# Create and manage activities and schemas

URL: https://attio.com/help/reference/managing-your-data/create-and-manage-activities-and-schemas
Breadcrumbs: [Help](https://attio.com/help) > [Reference](https://attio.com/help/reference) > [Managing your data](https://attio.com/help/reference/managing-your-data)

Set up activities and schemas in workspace settings.

> Available on plus, pro, enterprise plans.
>
> Only **admins** can manage activities and schemas.  
> All **members** can log activities.
>
> On **Plus**, admins can add attributes to standard activities and schemas. Creating custom activities and schemas requires **Pro** or **Enterprise**.

Activities let your team track events related to records, such as phone calls, demos, or site visits. Schemas group attributes that activities can inherit.

This article explains how activities and schemas work together, and how admins can create and manage them in workspace settings. To log an activity on a record instead, see [Log activities on records](https://attio.com/help/reference/managing-your-data/records/add-record-activities).

> **Note:** Activities are currently in Beta.

## Decide what to create

What you need to create depends on what you want to track:

| **If you want to…**                                                  | **Create…**                                           |
| -------------------------------------------------------------------- | ----------------------------------------------------- |
| Let members log a new kind of activity, such as a demo or site visit | An activity                                           |
| Reuse the same additional attributes across several activities       | A custom schema, then activities that inherit from it |
| Capture information that only applies to one activity                | An attribute directly on that activity                |

In most cases, start by [creating an activity](https://attio.com/help/reference/managing-your-data/create-and-manage-activities-and-schemas#create-and-manage-custom-activities). You only need a [custom schema](https://attio.com/help/reference/managing-your-data/create-and-manage-activities-and-schemas#create-and-manage-schemas) when multiple related activities should share the same additional attributes. Because you can’t change an activity’s parent schema after creating it, consider whether related activities should share a custom schema before you create them.

> **Note:** Attio plans to support reporting across all activities that share a schema, using their shared attributes. This isn’t available in Beta.

## Understand schemas and inheritance

Video: https://youtu.be/vCr4fkqhG04

Every activity inherits its starting attributes from a parent schema. Schemas can also inherit from other schemas, so attributes flow down through the hierarchy.

Attio includes three standard schemas:

| **Schema**  | **Use it for**                                                                               | **Attributes it adds**           |
| ----------- | -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- | -------------------------------- |
| Activity    | Activities that don’t need interaction- or call-specific information                         | Title, Timestamp, Linked records |
| Interaction | Activities involving multiple people and a direction, such as Inbound, Outbound, or Internal | Direction, Participants          |
| Call        | Activities that represent calls                                                              | End timestamp, Caller, Outcome   |

**Interaction** inherits everything from **Activity**, and **Call** inherits everything from both **Interaction** and **Activity**. Activities built on **Interaction** also contribute to communication intelligence values such as **Last interaction**, when they're set to **All interactions**. Every activity also includes the system attributes **Created at** and **Created by**.

If several activities need another shared set of attributes, [create a custom schema](https://attio.com/help/reference/managing-your-data/create-and-manage-activities-and-schemas#create-and-manage-schemas). For example, if Site visit and Conference should both capture a Location and Organizer, you could create an In-person event schema that inherits its attributes from the Activity schema. Site visit and Conference could then inherit from In-person event.

Activities and schemas that come with Attio are tagged **Standard**, and the ones you create are tagged **Custom**.

## Standard activities

Attio includes standard activities that are ready for members to use. Phone call is currently the only standard activity. It inherits its attributes from the **Call** schema, which also inherits from **Interaction** and **Activity**. You can’t edit or delete the system attributes on standard activities, but admins can [add custom attributes](https://attio.com/help/reference/managing-your-data/create-and-manage-activities-and-schemas#add-attributes-to-an-activity).

## Create and manage custom activities

Create a custom activity for anything else your team wants to track, such as a product demo, a discovery call, or a site visit.

1. Click your workspace name, then select **Workspace settings**.
2. Under **Data** in the sidebar, click **Activities**.
3. On the **Activities** tab, click **Create activity**.
4. Enter a **Plural noun** and a **Singular noun**, such as "Site visits" and "Site visit."
5. Optionally, click the icon next to **Plural noun** to choose a different icon.
6. Optionally, edit the **Slug**. Attio fills it in from the plural noun, and it can only include lowercase letters, numbers, and underscores.
7. Under **Schemas**, select the parent schema that best matches the activity. The activity will inherit all attributes from this schema.
8. Click **Create activity**.

> **Note:** You can’t change an activity’s parent schema after creating the activity.

Your new activity appears on the **Activities** tab, tagged **Custom**, with the attributes inherited from its parent schema. Once members start logging the activity, it appears on the **Activity** tab of every record it’s linked to and can be used as a data source in reports.

