How to Change the Button Text for Selecting Linked Records in an Airtable Form

When a linked record field appears in an Airtable Interface form, the button to open the selector or add a new linked record shows a label like "Add record." For client-facing forms or onboarding flows where plain language matters, you'll want this to say something more specific, like "Add Contact" or "Select Vendor."

This text isn't a setting on the form field itself. It comes from the record term set on the table the field links to. Airtable lets you rename "record" to something more specific to that table, and every place a linked record button for that table appears, in forms, in the base grid, in other Interfaces, picks up whatever term you've set.

Airtable form showing linked record button changed from Add Record to Add Product

Where to Change It

  1. Open the base and go to the table you want to rename records for, not the table containing the form.
  2. Double click the table name, or open the table's settings from its dropdown menu.
  3. Look for the record term option and choose from the provided list of terms (Contact, Task, Project, Vendor, and similar options).
  4. Save the change.

Every button that adds or links a record in that table now uses the term you picked, including the button inside your Interface form's linked record field. Because the term lives on the table rather than the individual field, this also affects how the table's name reads elsewhere in the base, which is worth knowing before you change it on a table used in more than one place.

The List Is Predefined, Not Custom Text

Airtable's record term picker is a list of preset options, not a free text field. You can't type in an arbitrary label. If the exact word you want isn't on the list, for example something specific to your industry, there's no way to enter it directly in this setting.

When the Predefined List Doesn't Cover What You Need

If none of the available record terms fit, two options work around it:

Add a Description to the linked record field in the Interface form editor. The description text appears below the field label and can spell out exactly what the submitter should select, even if the button itself still uses a generic or approximate term.

Or use Fillout, covered below, which gives you a literal custom label instead of a choice from a preset list.

Customising Further With Fillout

Fillout is worth reaching for specifically when the predefined record term list doesn't give you the exact wording you need. In Fillout's form builder, you can set the button label as free text and configure what information is shown when the selector opens (which fields from the linked record are visible).

If you are already using Fillout for other form customisation (like cascade reset between linked fields or draft saving), the linked record display settings are all in the same place. See how to limit dropdown choices in Airtable based on another field for the filter configuration that controls which records appear in the selector.