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What Are Related Lists?

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In this lesson, you will learn:

  • What a related list is
  • How related lists connect records from different tables
  • What you can do inside a related list

1 Records that belong together

An incident doesn’t live alone. It might have SLAs timing it, child incidents linked to it, and approvals waiting on it. Those are records in other tables, but they belong to this incident.

At the bottom of the form, ServiceNow shows them in related lists. 🔗

Key term: Related list

A list at the bottom of a form that shows records from another table that are connected to this record.

2 How are they connected?

Most related lists work through a reference field. Remember reference fields from Lesson 13.2?

How a related list works. A user record for Riya Sharma is shown at the top. Below it, a related list called Incidents Caller shows three incidents, INC0010001, INC0010005, and INC0010031. Each of those incidents has Riya Sharma in its Caller field, which is a reference to the User table. The arrow shows that the related list finds every incident whose Caller points back to Riya.
Figure 1. The related list shows every incident whose Caller field points to Riya.
  1. Every incident has a Caller field that points to a user.
  2. Open Riya’s user record.
  3. The related list Incidents (Caller) finds every incident where Caller = Riya.
  4. So you see all of Riya’s incidents right on her user record. ✅

📝 Note: The name in brackets tells you which reference field links them. “Incidents (Caller)” means “incidents linked through the Caller field”.

A related list works a lot like a normal list:

  • Click a record to open it.
  • New creates a record that’s already linked to this one.
  • Edit (on some lists) lets you add or remove links to existing records.
  • You can filter, sort, and even edit inline.

💡 Good to know: Related lists show as tabs at the bottom of many forms. The number on each tab tells you how many records it has.

⭐ Remember: Related lists show connected records from other tables, at the bottom of the form.

  1. Open User Administration > Users and open a demo user, like Abel Tuter.
  2. Scroll to the bottom. Which related lists do you see?
  3. Open the Groups and Roles related lists. You used these in Chapter 6!
  4. Open any incident. Scroll down. Find the Task SLAs related list.

5 Quick recap

  • A related list shows connected records from another table
  • They sit at the bottom of a form, often as tabs
  • Most work through a reference field, like Caller
  • You can open, create, filter, and sort records in them

6 Check yourself

Think of your answer first. Then tap to check.

1 Where do related lists appear? Show answer

At the bottom of a form.

2 What does “Incidents (Caller)” on a user record show? Show answer

All incidents whose Caller field points to that user.

3 You click New in a related list. What’s special about the new record? Show answer

It’s already linked to the record you came from.

Nice work! You finished this lesson. 🎉

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