New capabilities for custom buttons: Elevate UX and CX with just a click!

New capabilities for custom buttons: Elevate UX and CX with just a click!

-------------------------------------------------Post moderated on 24th May--------------------------------------------------------------

Dear all, The feature is now available for all users in all DCs. 


Dear Customers,

We hope you're well!

We're happy to announce enhancements we've made to buttons.

Buttons in Zoho CRM are a simple yet versatile customization tool. It offers great usability for CRM users, enabling them execute important actions as required. It was originally designated for use within modules. Realizing its importance in users' productivity, we opened the ability to configure buttons inside records, Wizards, Canvas, and related lists as well. Also, you can bridge your CRM to a third party software.

Now, to provide context and convenience, we are expanding the scope of buttons even more.
  • Layout-specification: We've added the ability to choose layouts while configuring buttons, which helps provide more context to your data organization efforts.
  • Portal accessibility: We enabled buttons for portals to offer exclusivity for customers and also to extend these UX capabilities to CX.
  • Kiosk accessibility: We also have a value-adding use case with regard to Kiosk.

Let's go in detail!

Buttons are now layout-specific

Layouts in Zoho CRM are customizable data templates that help you collect, store, process, interpret, and manage data to manifest your business processes. You can also run automations based on layouts. These layout-specific capabilities help align your CRM to your business processes.
However, until now, any button placed in record detail, create, or clone pages was invariably displayed for all layouts. This generic prevalence of a button irrespective of the layout or the process lacked context.

The screenshots below feature two buttons on the record details page. The button Send to events for leads from trade shows and the other, push to WFS for leads coming in via online store. Both the buttons help push data to different applications.

You can see, how two buttons irrespective of their relevance, are displayed in the record details page invariably.

Now, to provide clearer context and, more importantly, to make buttons more process-specific, we've introduced the ability to select which layout(s) a button should appear in before selecting its position. In fact, you can select one or more layouts, or choose all layouts (but this time it's your choice!).

In the screenshots below, you can see leads with different layouts—each with buttons specific for its layout.


Note: Layout choices will be available only where they're applicable. If you choose to place buttons in the list view (module view), then you won't be able to select the layouts.

UI update: Separate links and buttons tab

In line with this layout selection update, we've also split the former Links and Buttons tab into two distinct tabs: Links and Buttons. With this split, you'll not only have a dedicated list of links and buttons, but also get the benefit of managing each of them individually.


Empower portal users with more accessibility

Portals are a self-service channel Zoho CRM offers. By extending access to certain modules to portal users, you can enable them to create, view, and update records all by themselves. Click here to learn more about portals in Zoho CRM.

Now, to give Portal users, accessibility and a great experience that CRM users have had thus far, we've also developed the ability to create/extend buttons to records shared via portals.

Moving forward, admins create buttons exclusively for portal users or extend existing buttons to them. 

What does this mean for your business?

Building or extending custom buttons in portals opens up a lot of possibilities. In addition to the standard record buttons, by providing access to custom buttons in Portals, your Portal users will be able to do what CRM users can do, such as send SMS notifications, save records as offline files, push information to on-premise tools, and more. The possibilities with custom buttons are endless, and they offer the following benefits: 
  • Curb their dependence on CRM users
  • Add convenience
  • Elevate the user experience
  • Minimize effort required for manual tasks
But wait—this update to custom buttons does lead to another interesting use case. Let's talk about Kiosk Studio!

Kiosk Studio is one of our latest and most anticipated releases. It's a no-code customization tool that CRM users can use to get quick service at the click of a button. You can quickly display a screen, retrieve information from your database, or save information to it. Click here to learn more about Kiosk.

Summoning a Kiosk is one of many custom actions you can configure for custom buttons. If you've already configured Kiosk for your organization, you can associate it with a custom button as an action and initiate designated tasks.

Let's look at an example of how a Portal user can schedule a car service all by themselves:

KM is a premium car care center that deals with its correspondence online. All the customer has to do is to schedule a service on their portal, and they will be contacted. This is a classic example of a Kiosk inside a Portal.

This way, custom buttons can serve a larger purpose for your business. We hope these enhancements provide a lot more flexibility and convenience as you work with Zoho CRM. If you have any questions or feedback, please feel free to drop a comment.
That's all, folks!

Availability: These updates are available for all users in US DC as of now. It will be opened in the rest of the DCs in a couple of days.

Thanks and have a good one!

