Industries
Set the list of industries your team picks from, with codes and broader parent industries to group them.
Updated 12 October 2026 · 3 min read
An industry says what business a company is in, such as Restaurants or Hotels and Motels. Industries can sit under a broader parent, such as Restaurants under Food and Beverage Services.
For example, a company that sells billing software to restaurants and cafés wants to tell them apart from hotels. They add "Cloud Kitchens" under Food and Beverage Services. Now they can find every food business, and still pick the exact kind.
Before you start
- To see the list, you need the View Configurations permission. To add a value, you need Create Configurations. To change one or switch it off, you need Edit Configurations. To delete one, you need Delete Configurations.
If you don't have a permission you need, ask your admin.
Where it's used
- Industry on leads, contacts and accounts.
- Your company's own industry in Company settings.
- Lead scoring and web forms.
The list
Go to Settings > Configurations and click Industries. You start with 434 industries, each with a code, many of them under a parent.
Add a value
- Click Add Industry. The Create window opens.
- Fill in the fields. Fields marked * must be filled in.
- Click Create.
| Field | What to enter |
|---|---|
| Code * | A number no other industry uses |
| Name * | The industry, up to 100 characters, such as "Cloud Kitchens" |
| Description | When to use it, up to 255 characters |
| Parent | A broader industry to put it under |
| Sequence * | Its place in the dropdown, from 1 to 100. Lower numbers come first |
New values show in everyone's dropdowns straight away.
Change, switch off or delete
Click ⋮ on a value:
- Edit changes it. The window is called Update.
- Make it Inactive hides it from dropdowns. Records that already use it keep it. Make it Active shows it again.
- Delete removes it. You can't delete a value that records still use.
Each one asks you to confirm first. See Configurations.
Renaming a value doesn't change records that already use the old name. They keep showing the old name.
An industry used by accounts, leads, contacts or your company profile can't be deleted. Two industries can have the same name, but not the same code.
Troubleshooting
| You see | Why | What to do |
|---|---|---|
| "Industry cannot be deleted as it is used by … Deactivate it instead to hide it from new records." | Records still use the value | Click Make it Inactive instead |
| "A industry with this code already exists." | The code is taken, maybe by a deleted value | Pick another code |
| "Sequence must be at least 1" or "Sequence cannot be more than 100" | The sequence is outside 1 to 100 | Enter a number from 1 to 100 |
Related
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