What is an index field in salesforce?

Question

I'm trying to find a proper list of what standard fields are indexed by default in salesforce, as well as under what conditions custom fields are indexed.

To start things off I know fields are indexed:

When salesforce has added a custom index at your request (but you can't rely on this in other orgs)

Any fields marked as external IDs

Master-Detail fields

Lookup fields

System audit fields (CreatedDate, SystemModStamp)

I've asked salesforce support and there is no authoritative documentation on this outside of this page: http://www.salesforce.com/us/developer/docs/apexcode/Content/langCon_apex_SOQL_VLSQ.htm

Aalap Prabhakaran · Accepted Answer

Just found that salesforce has posted a cheat sheet with much more data about index fields in salesforce than I've ever seen before. Take a look at the Query & Search Optimization Fields Cheat Sheet on the developer force wiki's cheat sheet area.

One big takeaway is that there are some substantial differences between performance of standard and custom indexes.

Fields that have standard index applied:
Custom lookup fields
Custom master-detail fields
Id
Name
Owner
Audit dates
On standard objects there are some others that aren't documented anywhere
Custom indexes:
Can be added by salesforce support
External Id fields
Unique fields

Carson Sofia · Answer

Indexed fields in Salesforce are fields that are system-marked to speed up data searching and filtering. When indexed tap tap shots, queries run faster because Salesforce can access the data directly instead of scanning the entire table. This is commonly applied to ID, Name, Email, and other optimized fields.

Deloreshdelarosa · Answer

What a great explanation of index fields in Salesforce especially the ultimate block blast challenges that can help you figure out how to dramatically improve your query performance and data retrieval efficiency!

What is an index field in salesforce?

About this question

Your answer

3 Answers

More Salesforce discussions

Learn & Explore

Salesforce Tutorials

Salesforce Interview Q&A

Latest Salesforce Blogs

Want answers to more Salesforce questions?

Stay in the loop — it’s free

You’re on the list!