How to Insert Multiple Values into a SharePoint Lookup Field (Multi-Select) – Guidance Needed

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Posted on by na12063

Hi,

Let’s say I have thousands of existing customer records, where each record includes multiple selected city names. I’d like to load this data into the Customer SharePoint list using Power Automate. Would it be possible to handle and map the multi-select city values correctly during the import?

I’ve created two sample SharePoint lists below to illustrate the intended outcome I’m working toward.

Sample - City SP List as dimension table

Sample - Customer SP List

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Michael E. Gernaey 53,963 Moderator on at

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Hi @na12063

Hi Yes, this would be quite simple but

1. You should import all your Cities first (not customers)

2. As you import your customers, you would be able to build a very clear (yet... formatted needed) json to bind it to the values in your City

I realize that looks like super easy, and per se it is, but the important thing to note, is that you should always create the lookup"ed" to first.

so like if you have ice cream flavors and then Kids linked to their favorite flavors. same thing.

Create all the possible flavors (or add new ones)

Then insert the children, then you can use an action to grab all the records(rows) in the City (aka flavor) columns that match for that person (aka child), and then populate that column at the same time you create the Person.

so yes, completely doable.

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WillPage 2,337 Super User 2026 Season 1 on at

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For each customer, use the Filter array action to filter your City Name list to the cities that are relevant for that customer. You haven't said where your source data is coming from and what the schema of that is so you'll have to figure out how to do that filtering yourself.

Once you've got that figured out, use a Select action with the input being the output from your Filter array and the Map section of the action should look like this, a single column called Id (upper case I, lower case d) mapped to the ID column from the source array

The output of this Select action can now be used in an Update item action on the Customers list.

Tip: When you use the output of a Filter array as the input of the Select, you lose the dynamic content from the original list, so as a shortcut you can put the 'value' property of the City Names list into the From of the Select, then drop the ID column dynamic content into the right hand side of the mapping, then finally change the From field back to the output of the Filter array. They have the same schema so it's no problem doing that.

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