Dynamic amine sorting enables multiselective construction of unsymmetrical chiral diamines.

Precisely differentiating chemicals featuring minor discrepancies is the prerequisite for achieving high selectivities in both chemical synthesis and biological activities. However, efficient strategies to differentiate and sort such congeneric compounds are lacking, posing daunting challenges for synthetic endeavours aimed at their orderly incorporation. Here we report a dynamic amine-sorting strategy that incorporates the chemoselective formation of the aminomethyl cyclopalladated complex to achieve the efficient differentiation of amine congeners. A series of amines sharing similar three-dimensional structures and properties, as well as possessing notoriously strong binding ability to metals, can be efficiently differentiated, enabling the highly chemo-, regio- and enantioselective multicomponent aminomethylamination of dienes to construct a variety of unsymmetrical chiral diamines. This dynamic amine-sorting strategy tackles the long-standing challenge of precise differentiation and orderly incorporation of aliphatic amines with subtle differences. From a broader perspective, the success demonstrates that meticulously designed metal complexes can provide flexible and general solutions for controlling delicate selectivities in sophisticated synthesis.