AI Sheets FAQ
Answers to common setup and operating questions about AI Sheets.
For what the app is and how to set it up from scratch, see the
AI Sheets Overview.
Setup
Do I need to configure anything before people can use AI Sheets?
No. AI Sheets has no required configuration. Once you enable the app from the Apps Marketplace and grant a licence, every user in your business can create and share sheets immediately. AI features, AI edits, AI column fill, and AI automation actions are all on by default. Public sharing links are off by default and must be turned on in Settings if you want them.
Who can access AI Sheets settings?
Only app admins can see the Settings tab. App admins control the master AI switch, separate toggles for AI edits, AI column fill, and AI automation actions, a public sharing links toggle, the maximum rows per sheet (enforced per tab), and the maximum tabs per sheet.
Permissions and access
Who can see and edit a sheet?
The person who creates a sheet is its owner. Owners can share the sheet with other users in the business as a Viewer (read-only) or Editor (can add, change, and delete rows). Only the owner can manage sharing settings, delete the sheet, or change collaborator roles.
Can I give someone else ownership of a sheet?
No. Ownership stays with the person who created the sheet. They can add other users as editors, but only the owner can manage sharing and delete the sheet.
Day-to-day
What column types are available?
Text, Number, Date, Checkbox (yes/no), Dropdown, Email, URL, Currency, and Formula. Dropdown columns let you define a fixed list of choices. Formula columns compute a value per row using an expression and cannot be edited directly.
How do formula columns work?
A formula column stores one expression that computes a value for every row. You can write the expression yourself or describe what you want in plain English and let AI generate it. Supported functions include arithmetic operators plus:
if() round() abs() min() max() sum() concat() upper() lower() trim()
coalesce() days_between() today() year() month() day() sumcolumn() vlookup()
sumcolumn() totals a column across every row; add a quoted tab name as the last argument to sumcolumn() or vlookup() to read another tab of the same sheet (sumcolumn(amount, "Q1")). Expressions are capped at 500 characters. There are no per-cell formulas like =SUM(A1:A5), and no references across tabs or across sheets — a formula column sees only the rows of the tab it lives on.
How do I add, rename, reorder, or delete a tab?
A sheet is a workbook, and its tabs live in the strip along the bottom of the grid. Clicking a tab switches to it in place; Alt+↓ and Alt+↑ (or Ctrl+Shift+PageDown / Ctrl+Shift+PageUp) move to the next and previous tab, and the ≡ button lists every tab when the strip runs off the edge. With edit access:
- Add — click +. The New Sheet dialog opens as “Add tab to " with the Blank, AI, CSV, Google and Form doors. On Blank, **Copy columns from** starts the tab with an existing tab's columns.
- Rename — double-click the tab label, or choose Rename from the tab’s ⌄ menu. Names must be unique within the sheet.
- Reorder — drag the tab, or use Move left / Move right in the tab menu.
- Duplicate — Duplicate in the tab menu copies that tab’s columns and rows into a new tab.
- Delete — Delete in the tab menu. It is a soft delete, restorable for 30 days.
What applies to the whole sheet, and what applies to one tab?
Each tab is a full worksheet: its own columns, rows, formula columns, saved views, comments, automation rules, activity and version history. The row and column limits apply per tab. Two things reach across tabs on purpose: a formula can total or look up another tab by naming it — sumcolumn(amount, "Q1"), vlookup(item, item, rate, "Rates") — and an automation rule’s Create row action can add its row to any tab of the same sheet — pick the tab under Add the row to in the rule builder.
The sheet — the document — owns everything else, and it covers every tab at once: the name, description, tags, the star, collaborators and their roles, the public link, the Forms connection, and Trash. So sharing a sheet shares all of its tabs, and there is no way to share one tab and hold another back. Moving the sheet to Trash takes its tabs with it, and restoring the sheet brings them all back.
How do tabs work with Excel export and import?
An Excel (.xlsx) export writes one worksheet per tab, in strip order. Importing an .xlsx workbook does the reverse: each worksheet in the file becomes a tab, up to your business’s tab limit. CSV export and Google Sheets import stay single-tab — a CSV export covers the tab you are on, and each Google Sheets URL imports as one tab.
How do I import data?
You can import from a CSV file (up to 10 MB), an Excel .xlsx file (up to 10 MB), or a public Google Sheets URL. Google Sheets imports have a 30-second fetch timeout and a 50 MB content cap. The Google Sheet must be shared as “Anyone with the link” with at least Viewer access — organisation-only sharing does not work because the platform fetches it without a Google login. When importing into an existing sheet, AI can suggest how to map CSV headers to your columns.
What can the AI do with my data?
