"by detail" is a correct and usable phrase in written English.
You can use it to emphasize the accuracy or thoroughness of something. For example, "She finished the report quickly, but with great attention to detail."
They're less obsessed by detail.
Comedy lives or dies by detail and timing.
Detail by detail, possession by possession, it adds up to being impressive.
Parents and teachers across the state began to air their grievances, detail by detail.
Over and over again, detail by detail, he tried to recall his conversation with Blankenship.
Character is developed, detail by detail, so that real people emerge.
This hands on work is augmented by detail case studies of landscape structures.
You aren't deadened by detail; you're eager to know what happens next.
Often, in describing the actual world, he paints it similarly, detail by detail, attentive always to effects of the light.
Commentators seem obsessed by detail: "This girl has a big serve although she's very small for a tennis player".
Mr. Hockney's work is tighter and fussier, his line more broken, his subjects more particularized by detail.
