You may have seen recently the launch of Workflows, this is a cool new automation builder inside Copilot Studio.
But is it actually new, as with most things when you draw back the curtain you see that things are a lot less different then they appear.
Underneath Workflows are Power Automate flows, so that means that now we have 4 different ways to build our flows
- Classic UI
- New UI (V3)
- Agent Flow (Inline)
- Workflows
Well actually there are 5, as Power Automate is actually built on Logic Apps, and although the UI is the same V3, it also has a code editor (and with a nifty VS Code Extension I made you can edit flows from your environment in code too).
So=PowerDevBox.power-automate-utility) I made you can edit flows from your environment in code too).
So I was wondering, what exactly is the difference between flows built in these different UIs?
1. Logic Apps
Logic Apps are where it all began, as the origional Power Automate flows were just Logic Apps with a few tweaks. Even the UI was the same, just with the additional of code editor and some additional/missing connectors. When Logic Apps moved to a new UI called V3 so did Power Automate, and when you look at the clientData Power Automate uses a Logic Apps schema:
https://schema.management.azure.com/providers/Microsoft.Logic/schemas/2016-06-01/workflowdefinition.json
2. Classic UI
The Classic UI was loved by developers for a long time, and with the launch of V3 not so smooth (missing features) a lot delayed moving over (Microsoft even had to introduce a toggle to switch back). Even now V3 is established you will still see Classic in Power Apps when selecting a flow, some logs, and randomly when creating a flow from solution screen.
3. New UI (V3)
The V3 UI is the current UI for Power Automate (for now) and was 100% client side deep, with everything under the hood the same. You can not tell any different by looking at a flow in the Workflow table, and they were 100% interchangeable.
The UI moved from inputs and buttons inside actions to a side panel, along with a fresh new modern look, version control, and Copilot.
4. Agent Flows (Inline)
Originally flows used in Copilot Studio looks identical to Power Automate, with the only difference how they are billed (Power Automate runs use the owner/app users API allowance, Agent Flows use Copilot Studio Credits), but in August 2025 that changed, with Agent Flows having a different UI.
The New New UI was a hybrid of Classic and V3 UI, with inline inputs, side panels, and other benefits from V3.
When you open the same flows in Power Automate they fall back to V3, but the story isn't quite over there. The Inline UI was suppose to launch in Power Automate at the same time, it was pushed back to February, and following Microsoft's playbook of poor rollouts, this version was slow and unresponsive, leading to it being pulled and planned for later 2026.
Again looking under the hood there appears to be no difference between Agent Flows and Power Automate flows, with the same definition (Logic Apps), but there are some differences.
First different connectors are available/not available, and second was within the Workflow table, where there was a new field, modernflowtype.
If this was set to 0 it was a normal flow, if it was set to 1 it was an Agent Flow. So you can simply update the field in an API call or in the details in the UI change the plan to Copilot Studio.
Though be warned, for some reason you can not change them back. Im guessing the modernflowtype is more of a trigger, with a plug-in running on it changing to update something in the resource, and creating a switch back wasn't prioritised for development.
{
"error": {
"code": "0x80048d0b",
"message": "{\"errorCode\":\"InvalidModernFlowOperation\",\"message\":\"This modern flow's type cannot currently be changed.\",\"correlationId\":\"95c3fa83-ee4b-4c1a-bf3a-59850b4ea8b5\"}"
}
}
So at this point we had 4 UIs, with them all running on the same infrastructure but 3 different billing methods, but that is now changing.
A recent announcement brought to my attention by the awesome Jukka Niiranen showed that Logic Apps and Power Automate were actually breaking up. Power Automate (inc Agent Flows and Workflows) have forked from Logic Apps and now have there own update and release plan. The infrastructure is no longer Logic Apps, but SelfHostMultiTenant. You can see this manifesting in 2 ways so far, the new http trigger URL, and the Express Mode. So yes, this divergence definitely feels like its for Agent Flows benefit, not Power Automate.
5. Workflows
And that brings us nicely to Workflows, this UI is still hot of the press and in preview in selected regions so subject to change.
Again looking under the hood there is nothing new, though this time its with Agent Flows (modernflowtype:1). There are some differences in practice, different connectors being the main one, and for now you can still select the same flow and open it as an Agent Flow and build in that UI.
With all of the updates again client deep compared to Agent Flows it feels that this could eventually replace Agent Flows (like V3 was suppose to replace Classic), though its less then a year old so that seems too quick for deprecation.
So what's the take away,
- Well first Logic Apps is an incredible product, that is so well built its been the backbone for all automation in the Power Platform and will live on as the foundation
- It doesn't look like we are going to get Code Flows (what's a Code Flow I hear you asking, well I was expecting Microsoft to create Vibe Coded Function Apps - which I named Code Flows - , but it looks like investment is not going that way)
- Power Automate is not driving Power Automate anymore, Workflows (and maybe Agent Flows) are, as they need the Express Mode, and they are getting all of the investment. Power Automate is just coming along for the ride.
- Expect more changes, now they have forked I expect changes throughout, including eventually the definition and one day
https://schema.management.azure.com/providers/Microsoft.Logic/schemas/2016-06-01/workflowdefinition.jsonmight disappear.
Part of me is excited that Power Automate will get all the benefits of the investment in Agent Flows/Workflows, but the other part of me is worried that just like before when Logic Apps drove the agenda, again Power Automate has to follow.