> **Tip:** The slug identifies the activity in URLs, in the API, and in SQL queries. If an activity comes from a particular tool, prefixing its slug with the tool's name, as in `lemlist_email`, helps you avoid conflicts as you add more activities.

### Add attributes to an activity

Add attributes directly to any activity, standard or custom, for information that only applies to that activity. The activity already includes all attributes inherited from its parent schemas.

For example, a Demo activity that inherits from **Interaction** already includes Participants and Direction. You could add Demo outcome directly to the Demo activity if that information isn't needed by other activities.

To add an attribute:

1. Click your workspace name, then select **Workspace settings**.
2. Under **Data** in the sidebar, click **Activities**.
3. Select the activity, such as **Phone calls**.
4. Open the **Attributes** tab.
5. Click **Create attribute**.
6. Choose an attribute type and configure it.

The **Attributes** tab shows both attributes added directly to the activity and attributes inherited from its parent schemas. Inherited attributes are labeled with the schema they come from, such as **from Interaction**, and tagged **Inherited**. To change one, open the schema it comes from.

Attributes built into Attio are tagged **System**. The **Constraints** column indicates when an attribute is required, such as **Timestamp** or **Linked records**. For more about attribute types and settings, see [Create and manage attributes](https://attio.com/help/reference/managing-your-data/attributes/create-manage-attributes).

### Edit or delete an activity

To edit an activity, click its row on the **Activities** tab. The **Configuration** tab holds its nouns and slug, and the **Attributes** tab holds its attributes.

To change a custom activity's slug, open its **Configuration** tab and click the pencil icon next to **Slug**. You can't change the slug of a standard activity.

> **Note:** Changing a slug breaks any API calls, workflows, and SQL queries that use the old slug. Update them to use the new one.

To copy an activity's ID or slug for use with the API, click the ⋮ icon on its row, then select **Copy ID** or **Copy slug**.

To delete a custom activity, open it, then open the **Configuration** tab. Under **Danger zone**, click **Delete activity**.

## Create and manage schemas

Create a custom schema when multiple activities need to share attributes that aren’t already provided by the standard Activity, Interaction, or Call schemas.

To create a schema:

1. Click your workspace name, then select **Workspace settings**.
2. Under **Data** in the sidebar, click **Activities**.
3. Open the **Schemas** tab.
4. Click **Create schema**.
5. Enter a **Plural noun** and a **Singular noun**, such as “In-person events” and “In-person event.”
6. Optionally, edit the **Slug**. Attio fills it in from the plural noun, and it can only include lowercase letters, numbers, and underscores.
7. Under **Schemas**, select the parent schema whose attributes your new schema should inherit. **Activity** is selected by default because it provides the standard activity attributes, including Title, Timestamp, and Linked records.
8. Click **Create schema**.

> **Note:** You can’t change a schema's parent schema after creating it.

Your new schema inherits all attributes from its parent schema. You can select this custom schema as the parent schema when creating an activity.

### Add attributes to a schema

Add attributes directly to a schema when you want every activity or child schema that inherits from it to receive those attributes.

To add an attribute, open the schema, select the **Attributes** tab, then click **Create attribute**. Attributes inherited from parent schemas are tagged **Inherited**.

For more about attribute types and settings, see [Create and manage attributes](https://attio.com/help/reference/managing-your-data/attributes/create-manage-attributes).

### Edit or delete a schema

To edit a schema, click its row on the **Schemas** tab. Use the **Configuration** tab to edit its nouns and slug, and the **Attributes** tab to manage its attributes. You can't change the slug of a standard schema.

> **Note:** Changing a slug breaks any API calls, workflows, and SQL queries that use the old slug. Update them to use the new one.

To copy a schema’s ID or slug for use with the API, click the ⋮ icon on its row, then select **Copy ID** or **Copy slug**.

To delete a custom schema, open it, then open the **Configuration** tab. Under **Danger zone**, click **Delete schema**. Confirm by clicking **Delete schema** again.

> **Note:** You can’t recover a deleted schema. You can only delete a custom schema when no activities or other schemas inherit from it.

## Related resources

- Add an activity on a record with [Log activities on records](https://attio.com/help/reference/managing-your-data/records/add-record-activities).
- Learn about attribute types and settings in [Create and manage attributes](https://attio.com/help/reference/managing-your-data/attributes/create-manage-attributes).

## FAQ

### Can I change the schemas Attio provides?

You can add custom attributes to Attio’s standard schemas. Activities that inherit from those schemas also inherit the custom attributes you add. You can’t edit or delete the system attributes that Attio provides.

### Can I build reports on activities?

Yes. When you create a report, select an activity as its data source. Learn more about [creating reports](https://attio.com/help/reference/managing-your-data/dashboard-and-reports/reports). You can also query activities with SQL.

### Can I create activities through the API?

Yes. See [Activities](https://docs.attio.com/docs/activities) in Attio's API documentation.