Kind regards,
Saranya Balasubramanian
Zoho CRM - Marketing

Rephrase with Ginger (Cmd+⌥+E)

    • Recent Topics

    • Cliq File Upload

      While uploading large file like 500MB, it takes time, that fines. But if you resize window or move window in other screen, that uploading disappears. After upload complete & sent it will be visible

    • Zia Actions: AI-powered Workflow Automation for Faster and Smarter Execution

      Hello everyone, Workflows got a notch better with AI-based actions. Actions such as field extraction, prediction, auto reply, and content generation facilitate quick execution with improved speed and accuracy. Zia can intercept useful details in newly

    • Constant color of a legend value

      It would be nice if we can set a constant color/pattern to a value when creating a chart. We would often use the same value in different graph options and I always have to copy the color that we've set to a certain value from a previous graph to make

    • What's New in Zoho POS - October 2025

      Hello everyone, Welcome to Zoho POS's monthly updates, where we share our latest feature updates, releases, changes, and more. Let’s take a look at how October went. Process returns for refunds, exchanges, or offer store credit Returns and exchanges can

    • Loan and purchase

      My husband is lending me mobey to buy a vehicle intersst free ... I need to know how to record the cash receipt and how I pay it back... the money is for a vehicle do I just post the invoice for that as I normally would usung the loan money to pay for

    • Zoho Connect Module in Zoho Trident

      Hi I really like where Zoho Trident is going. Having Mail and Cliq in one place is especially powerful. However, Zoho Connect really needs to be included to make this a true communication and collaboration hub. I would like to request that Zoho Connect

    • Zoho FSM API Delete Record

      Hi FSM Team, It would be great if you could delete a record via API. Thank you,

    • File Field Validation

      Hello all, We are tracking our customer NDA agreements in our CRM and have created 2 fields to do so, an execution date field and a file upload field. I want to create a validation rule to ensure that when the execution date field is populated that the

    • 100 record view limitation

      I have just migrated from another CRM and am starting in ZOHOcrm with over 5000 contacts. It seems that my searches and sorts are limited to 100 live records....or am I missing something. This seems to be very limiting...in a lot of scenarios (mass email,

    • ZUG Meet-ups are back - Across India (December 2025)

      The Zoho User Group (ZUG) meet-ups are back, and this time, we’re travelling across India to reconnect with our amazing community! From Chennai to Delhi, Bengaluru to Mumbai, we can’t wait to meet you all in person and talk everything Zoho SalesIQ, automation,

    • Categorise Attachments

      We take ID, proof of address, right to work documentation and more.  I can upload a single file in to field, but we often receive multiple files for each category e.g. someone may send a separate file for the front and back of their national ID card.  My team don't have time to manipulate the files in order to upload them as a single file. The options, as far as I can tell, would be to create additional fields on attachments in order to categorise what the file is, or to be able to upload single

    • Scheduling a meeting for just a 1:1 phone call

      My business is B2C and many of my customer's don't want to engage in an online meeting for what can be handled in a regular phone call. I am trying to create a new meeting invitation, but there is no venue optoin for "phone call". How are other's handling

    • Need more details on API Usage Dashboard

      Hi Team, We have implemented Zoho Expense for a client and has done some integrations with well known third party ERP via api. Recently we have noticed a huge spike in the API consumption. But we couldn't get the root cause for the same. I accept there

    • Power of Automation:: Automating SLA Timelines for First Response & Resolution for Issues module.

      Hello Everyone, Ever wished SLAs could update automatically based on issue severity i.e no manual tracking, no missed timelines? That is exactly what one of our customers, Alex, wanted to achieve in the Issues module. So, we have setup a simple automation

    • Finding missing records

      I have a challenge and I am not really sure where to start with it. I can't find any similar threads on here, can anyone help: I have two forms, FormA and FormB. Both forms have records that contain a field called Job_Number. What I am trying to achieve

    • Power of Automation :: Quick way to associate your Projects with Zoho CRM

      A custom function is a software code that can be used to automate a process and this allows you to automate a notification, call a webhook, or perform logic immediately after a workflow rule is triggered. This feature helps to automate complex tasks and

    • Free webinar! Build smarter apps with Zoho Sign and Zoho Creator

      Hello, Bring the power of digital signatures to the apps you build in Zoho Creator! Connect Zoho Sign as a microservice and enable seamless e-signature workflows in your applications. This integration allows you to automate signing tasks using Deluge.

    • Move orders scan ISBN

      Hi We have ISBN setup to be searched in items zoho but move orders dissent recognize the ISBN is there q missing configuration? regards, JS

    • What's New - October 2025 | Zoho Backstage

      Hey everyone! We’ve been busy rolling out a host of upgrades for Zoho Backstage. While some major features are still going through final rounds of testing to make your event experience smooth as butter, here’s what was new and improved in October 2025.

    • Zoho Analytics - Feature Request For Time Based Data Source Fetch

      Hi Analytics Team, I have a client using Zoho CRM and they want a weekly report at 4:30pm every Friday, emailed to the sales team showing a pie chart of Closed Won Deals for that week. This is easy to achieve in Analytics but not so easy to ensure the

    • Zoho People Attendance Regularization – Wrong Total Hours Displayed

      While using Zoho People, I observed that the attendance regularization is showing wrong total hours when applied to past dates. For example, if a check-in is added at 10:00 AM and check-out at 6:00 PM for a previous date, the system sometimes calculates

    • Add Flexible Recurrence Options for Meeting Scheduling in Zoho Cliq (e.g., Every 2 Weeks)

      Hello Zoho Cliq Team, We hope you are doing well. Currently, when scheduling a meeting inside Zoho Cliq, the recurrence options are limited to Daily, Weekly, Monthly, and Yearly. There is no ability to set a meeting to occur every X weeks — for example,

    • AI generated meeting notes associated to Account or Deal

      As our organization works to improve efficiency we are looking for a solution to leverage AI to generate meeting notes and then add those notes to a CRM record such as an Account or Deal. I see Zoho has a Notebook AI offering that talks about the ability

    • Subform Disabled Fields Should Remain Disabled on Edit/View

      Currently, when we disable a subform field using on user input or on add new row, it works perfectly during the initial data entry. However, when the record is saved and reopened for viewing or editing, these disabled fields become editable again. This

    • How do you print a refund check to customer?

