How to Change Text Field Length in Salesforce

In this Salesforce tutorial, we will learn how to change text field length in Salesforce. The text field permits the users to enter any combination of letters and numbers. Let’s take an example to understand clearly, We discuss case description field length increase.

Imagine there is a company and I am working for the customer support team, The team uses Salesforce to control the customer service cases.

The cases that are controlled by the customer support team have various fields and they involve the custom text field and this text field name as case description. This description is used to contain the customer issues and questions. But there is a time when the customer support agent receives a lengthy detailed description of a customer issue by the customer.

This case description exceeds the current case description field limit of 100 characters. To resolve this issue and improve the accuracy of customer support. For this, we decided to increase the length of the case description field from 100 to 255 characters to allow for more detailed information to be captured.

If you want to learn the process of how to change text field type length in Salesforce you have come to the right place and we learn this topic in both the editions in Salesforce Lightning and Salesforce Classic.

How to change the text field length in Salesforce Lightning

Here we will learn how to change text field length in Salesforce Lightning. For example, there are lots of company that uses Salesforce but which company I am working for uses Salesforce to manage its Sales and marketing efforts. There are Lead custom objects in Salesforce that represent the possible customers.

Every lead has different fields and these fields involve the text field and this text field name as Lead description. This description field is used to hold the additional information about the lead that was received.

At times comes where our Salesforce team realized that the existing lead field description field length of 50 is not sufficient to hilding detailed information about the lead source. The sales and marketing team receives lengthy descriptions that exceed the current length limit.

To resolve this issue we decided to increase the length of the lead description field to 255 characters to permit more detailed information to be stored.

If you want to learn how to change the text field length in Salesforce Lightning, follow these steps:

Step-1: First log into the Salesforce account, for login into the Salesforce account Enter the user name and password. After entering the credential we are directly logged into the Salesforce Lightning account.

In this Lightning account, we discuss how to change the text field length in Salesforce for this we can click on the gear icon that is present at the top right corner, and under this gear icon, there are two options. The first one is Setup and the other one is service setup. Click on the Setup option, after clicking on the Setup option.

The Setup page is open and under this Setup page, we can see that the two tabs are present on the nav bar. The First tab is a Home tab and the other tab is the Object Manager tab. Click on the Object Manager tab.

Step-2: The Object Manager page is open, after clicking on the Object Manager tab. Under this object manager tab, lots of objects are present, Select one of the objects from the lots of objects and we can also choose our object by simply entering the object in the search box and here we are entering the lead in the search box.

The lead object comes at the top, and select the lead object from the object manager page. This lead object is the Standard type od object.

Step-3: The lead object page is open, After clicking on the lead object. And under this page, we can see the details related to the object. On the left side of the lead object page, we can see the Fields and Relationships option. Click on the Fields and Relationship option.

Step-4: After clicking on the Field and Relationship option of the account object, The lead Fields and Relationships page is open, and under this fields and relationships page we can see that there is a Lead Source Description text field type that is already created.

To change the length of the text field type of lead source description we click on this lead source description field.

Step-5: The lead custom field lead source description page is open after clicking on the lead source description field which has the text field type.

Under this page, we can see the details related to the description but now we want to edit this detail by simply clicking on the edit button that is present at the middle of the page.

Step-6: After clicking on the edit button, the edit lead custom field lead source description page is open Here we can see the custom field definition edit with field information. Here we click on the change field type to change the length of the text field type.

Step-7: After clicking on the change field type button, the custom field type page is open here we are again selecting the text field and clicking on the next button. We click this change field type button to see the length field.

Step-8: After clicking again on the text field type, the lead custom field lead source description page opens Here we can see the length already filled is 50 which is not sufficient to hilding detailed information about the lead source. The sales and marketing team receives lengthy descriptions that exceed the current length limit.

Step-9: To resolve this issue we decided to increase the length of the lead description field to 255 characters to permit more detailed information to be stored.

Here we change the length of the Lead Source Description from 50 to 255 for storing the more detailed information and click on the save button.

Step-10: After Saving the Lead Source Description field changing the length of this field is again shown under the Fields and Relationships page and this lead source description is shown with changing data type as text(255).

In this way, we understand how to change the text field type length in Salesforce Lightning. Let’s Proceed further and learn how to change the text field type length in Salesforce Classic.

How to change the text field length in Salesforce Classic

Here we will learn how to change the text field length in Salesforce Classic. Let’s take an example from which we can easily understand and here we are taking the product description field length increase.

Let’s suppose I am working for a manufacturing company that uses Salesforce to manage the product index. Every product that is present in the index is represented by the custom object. There is a product text field that is known as Product description this description field provides the description related to the product.

Our product index has grown rapidly throughout the year and the existing product description field with a length of 25 characters is not sufficient for the longer time for describing the longer and new products. Our Teams of sales and marketing struggling to give detailed information to the customers.

To resolve this issue the sales and marketing teams decided to increase the length of the product descriptions field to 255 characters for a more complete product description.

If you want to learn how to change the text field type Length in Salesforce Classic, follow these steps:

Step-1: After entering credentials like username and password, our salesforce account is logged and we can see the Salesforce Lightning org is open. However, we want to work on the Salesforce Classic account for switching from Salesforce Lightning to Classic.

Click on the profile picture that is shown in the right top corner. The Profile picture drop-down menu is open, under this drop-down menu, there is an option to switch to the Salesforce Classic version. Click on the switch to the Salesforce Classic version. Our Salesforce Classic version is open.

Here we can see that the username is present. On the left side of the username there is a drop-down arrow click on the drop-down arrow of the username. After clicking on the drop-down arrow the drop-down list is open. Under this drop-down list, we can see that the Setup option is present. Select the Setup option.

Step-2: After clicking on the setup option, the setup page is open. Enter the Product object in the Quick Find Box. The products object comes at the top, click on the drop-down arrow of the products object. Under this drop-down list, there are field options. Click on the Fields.

Step-3: After clicking on the product object, the product page is open. Now scroll to the bottom of the product page, There are fields and relationship options present click on this field and relationship option.

After clicking on the field and relation option, the field and relationship page is open. Here we can see that there is a Product Description text field type that is already created. To change the length of the text field type of product description we click on the edit option of the product description field.

Step-4: After clicking on the edit button, the edit product custom field product description page is open Here we can see the custom field definition edit with field information. Here we click on the change field type to change the length of the text field type.

Step-5: After clicking on the change field type button, the custom field type page is open Here we are again selecting the text field and clicking on the next button. We click this text field type button to see the length field.

Step-6: After clicking again on the text field type, the lead custom field product description page opens Here we can see the length already filled is 25 which is not sufficient to hilding detailed information about the lead source. The sales and marketing team receives lengthy descriptions that exceed the current length limit.

Step-7: To resolve this issue we decided to increase the length of the product description field to 255 characters to permit more detailed information to be stored.

Here we change the length of the Product Description from 25 to 255 for storing the more detailed information and click on the save button.

Step-8: After Saving the Product Description field changing the length of this field is again shown under the Fields and Relationships page and this Product description is shown with changing data type as text(255).

So, with this, we have learned how to change the text field length in Salesforce Classic.

Conclusion:

In this tutorial, we have learned how to change the text field length. For this, we first choose the object then select the text field type the custom field and then click on the field, and then edit this field under this edit field page, After editing the field click on the change field type and then check the checkbox and then change the length of the field and then click on the save button.

I hope you read the complete article and get the complete idea related to how to change the text field length in Salesforce.  I have also explained all the steps for changing the text field length in Salesforce Lightning and Salesforce Classic.

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