Power Automate console

The console is the central interface of Power Automate for desktop.

The main area of the console contains four tabs that display different kind of information: a home screen, your desktop flows, shared desktop flows, and built-in examples.

On the top of the window, you can see the current user, while on the command bar, you can see all the available actions, a dropdown list to switch environments, the Settings and Help buttons, and a search bar.

Screenshot of the Power Automate for desktop console.

Note

Some options in the console may be disabled due to insufficient permissions in the current environment. Contact your administrator to grant you access or switch to another environment. To find more information about security roles, go to Configure user security.

Starting a desktop flow

To run a desktop flow as local attended, use the Start button next to the selected flow or on the command bar. The Status column allows you to review the current status of each flow.

Screenshot of the status column in the console.

If a running flow contains input variables, a dialog box will prompt you to provide the appropriate values.

Screenshot of the flow inputs dialog.

Editing a desktop flow

Apart from creating new desktop flows, you can edit existing flows using the Edit button next to the selected flow or on the command bar.

Screenshot of the edit buttons in the console.

The development of new flows and the editing of existing flows occur in the flow designer. To find more information regarding the flow designer and how to develop desktop flows, refer to Desktop flow designer.

Important

When more than one person changes a shared desktop flow, the last person who saves the flow overrides all previous actions.

Console Settings

To configure Power Automate for desktop to your liking, select the Settings button.

Screenshot of the console settings pane

Under the Application category, select whether Power Automate should launch automatically and whether closing the console will also close the application. You may also set a hotkey combination to stop running flows instantly.

Using the Monitoring/Notifications dropdown menu, you can choose whether Power Automate will display integrated Windows notifications, a custom monitoring window, or no notifications at all. To find more information regarding Power Automate notifications, refer to Runtime notifications.

By default, Power Automate always prompts you to confirm the triggering of a desktop flow via URL or desktop shortcut. The Display confirmation dialog when invoking flows externally option allows you to disable this functionality. You can find more information about external links in Run desktop flows via URL or desktop shortcuts.

To decide whether Microsoft may collect diagnostic data to improve user experience, navigate to the Data collection settings tab.

Important

Only admins can change data collection settings.

Desktop flow properties

To review the properties of a desktop flow, right-click on it and select Properties. In the General tab, you can edit the name and description of the flow, set up a keyboard shortcut to trigger the flow locally, and define the On error behavior of the flow run.

If the Add screenshot to logs option is enabled, a screenshot is captured upon flow run failure and is uploaded to the flow run action details.

Important

In the Details tab, you can see the owner, the creation and last modification dates, the flow ID and the flow’s storage schema version in Dataverse. For more information on the enhanced desktop flows schema, go to Power Automate v2 schema.

Additionally, there's the Run URL that you can use to run the flow through many different sources, such as browsers, the Windows Run application, and the Command Prompt. You can find more information regarding this functionality in Run desktop flows via URL or desktop shortcuts.

Screenshot of the general properties of a desktop flow.

Screenshot of the details of a desktop flow.

Update Power Automate for desktop

Power Automate frequently checks for updates and displays appropriate notifications.

Update notifications offer you the option to delay the update and proceed with it at a later time. If you don't wish to receive any update notifications, uncheck the Show update notifications option in the general settings.

To manually update, select Check for updates in the general settings.

Switch organization

If you're a member of more than one tenant, you can switch between them by selecting their alias at the top right corner of the console and clicking on Switch organization.

Screenshot of the switch tenants option.