Best Practices for Power Automate: What You Need to Know

Power Automate can help you improve your productivity, efficiency, and innovation by enabling you to build solutions that suit your specific needs and scenarios. However, to get the most out of Power Automate, you need to follow some best practices that will ensure the quality, performance, and security of your flows. In this blog, we will share some of the best practices that you should follow when using Power Automate.

Understand Power Automate in the Power Platform ecosystem

Power Automate is part of the Microsoft Power Platform, which also includes Power Apps, Power BI, and Power Virtual Agents. These tools work together to enable you to create end-to-end solutions that automate workflows, build apps, analyze data, and create bots. You should learn how to use Power Automate with the other tools in the Power Platform to create powerful and integrated solutions. For example, you can use Power Automate to handle the business logic and data integration for your Power Apps, or to trigger and consume data from your Power BI reports and dashboards. You can also use Power Automate to connect to hundreds of other services and applications, such as SharePoint, Outlook, Teams, Dynamics 365, and Azure1.

Know the Power Automate product timeline

Power Automate has evolved from its previous versions, such as Microsoft Flow and Logic Apps. You should be aware of the product history and roadmap of Power Automate, and keep up with the latest updates and features. You should also understand the differences and similarities between Power Automate and Logic Apps, and when to use each one. Power Automate and Logic Apps are both low-code platforms that allow you to create workflows, but they have different target audiences, capabilities, and pricing models. Power Automate is designed for business users and citizen developers, while Logic Apps is designed for professional developers and IT pros. Power Automate has more connectors and templates, while Logic Apps has more advanced features and integrations. Power Automate is priced per user or per flow, while Logic Apps is priced per action or per connector2.

Keep it simple (At least at the beginning)

Power Automate allows you to create complex and sophisticated flows that can perform multiple actions and handle various scenarios. However, you should start with simple and basic flows that focus on one or a few tasks, and test them thoroughly before adding more complexity and functionality. You should also use descriptive names and comments for your flows and actions, and organize them into scopes and groups for better readability and maintainability. This will help you avoid errors, bugs, and performance issues, and make your flows easier to debug, modify, and share3.

Be aware of surprise loops

Power Automate has a feature called Apply to each, which allows you to loop through an array of items and perform an action for each item. However, sometimes you may not realize that you are using an array as an input, and end up creating an unintended loop that can cause unexpected results or errors. You should always check the type and structure of your inputs, and use the single item option or the first function to avoid surprise loops. For example, if you use the Get items action to retrieve items from a SharePoint list, and then use the value output as an input for another action, you will create a loop that will run the action for each item in the list. If you only want to use the first item in the list, you should use the first function to extract it from the array3.

Understand Flows as the “business layer” when building a solution

Power Automate can be used to create the business logic and workflow for your solution, while Power Apps can be used to create the user interface and presentation layer. You should design your flows to handle the data processing, validation, and integration, and use Power Apps to display the data and collect the user input. You should also use the Power Apps trigger and the Respond to Power Apps action to connect your flows and apps seamlessly. This will help you create modular and reusable solutions that separate the concerns and responsibilities of each layer3.

Remember Flow duration expires after 30 days

Power Automate has a limit of 30 days for the retention of flow run history and analytics. This means that after 30 days, the details of the flow runs and the performance metrics will be deleted and no longer available. This also means that if you have a flow that runs for longer than 30 days, such as a recurrence flow or a flow that waits for an approval or a condition, it will expire and stop running after 30 days. You should be aware of this limitation and design your flows accordingly. You should also monitor your flow runs and analytics regularly and export or archive them if needed3.

Be aware of your Power Automate license and connectors

Power Automate has different licensing plans and connectors that offer different features and capabilities. You should be aware of your Power Automate license and the connectors that you use in your flows, and understand their limitations and costs. For example, some connectors are premium and require a premium license or an add-on to use them. Some connectors have limits on the number of requests or the amount of data that they can handle. Some connectors have different pricing models based on the usage or the consumption. You should check the connector reference and the pricing page for more information4.

Understand Power Automate governance

Power Automate governance is the process of managing and controlling the usage and quality of Power Automate in your organization. Power Automate governance involves setting policies, roles, and permissions for Power Automate users and flows, as well as monitoring, auditing, and reporting on Power Automate activities and resources. Power Automate governance helps you ensure the security, compliance, and performance of your Power Automate solutions, and prevent potential risks and issues. You should use the available tools and resources to implement and enforce Power Automate governance in your organization, such as the Power Platform admin center, the Power Platform Center of Excellence (CoE) kit, and the Power Platform ALM guide5.

Conclusion

Power Automate is a powerful and versatile platform that allows you to create workflows that automate tasks and processes across various applications and services. However, to get the most out of Power Automate, you need to follow some best practices that will ensure the quality, performance, and security of your flows. In this blog, we shared some of the best practices that you should follow when using Power Automate. 

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