Pros & Cons of One Big Flow or Multiple Flows Etc ?

[Anonymous]

Hi, I've been googling best practices but have not been able to find a lot of answers. Hoping for some input from those who've used Power Automate for awhile. Our organization is huge and is just implementing Power Automate. I'm looking for best practices as I'm sure things could get very messy fast. 1) Is it best to use on big flow with various conditions that may occur for the SP List or is it best to create multiple flows that pinpoint the exact trigger condition? I'm thinking one flow would be nice for troubleshooting and worry that multiple flows may be hard to find or associate. Example: I create 10 different flows for an app but then leave the department. Someone new comes along, how will they know which flows should belong to the SharePoint list? 2) There must be pros and cons to using one big flow as opposed to various smaller ones. I'd like to hear from those with experience with this so we can enforce best practices in our organization so we start off in a good fashion. As mentioned, we are a huge organization so I imagine we will have thousands of Power Automate flows, developed by many different people. Hoping for any insight to get us started correctly. I'm reading that naming conventions for Power Automate flows should include the SP List name or App Name and we could also use a solution to group flows into one solution for each application or SP List. Would love to hear your experiences! Thanks in advance!! 🙂

[eric-cheng]

Hi @Anonymous ,

For myself.

Multiple smaller flows

+ multiple users can develop parts of a process at the same time

+ can be used to get around the 30 day limit

+ helps break down complicated processes

- harder to troubleshoot/visualize flow history for the entire process due to segmentation

- depending on your licensing, if you are using per flow for premium connectors, it can be expensive

- potentially introduce complexity with more flows to manage

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[lsittler]

Hi @Anonymous,

I wrote a blog post that maybe can provide you some information: One or multiple Power Automate Flows? (lsonline.fr)

Note: If you have several flows, you can use the environment variables to configure them without editing them every time.

[Anonymous]

Dear TerraDawn

I tend to opt for the multiple flow scenario. I also work a lot with child flows. I use them like functions, so whenever there is a chance I want to use the same logic in different processes or triggered by different actions, I will put this into a child flow.

I agree that this might be a bit harder to troubleshoot or lets rather say more intransparent at first.

On the other hand it reduces complexity and risk of error when you otherwise need to duplicate same steps in different flows.

In my experience, the built in error messages point you to the right spots pretty well plus I came up with a neat way to document the relationsships between the different flows and triggers.

Best regards

Sascha