How to find where a field is used in Salesforce

Short answer: Salesforce’s Where is this used? button on a custom field lists many references, but not all of them – Apex that builds field names as text, reports, list views and several other places are easy to miss. doDev, a free Chrome extension, searches the places you choose and shows each reference with the line that matches.

Find the references with doDev

1. Install doDev and open it from the toolbar while you are logged into Salesforce.
2. Go to Find → Where Is It Used.
3. Choose Field and type it, e.g. Account.DoDev_Picklist__c. It also works for objects, profiles, roles, groups, permission sets, Apex classes, labels, custom permissions, record types or any text.
4. In What to search (on the right), check the places – Apex, triggers, Visualforce, Lightning components, formulas, page layouts, list views, email templates, custom metadata and more. The slower ones, such as flows, validation rules and reports, can be added too.
5. Click Find references.

You get:

• Who and what uses it – e.g. how many records have a value, and how many profiles and permission sets can see the field.
• Each reference with its line and the match highlighted, marked exact or name only (a match on the name that may be something else).
• View › to open the component.

Before you delete a field

• Check the references above – code and formulas will stop the deletion, but reports, list views and integrations won’t.
• Look at how many records have a value: deleting the field deletes that data (it can be restored for 15 days).
• Search the field’s API name in your integrations and external code too.

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