Electrochemical Benzylic C(sp)-H Direct Amidation.

Amide bonds are ubiquitous and found in a myriad of functional molecules. Although formed in a reliable and robust fashion, alternative amide bond disconnections provide flexibility and synthetic control. Herein we describe an electrochemical method to form the non-amide C-N bond from direct benzylic C(sp)-H amidation. Our approach is applied toward the synthesis of secondary amides by coupling secondary benzylic substrates with substituted primary benzamides. The reaction has been scaled up to a multigram scale in flow.