4 Ways to Duplicate a Flow in Power Automate

Do you want to make a copy of your flow? This post is going to show you how to duplicate any flow in Microsoft Power Automate.

When building flows to automate your work you might find you need to create several flows that are similar. When this is the case, it might be easier to copy a flow rather than start from scratch.

Creating a copy of your flows can also allow you to archive previous versions when introducing and testing new changes to any automation.

Whatever your reason for needing to copy and paste a flow, this post will show you how to get it done!

Duplicate a Flow from My Flows More Command

Creating a copy of a flow is very easy. But unfortunately, Microsoft likes to hide important menu items so you will need to know where this command is.

Follow these steps to copy a flow.

  1. Go to the My flows tab in the Power Automate Portal.
  2. Select the Cloud flows tab.
  3. Hover your mouse cursor on the flow you would like to copy.

This will reveal several commands as well as an ellipses icon which will reveal even more commands.

  1. Click on the Ellipses icon.
  2. Select the Save As option.

Power Automate doesnèt call the feature copy or duplicate a flow, but when you save the flow with a new name it will achieve the same result.

  1. Enter a new name for the flow.
  2. Press the Save button.

That’s it! You now have a copy of your flow.

When you copy a flow it will be disabled by default. When you’re ready to turn it on, you can click on the Ellipses icon and select the Turn on option to enable it.

Duplicate a Flow from My Flows Selected Flow

There is another option for duplicating a flow from the My flows area.

You can select the flow which you want to copy in the My flows area. Each flow has an empty circle to the left and when you click on this it will select the flow.

When you select a flow it will reveal hidden commands in the heading area or the Power Automate portal.

You can then click on the Save As command in the heading area to create a copy of your flow.

Duplicate a Flow from the Flow Details

The Flow Details screen can be accessed when you click on the flow name in the My flows list.

This will open the Details screen for the flow where you will see details about the flow such as the name, when it was created, who owns the flow, the run history, and much more.

The top heading area contains a bunch of commands that you can use for the flow. This includes a Save As option

Click on the Save As button to create a duplicate of the flow.

Duplicate a Flow with Copy to Clipboard

Suppose you want to reuse a part of your flow in another flow.

Is it possible to copy and paste parts of a flow? Yes!

There is a feature in the flow editor called Copy to my clipboard that will allow you to copy any action into a personal clipboard which you can then paste into other flows.

Follow these steps to copy and paste any action in the flow editor.

  1. Click on the Ellipses icon on the right of the action you want to copy.
  2. Select the Copy to my clipboard option.

This will store the action in your clipboard. Unfortunately, these don’t persist in your account and they will disappear from your clipboard the next time you log in.

Now when you add a new step the copied action will be available under the My clipboard tab when selecting an operation.

💡 Tip: If you want to copy and paste multiple actions, then place them inside a Scope action and copy the Scope action.

Conclusions

The ability to copy and paste a flow when building your workflow automation is essential and there are many ways to get this done in Power Automate.

The Save As command can be found throughout the Power Automate portal and can be used to duplicate any flow.

If you only want to copy part of a flow and paste it elsewhere, this can also be done using the Copy to my clipboard feature.

Did you know you can copy a flow? Do you know any other tips for making a copy of your flow? Let me know in the comments below!

About the Author

John MacDougall

John MacDougall

John is a Microsoft MVP and freelance consultant and trainer specializing in Excel, Power BI, Power Automate, Power Apps and SharePoint. You can find other interesting articles from John on his blog or YouTube channel.

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