot me a message :)

 

ps. 

Also, it allows you to UPDATE list and Library items using any source (including other SharePoint lists and libraries) and KEEPING the audit (Modified & ModifiedBy).

 

Brass Contributor

Nice feature but somehow it's not showing up in our modern team sites? When clicking on New list from the Site Contents page it takes to the old ways to create the list.  Any idea why this feature is missing?  thanks..

 

Iron Contributor

These things are rolled out incrementally and there is really no way to know when you'll get it. I have even had techs on the link who didn't have some of the features I had already because it hadn't rolled out them yet. It's a daily waiting game and you get to go yippee when when it finally drops to your tenant!

Brass Contributor

I have a super elegant solution that by no comparison does the trick and much much more .. 

I will be happy to provide it for you free.

 

Just shoot me a message. :)

Brass Contributor

Hello Chris,

 

I am not able to create a list from another list for one particular source list only. For any other list it is working fine. I have checked and found below error in console. @Chris McNulty 

 

error.png

Brass Contributor

Hi,

 

How to get data into the newly created Lists from other Lists or from external XLSX, CSV or databases?

This feature is visibly ABSENT ... so I have made an elegant free solution that I can provide for anyone interested :)

 

Just shoot me a message :)

 

ps. 

Also, it allows you to UPDATE list and Library items using any source (including other SharePoint lists and libraries) and KEEPING the audit (Modified & ModifiedBy).

Deleted
Not applicable

So I opened a case with the Microsoft Support and they learned from the product group that the feature to import from Excel was rolled back due to a bug and that we should monitor the official roadmap. Bummer!

Copper Contributor

Try the Saketa Excel Importer  if you are looking for an advanced tool that can map to SharePoint field types and manage incremental loads. You have the option to perform scheduled runs periodically and even do a truncate/loads.

 

Saketa provides this as a stand alone product and as a SharePoint web extension. Trials are available for the same as a part of Saketa's Migrator tool, again a very comprehensive tool to move content to the cloud O365.

 

Good Luck.

 

Copper Contributor

I'm seeing the same issue @Deleted mentioned on 07-31-19. This feature works beautifully in most site collections, but we get the "Sorry, something went wrong. Please try again later." message on one of our sub-sites. We are trying to create a list from an existing list in the site collection (not from Excel). Has anyone been able to figure out why some sites throw this error?

Copper Contributor

I'm getting the same issue as a few others. 

"Sorry, something went wrong. Please try again later."

I've tried a few different tenants, but the same error pops up. 
Is there some browser or other prerequisites which we should be aware of? @Chris McNulty 

Copper Contributor

I'm getting the same issue as well.

I am trying to create a new list from an existing list. Both the new and old list are in sub-site.

This issue is related to the sub-site. I tried the same action in the parent site and there were no issues. 

Also, I tried to create a new list using parent site list, but unfortunately this ended up with the same error "Sorry, something went wrong. Please try again later."

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‎Apr 08 2020 10:31 AM
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