      Maybe this is a dumb question, but how does anyone print a refund check to a customer? We cant find anywhere to either just print a check and pick a customer, or where to do so from a credit note.

    • Enable Screen Recording in Zoho WorkDrive Mobile Apps (Android & iOS)

      Hi Zoho WorkDrive Team, How are you? We are enthusiastic Zoho One users and rely heavily on Zoho WorkDrive for internal collaboration and content sharing. The screen-recording feature in the WorkDrive web app (similar to Loom) is extremely useful- however,

    • What is Resolution Time in Business Hours

      HI, What is the formula used to find the total time spent by an agent on a particular ticket? How is Resolution Time in Business Hours calculated in Zohodesk? As we need to find out the time spent on the ticket's solution by an agent we seek your assistance

    • Is it possible to turn off all capabilities for a customer to schedule, reschedule or cancel an appointment?

      Is it possible to turn off all capabilities for a customer to schedule, reschedule or cancel an appointment? I would like to set it up so only staff can schedule appointments. Is this possible?

    • Hide "Section" headers when using a form as a subform in "List view"

      When using a form as a subform and setting the "View Type" to "List View" it is not possible to hide the section headers. This can become an issue if I have a section which is not applicable to this subform and I hide the fields within that section and

    • Add additional field to quick search results

      IN the advanced search, we can add any field to the columns. In the regular search results (before you press enter, there is no option to modify the results. It would be super useful to include a custom field where it currently displays the pipleine

    • Books API Receiving an Error that Doesn't Make Sense when Creating Credit Note - trying to use 'ignore_auto_number_generation' argument

      Hello, I'm working on a newly created routine and I'm getting an error that doesn't make sense when trying to create a new Credit Note. Here is my POST request. Endpoint: https://www.zohoapis.com/books/v3/creditnotes?organization_id=########## Body:     {

    • Bug Report and Suggestions for Improvement in Zoho Applications

      Hi Zoho Team, I’d like to report a few bugs and improvement suggestions I’ve noticed while using Zoho products: Zoho Cliq Video Call: The camera sometimes turns off automatically during video calls. This seems to be a bug — please check and fix it. Zoho

    • Need Help: Updating Related Records via Subform Entries in Zoho Creator

      Hi everyone, I’m trying to set up a workflow in Zoho Creator where each row in a subform updates related records in another form automatically. Here’s the situation: My main form (e.g., “Receipts”) contains a subform where each row selects a related record

    • Zoho Desk - Community - Customer Portal - Description Field UX Improvement

      Hi Zoho Desk Team, As a prolific user of Zoho Cares Community, I find it very frustrating that I cannot increase the size of the Description box (this one which I am typing this message). Many apps with multi line text fields have a small handle in the

    • Add the same FROM email to multiple department

      Hi, We have several agents who work with multiple departments and we'd like to be able to select their names on the FROM field (sender), but apparently it's not possible to add a FROM address to multiple departments. Is there any way around this? Thanks.

    • Can I change the format of the buttons in the email templates?

      Hi all! We have been working hard trying to brand our email templates, and have some way to go yet. One of the things we can't seem to edit is the green ${Cases.CUSTOMER_PORTAL_BUTTON} button and the font of the View Ticket text. Is there any way of doing

    • Introducing parent-child ticketing in Zoho Desk [Early access]

      Hello Zoho Desk users! We have introduced the parent-child ticketing system to help customer service teams ensure efficient resolution of issues involving multiple, related tickets. You can now combine repetitive and interconnected tickets into parent-child

    • Zero Personalization of the File Sharing Experience

      By now (2025) this is the maximum level of personalization available for a Zoho sharing link. We gently asked Zoho if we could modify at least the background, and they replied that it cannot be customized. We're truly disappointed – and surprised every

    • Lead to Contact Conversion with multiple email address fields

      We are a B2C business with a strong repeat cycle, and as such it's not uncommon for customers to use multiple email addresses with us. We have both our Contacts & Leads modules set up with 3 email fields. (Primary Email / Secondary Email / Historic Email)

    • Introducing Dark Mode / Light Mode : A New Look For Your CRM

      Hello Users, We are excited to announce a highly anticipated feature - the launch of Day, Night and Auto Mode implementation in Zoho CRM's NextGen user interface! This feature is designed to provide a visually appealing and comfortable experience for

    • Next Page