Simple, Useful Formula Examples

Notion's Formula property offers immense utility, allowing you to manipulate other properties in a variety of useful ways. Formulas can be as simple as 2 + 2 (literally) or elaborate compilations of nested functions.

The examples below are widely useful yet easy to implement for users at all levels. To demonstrate them, we use two sample databases: a basketball team roster and a list of ecommerce orders. Feel free to duplicate them for your own practice.

As you utilize the Formula property, be sure to reference The Notion Formula Cheat Sheet, and send any questions our way on Twitter.

If you're new to formulas, consider starting with Meet Notion's Formula Property for a fundamental understanding of how they work.

Team Roster

We'll begin with a database of players who comprise a basketball team.

Side note: If you're a hoops fan, you'll appreciate The NBA — in Notion.

Merge First and Last Names

Given each player's First Name (text) and Last Name (text), we can create a Formula property that combines them into a Full Name using the + operator:

prop( "First Name" ) + " " + prop( "Last Name" )

Calculate Age

Given each player's Birthday (date), we can determine their ages with the dateBetween() and now() functions:

dateBetween( now(), prop( "Birthday" ), "years" )

Add Context to Gallery Cards

When we display the roster as a Gallery, some properties stand alone ambiguously without context, such as Age. Using the concat() function, we can add a label to those properties. When we do so, we also need to convert Age (number) to text using the format() function.

concat( "Age: ", format( prop( "Age" ) ) )

concat( "School: ", prop( "School" ) )

Ecommerce Orders

The next set of examples augments a database of orders from an online business. The database contains an item for each unique Order-SKU pairing. For example, Order #1 contains two products (P18 and P21), and therefore has two items in the database: 1-P18 and 1-P21.

Generate a Unique ID

Databases often need a unique ID for each item. Given the Order # (number) and Product SKU (text), we can generate a unique ID, which we can easily paste into the ID (title) property. Because the Order # is a number, we use the format() function to convert it to a string so it can be merged with the Product SKU (text) using the concatenation operator (+)

format( prop( "Order #" ) ) + "-" + prop( "Product SKU" )

Calculate Markup

Markup calculations would typically occur in an independent Products database, but for simplicity's sake, we've included them here.

Say we want our Markup to correlate with the Cost of Goods (number):

• Where Cost of Goods is less than $10, Markup is 25%
• Where Cost of Goods is $10 or more, but less than $50, Markup is 20%
• Where Cost of Goods is $50 or more, Markup is 15%

We can achieve this with nested if() functions:

if( prop( "Cost of Goods" ) <= 10, .25, if( prop( "Cost of Goods" ) < 50, .2, .15) )

Calculate Customer Price

With the Markup determined, we can then calculate Customer Price by multiplying the Cost of Goods (number) by the Markup (number), then adding the Cost of Goods (number):

prop( "Cost of Goods" ) * prop( "Markup" ) + prop( "Cost of Goods" )

Calculate Tax

We then want to calculate tax by multiplying the Customer Price (number) by the Tax Rate (number):

prop( "Customer Price" ) * prop( "Tax Rate" )

Calculate Total Cost

Our store is part of the free-shipping movement, so we can calculate the Total Cost by adding the Customer Price and Tax:

add( prop( "Customer Price" ), prop( "Tax" ) )

Show Days Since Order

For tracking the fulfillment process, we can calculate the Days Since Order using the Order Date (date) and now() function within the dateBetween() function.

dateBetween( now(), prop( "Order Date" ), "days" )

Show Fulfillment Progress

With five different stages of processing each order, we can create a field that nicely indicates Progress. It includes a series of nested if() functions to define an output for each Fulfillment Stage:

if(prop("Fulfillment Stage") == "Payment Processing", "•◦◦◦◦ 20%", if(prop("Fulfillment Stage") == "Payment Cleared", "••◦◦◦ 40%", if(prop("Fulfillment Stage") == "Packaged", "•••◦◦ 60%", if(prop("Fulfillment Stage") == "Shipped", "••••◦ 80%", if(prop("Fulfillment Stage") == "Delivered", "••••• 100%", "")))))

Show Urgency

With properties for Days Since Order (number) and Progress (text), we can establish a field that displays a special character for orders that remain unshipped after a week:

if( and( contains( prop( "Progress" ), "◦◦" ), prop( "Days Since Order" ) >= 7 ), "?", "" )

The formula tests if the Progress property contains two or more empty circles and the Days Since Order is seven or more days. If so, it displays an emergency emoji.

We've also sorted the table by this Attention property to amplify the urgency.