📖 Definition

The Scheduled Flow trigger automatically starts a flow at a specified time and on a recurring schedule, eliminating the need for manual intervention. It’s ideal for time-based automations such as daily reports, weekly data cleanups, or monthly alerts.

Key capabilities include:

Time-based automation — trigger flows to run once or on a recurring basis
Customizable scheduling — choose start date, frequency, and time unit
Timezone-aware execution — runs are aligned with your workspace timezone
Generates detailed execution metadata including start time and timezone details

This trigger is perfect for workflows that need to run consistently on a schedule — whether once, hourly, weekly, or even yearly — ensuring predictable and reliable automation across your organization.

🎯 Example Use Cases

1. Daily Report Generation

Automatically generate and send performance or usage reports at the same time every day — no manual effort required.

2. Weekly Backup Task

Trigger a data backup flow every Friday evening to ensure records are securely stored and up to date.

3. Monthly Invoice Reminders

Start a flow on the first day of each month to send reminders to clients with unpaid invoices.

4. Quarterly Policy Review Notifications

Schedule a flow to notify stakeholders every 3 months to review and confirm policy updates or compliance tasks.

5. Run Once for Campaign Launch

Use the "Run Once" option to execute a flow at a specific time — perfect for launching one-time marketing campaigns or system configurations.

6. Conditional Run: Skip Holidays

Set the flow to run daily except when the localized start time falls on a public holiday (based on Vault-stored dates or custom logic).

7. Conditional Run: Business Hours Only

Run the flow only when the start time is between 9:00 AM and 6:00 PM to ensure business processes occur within working hours.

8. Conditional Run: Weekday Filtering

Run a scheduled flow every day, but skip execution if it falls on a Saturday or Sunday, using weekday logic from the Start Time output.

These examples show how scheduled flows can automate repetitive tasks — and how Conditional Run enhances control by skipping unnecessary or inappropriate executions based on timing or business rules.

Configuration

The Scheduled Flow trigger allows you to automate your flow to run at specific times or on a recurring schedule. Its configuration is divided into two sections: Settings and Conditional Run.

Settings

This section defines when and how often your flow will run.

Start Date

The Start Date sets the initial date and time the schedule becomes active.

By default, the time is set based on your current time zone.
You can adjust both the date and time as needed.
The flow will not run before this configured start time.

Run Once

Select this option if you want your flow to run only one time at the scheduled start date and time.

Ideal for one-time operations like launching a campaign or sending a one-off notification.

Run Every

Choose this option if you want the flow to repeat on a regular schedule.

When selected, two additional fields appear:

Frequency

This is a numeric value (from 0 to 100) that defines how often the flow should repeat.

Enter 1 to run the flow every 1 unit of time (based on the selected frequency unit below).
Enter 2 to run it every 2 days, weeks, etc.

Frequency Unit

This field lets you select the time interval used with the frequency:

Hour
Day
Week
Month
Year

*Example:*If you set Frequency to 1 and Frequency Unit to Week, the flow will run every week from the start date.

Conditional Run

The Conditional Run feature allows you to define specific conditions that must be met for the scheduled flow to actually run. If the scheduled time arrives but the defined conditions are not met, the flow will be skipped.

This is useful when you want to fine-tune recurring automations — for example, running the flow only on specific days of the month or excluding holidays and weekends, even if the schedule matches.

How Conditional Run Works

Once enabled, you can define one or more conditions using AND / OR logic. Each condition consists of four components:

1. Condition Type

When – The flow runs only if the condition is met.
Except When – The flow is skipped if the condition is met.

2. Value to Evaluate

This is the data you want to check against a condition.

For the Scheduled Flow, this commonly includes:

Trigger Outputs such as:
- Start Time
- Localized Start Time
- Time Zone
Vaults – static, secure values like custom control dates or flags (e.g., runDay, isLastMonday)

**Note:**Vaults can be created and managed from your workspace under Settings → Vaults. For security, Vault values are not visible or editable in the flow — they are only available for secure, read-only use.

3. Operator

Defines how the selected value will be compared. Available options include:

Equals / Not Equals
Greater Than / Greater Than or Equal
Less Than / Less Than or Equal
Between
Is Null / Is Not Null

4. Comparison Value

The value you want to compare against. This can be:

A hardcoded date, time, or text (e.g., "Monday", "2025-06-30")
A value from Vaults
A value from the trigger outputs, like Localized Start Time

Example Conditions

Skip the flow except when today is the last Monday of the month
Run the flow when the Localized Start Time falls within a specific date range (e.g., a particular week or business period)
Run the flow only if a Vault variable named runDay is equal to true
Combine conditions like:
- When Localized Start Time > "2025-01-01"
- Except When Localized Start Time = "2025-12-25" (e.g., skip holidays)

This flexible control allows your scheduled flows to stay smart — executing only when it truly makes sense and skipping when it doesn’t.

Outputs

When a Scheduled Flow is triggered, it provides several helpful pieces of information that are automatically generated at the time the flow runs. These outputs are available:

Within actions in your flow via the Token Picker
In the Conditional Run section to help decide whether the flow should proceed

These outputs are especially useful for logging, time-based logic, filtering, and decision-making.

Start Time

Represents the exact date and time when the scheduled flow was triggered.

This is based on UTC and is useful for record-keeping, comparing run times, or time-based conditions in the flow logic.

Example use: Skip a flow run if the Start Time falls on a weekend or outside working hours.

Time Zone

Shows the Time Zone ID in which the flow is configured to run (e.g., America/New_York, Asia/Tokyo).

This helps in understanding the context of the schedule and interpreting date/time values properly.

Localized Start Time

Indicates the scheduled run date and time in the configured time zone.

Unlike Start Time (UTC), this value reflects your local time, making it more intuitive when referencing or comparing times.

Example use: Perform operations only during business hours by comparing Localized Start Time.

These outputs provide clarity and control over when and how your scheduled flows execute. Whether you're building logic around timing, auditing flow activity, or setting advanced conditions — these fields make it easy to work precisely and securely.

📘 *Example Scenario: Monthly Report Email (Except December)**

Scenario Overview:

You want to automatically send a monthly performance summary to your team. However, this summary should not be sent in December, because a separate, annual report is prepared and sent during that month.

How the Flow Works:

Trigger: The flow uses the Scheduled Flow trigger, set to run monthly on the 1st of each month at 9:00 AM.

Conditional Run: A condition is added using Except When with the logic:

Localized Start Time is between 12/01 and 12/31

This ensures the flow skips execution in December.

Actions: If the condition passes, the flow continues to:

Retrieve performance metrics
Format a summary
Send it via email to selected recipients

Outcome:

The flow runs automatically every month and emails the summary except in December, where it is intentionally skipped to avoid redundant communication.