Airtable is not a traditional CRM software, it's first and foremost a database (you can use it as a replacement to Google Sheets for example). Just like some people use Google Sheets as a CRM, you can also "technically" use Airtable as a CRM—though it's not something we ever recommend.

The reason is because Airtable lacks the main features of a CRM, like ingesting all your teams emails in one place. Further, because there is unlimited flexibility with Airtable, you can get stuck spending dozens, if not hundreds of hours, configuring Airtable to function as a CRM. And more likely than not, the tool will lack proper adoption as there are little guardrails when using the tool for CRM purposes and everyone can kind of use it "how they want".

In general, while Airtable tries to position itself as a contender in the CRM space due to it's customization abilities, it's the main reason why we advise teams not to go down this path. It will likely lead to overwhelm and sunken time that could have gone into setting up a proper CRM that will scale with time.

If you're tempted to use Airtable as a CRM, we'd recommend folk instead as it will still give you a similar database like structure, all while providing CRM features at the core.