Overview of workflows in Microsoft Teams

Workflows let you automate repetitive tasks or processes that connect one or more apps to Teams. In short, they can save you time and effort. Here, we’ll walk you through how to add, run, and manage your workflows.

How can workflows help you?

Take a moment to ask yourself the following questions. Every time you answer “yes,” there’s an opportunity to increase your productivity with a workflow.

Is there something you do over and over again in Teams?
Do you switch between Teams and other apps to check for updates or complete tasks?
Do you ever copy and paste info from Teams into other apps?
Are you getting app notifications in email that you’d rather get in Teams?
Do you ask people the same questions on a regular basis, whether in a channel, chat, or meeting? (For example, can you post your weekly status update?)

Find and add workflows

The easiest way to get started is to browse the collection of pre-built workflows.

Select Apps in Teams.
Select Workflows from the navigation on the left.
Select a workflow that interests you.
Follow the prompts given.

When done, you’ll get a confirmation saying, "Workflow added successfully!" The confirmation also includes instructions for running your workflow.

Note: The Workflows app, which runs workflows in Teams, is installed by default. If you can’t find the app, it might be uninstalled. Find the Workflows app in the app store and select Add. The setup screen for the workflow you selected then appears.

How workflows run in Teams

After you’ve added a workflow, you'll get instructions on how to run it. Workflows run in a few different ways:

Automatic. An automatic workflow doesn't need you to do anything after you add it. Each workflow has a trigger, and when the trigger occurs, an action or series of actions happen automatically. Here are two examples:

Workflow name	Trigger	Actions
Notify a channel when a Planner task changes status	A Planner task on a board (specified when you set up the workflow) changes status.	A card is automatically posted to a channel (specified when you set up the workflow), notifying your team of the status change.
Start an approval when a SharePoint list is modified	A SharePoint list (specified when you set up the workflow) is modified.	An approval is automatically sent in Teams chat to the right people.

Conditional. Some workflows are designed to act on the content of a single Teams message. After you set up this type of workflow, it appears under More options Microsoft Teams more options icon . You can run it from any message. Read step-by-step instructions.