When the master AI switch is on, AI can generate a column schema from a description, answer natural-language questions, compute exact aggregates (count, sum, average, min, max, group-by) over every row with provenance, generate charts, and suggest formula expressions. With AI Edits also enabled, AI can propose row updates, additions, deletions, column additions, and duplicate cleanup — always through a preview you confirm before anything is written. With AI Column Fill enabled, AI can fill an entire column in the background (classify, extract, translate, or normalize values row by row). With AI Automation Actions enabled, automation rules can include AI-powered actions like per-row fills on new rows, scheduled digests, and anomaly alerts.
Can I undo an AI edit?
Yes. Every applied AI edit — bulk updates, row additions, deletions, enrichments, and duplicate cleanups — is snapshotted in the activity log. You can revert any AI edit with one click from the AI panel.
How does the Forms-to-Sheet bridge work?
When you create a sheet from a form, the sheet’s columns are built automatically from the form’s fields. Existing completed submissions are backfilled as rows. New submissions that arrive after the sheet is created are appended automatically, and resubmissions update the existing row rather than creating a duplicate.
When something looks wrong
Why can’t I import my Google Sheet?
The most common cause is that the sheet is not shared publicly. In Google Sheets, choose Share → General access → “Anyone with the link” with at least Viewer access. Organisation-only sharing does not work. Also check that the URL starts with https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/ — other formats are not accepted.
My CSV import skipped some rows — why?
The import stops at your sheet’s row limit. If the sheet already has rows, only the remaining capacity is filled and the rest are skipped. Rows that exceed the 64 KB per-row data limit are also skipped. The import notice tells you exactly how many rows were skipped and why.
I turned on a setting but nothing changed — is it broken?
The AI toggles (AI Edits, AI Column Fill, AI Automation Actions) are gated behind the master Enable AI Features switch. If the master switch is off, the individual toggles have no effect. Turn on the master switch first, then enable the features you want.
Why can’t I see the public link option on my sheet?
Public sharing links require two things: the administrator must enable Enable Public Sharing Links in the app’s Settings (it is off by default), and you must be the sheet’s owner. If both are true and you still do not see it, the app may not be enabled for your business.
I deleted a tab by mistake — can I get it back? And why can’t I delete this one?
Deleting a tab is a soft delete. For 30 days it sits under Deleted tabs in the ≡ list at the right of the tab strip, with a Restore button next to it; restoring brings the tab’s rows, comments and views back with it. Restoring is refused only if the sheet has meanwhile filled up to the tab limit — delete a tab first, then restore.
Delete is disabled on the last remaining tab, because a sheet always keeps at least one. To get rid of the whole document, use Move to Trash on the sheet instead. Deleting the first tab is allowed — the sheet’s identity simply moves to the tab that follows it, and the sheet’s name, sharing and public link are unaffected.
My automation rule stopped running — what happened?
Check whether the rule references columns that have been renamed or deleted since the rule was created. Stale column references prevent the rule from matching any rows. Also confirm the rule is still enabled — rules can be individually toggled on and off.
I asked AI to fill a column, but some rows came back blank — why?
AI column fill runs one LLM call per batch of 20 rows. If the AI cannot determine a value for a row (the source data is ambiguous or empty), it returns blank for that row. The enrichment status shows how many rows were filled, skipped, and failed. You can re-run enrichment with different instructions or on a narrower filter.
Licensing and limits
Does AI Sheets require a licence?
Yes. AI Sheets requires a licence and is disabled by default. An administrator enables it from the Apps Marketplace for your business. Individual users do not need separate licences — once the app is enabled, everyone in the business can use it.
How many tabs can one sheet have?
Twenty by default, and an app admin can set the limit anywhere from 2 to 50 under Settings → Limits → Maximum tabs per sheet. The first tab counts towards the limit. It is enforced everywhere a tab can be created — the + button, importing an Excel workbook, restoring a deleted tab, and the Ask AI add_tab tool — and the refusal names the number: “This sheet already has 20 tabs, the maximum allowed in this business.” Lowering the limit never deletes anything; sheets already above it keep their tabs and simply cannot gain more. Because the row limit applies to each tab, the tab limit is what bounds how much data one document can hold: tabs × rows.
What are the limits?
| Limit | Value |
|---|---|
| Rows per tab | 5,000 default; configurable from 100 to 50,000 |
| Tabs per sheet | 20 default; configurable from 2 to 50 |
| Columns per tab | 100 |
| CSV / Excel upload size | 10 MB |
| Google Sheets fetch cap | 50 MB |
| Per-row data size | 64 KB |
| Automation rules per sheet | 25 |
| Actions per automation rule | 10 |
| Conditions per automation rule | 50 |
| Minimum schedule interval | 5 minutes |
| Rows per AI edit or deletion | 1,000 per operation |
| Rows per AI add | 100 per operation |
| Rows per AI column fill | 1,000 per run |
| Formula expression length | 500 characters |
| Google Sheets import timeout | 30 seconds |
| Sheet name length | 255 characters |
| Sheet description length | 5,000 characters |
| Automation rule name length | 255 characters |
More help
- AI Sheets Overview
- Ask AI — the assistant answers AI Sheets questions from these articles.