Snowflake integration for HyperDB in Airtable

  • Published on May 6, 2025
  • 2 minute(s) read
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Plan availability

Enterprise Scale

Permissions

  • Enterprise Admin

  • Integration Admin (private beta)

Platform(s)

  • Web/Browser

Related reading

Snowflake integration for HyperDB in Airtable overview

The Snowflake HyperDB integration allows you to sync the contents of a Snowflake view (saved query) or table into Airtable. Because HyperDB is the destination for this integration, you can now also sync much larger datasets than our standard Snowflake sync. One HyperDB Table can contain up to 100M records.

The Snowflake integration is a one-way sync into HyperDB, so changes made in Airtable or HyperDB cannot be synced back to the external application from which you are syncing.

Understanding the Snowflake integration for HyperDB

  • The HyperDB integration is configured to run once every 24 hours—nightly, at 9PM Pacific time. Admins can also manually trigger data imports via the admin panel.

  • The integration uses either OAuth authentication or Key Pair Authentication to access data in Snowflake. Configuring this for a Snowflake account/instance requires a one-time setup with account admin access to Snowflake and organization admin access in Airtable.

Snowflake integration for HyperDB admin configuration (OAuth)

The Snowflake integration requires the same admin setup as the in-base integration, using OAuth authentication. Configuration requires:

  1. One-time setup with account admin access to Snowflake and organization admin access in Airtable

  2. After setup, all users within your organization can connect their Snowflake account to Airtable

Follow the steps at Airtable Sync Integration: Snowflake to complete the admin setup.

Connecting to Snowflake

Option 1: Using Key pair:

  1. Open your admin panel.

  2. Click HyperDB.

  3. Click Add table.

  4. Click Snowflake, then Next.

  5. Click Key pair.

  6. Follow the Snowflake Key Pair Authentication instructions to generate the specific private key.

Option 1: Using OAuth:

  1. Open your admin panel.

  2. Click HyperDB.

  3. Click Add table.

  4. Click OAuth, then Next.

  5. Select an account to use.

Note

By Default, Snowflake OAuth authorizations last for only 90 days and then expire, which causes your syncs to stop working.

To reconnect your Snowflake connection after being disconnected:

  1. Open your Airtable homepage.

  2. Click on your profile picture in the top-right corner.

  3. Click Integrations.

  4. Click the … icon next to Snowflake.

Choosing Snowflake data to sync

After authenticating, you're asked to select the data source for your HyperDB table and specify the following information:

  • Warehouse - Snowflake's virtual warehouse used for SQL queries 

  • Database

  • Schema

  • Whether you want to sync from a table or view

  • Source -  the specific model in Snowflake to sync

Note

Airtable prepopulates the possible options in the dropdown shown below based on the permissions your connected account has within Snowflake.

Finalizing the Snowflake data connection

To finalize your Snowflake connection:

  1. Choose a unique primary ID for the data set (text type required).

  2. Make schema modifications to the import, like converting fields to single selects.

  3. Choose a secondary search column for human-readable searches.

  4. Optionally customize data types (though we recommend doing most type definitions within Snowflake)

  5. Name your HyperDB table and provide a description.

FAQs

What immediately happens after creating a HyperDB table:

After creating a HyperDB tabe, you should:

  • Your data preview is available.

  • Your initial data import may take some time to complete based on its size.

  • Your data will automatically refresh nightly