Power Automate per business process plan is great for departmental scenarios where typically, one power user sets up a flow and shares the same with the broader group. This plan alleviates the need to license each end user that knowingly/unknowingly triggers execution of the licensed flow.

Customers that need full-fledged, general purpose workflow/business process automation capabilities, should consider purchasing standalone Power Automate licenses. Licensing is supported on both a “per user” basis as well as a “per flow” basis. Both standalone licenses include the full capabilities on Power Automate. Limited Power Automate capabilities are also included within Power Apps, Office 365 and Dynamics 365 licenses. High level overview of the licensing structure is provided below.

Power Apps licenses (both “Power Apps per app plan” and “Power Apps per user plan”) include Power Automate use rights for the purpose of automating workflows associated with the Power Apps application(s).

Power Automate use within Power Apps is limited to the context of the Power Apps application. What this means is that for both triggers and actions, flows included within a Power Apps application can connect to:

• Any data source within the use rights of the Power Apps application
• Directly with the Power Apps application (via built in trigger/action)

If the flow is isolated and has nothing to do with the Power Apps application, then standalone Power Automate licenses will need to be purchased.

User with a standalone Power Apps license runs an app that uses SQL DB as the data source and includes flows that:

• Read from OR write to SQL DB
• Use a built-in Power Apps trigger and/or action – e.g., Send a push notification to the app

The same user (in the example above) now also wants to use a flow that updates an Oracle database, and:

• Is completely unrelated to the Power Apps app
• Does not interact in any way with the Power Apps app (or its data sources)

This user will then require a standalone Power Automate license.

Dynamics 365 licenses include Power Automate use rights for the purpose of customizing and extending Dynamics 365 application(s).

Power Automate use within Dynamics 365 is limited to the context of the embedding Dynamics 365 application. For both triggers and actions, flows included within the Dynamics 365 application can connect to:

• Any data source within the use rights of the Dynamics 365 application
• Directly with the Dynamics 365 application (via built in trigger/action)

If the embedded flow is not within the context of the Dynamics 365 application, then standalone Power Automate licenses will need to be purchased.

Office 365 licenses include Power Automate use rights for the purpose of customizing and extending Office 365 applications.

Power Automate use within Office 365 is limited to the context of the embedding Office 365 application. For both triggers and actions, flows included within the Office 365 application can connect to:

• Any data source within the use rights of the Office 365 application
• Directly with the Office 365 application (via built in trigger/action)

If the embedded flow is not within the context of the Office 365 application or if the embedded flow needs to connect to a premium on-premises or custom data source standalone Power Automate licenses will need to be purchased.