Power Automate Free vs Paid: 2025 Comparison

Microsoft Power Automate makes building automated workflows across your apps and services easy. However, figuring out how much it costs (and what’s actually included) isn’t always straightforward.

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This guide breaks down:

• What’s included in Power Automate Free vs Paid
• Licensing structure and pricing models
• When to upgrade from the free plan and when to look elsewhere

We’ll start by discussing what Power Automate is.

What is Power Automate?

Power Automate is Microsoft's tool for automating workflows across various applications and services. It enables users to create automated processes, known as "flows," that can handle tasks like data collection, sending notifications, and approving requests.

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It's a part of the Microsoft Power Platform, which also includes:

• Power Apps: For building custom business applications
• Power BI: For data analytics and visualization
• Power Virtual Agents: For creating chatbots
• Power Pages: For building business websites

Power Automate licensing models 

Microsoft offers several licensing options for Power Automate, each catering to different business needs and usage scenarios.

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The licensing can be complex, but it primarily breaks down into (a) a free (or included) plan with basic capabilities and (b) premium plans, which come in different flavors (per user or flow). 

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Below is a complete breakdown:

Free plan

Power Automate provides a free capability primarily through two avenues: 

• The free Power Automate trial
• The free/included use with certain Microsoft subscriptions

The 30-day free trial gives full access to premium features for evaluation (cloud flows with any connector, etc.)​. Separately, if you have an eligible Microsoft 365 (Office 365) subscription, you already can use Power Automate at no extra cost for flows that use standard connectors​.

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The free plan provides:

• Access to create and run basic cloud flows using standard connectors only. Standard connectors cover most Microsoft 365 services like Outlook, SharePoint, and Teams.
• Pre-built templates for common automation scenarios.
• A limited number of runs monthly (approximately 750 runs per month).
• Basic data handling with limited storage.

What’s not included:

• No access to premium connectors, AI Builder, or unattended RPA capabilities.
• Data storage (Dataverse) is not included in the free plan.
• No guaranteed support.

Is Power Automate free forever? The free version, which is included in Office 365, has no time limit. However, its significant limitations make it suitable only for individual users with basic automation needs or for evaluation purposes.

Premium plans

Microsoft offers premium licensing for full Power Automate functionality (premium connectors, higher limits, RPA orchestration, etc.). 

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There are a few options to suit different needs:

Power Automate Premium (per user plan)

This is a per-user license at roughly $15 per user/month if paid annually.​ Each licensed user gets the complete set of Power Automate capabilities for their use​. 

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It includes:

• Unlimited cloud flows (with both standard and premium connectors)
• The ability to run attended RPA (desktop flows) on their computer
• Access to AI Builder credits (about 5,000 credits per month are included)​
• Desktop flows (RPA) in attended mode with one bot included
• Process mining capabilities with 50 MB of data storage
• Dataverse storage of 250 MB database and 2 GB file capacity

This plan is ideal for organizations where many individuals need to create or run their own automations.

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Since the license is tied to a user, it covers any flows that the user runs or builds. However, each user who triggers or uses a flow with premium features needs a license. Also, the attended RPA means the user must be logged in for desktop flows to run. 

Power Automate Process (per bot/flow plan)

This capacity-based license is intended to cover automations themselves (rather than individual users). It costs $150 per month per “bot” (or per flow). 

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This plan provides:

• Cloud flows
• The right to run desktop flows in unattended mode (i.e., automate a machine with no user signed in)​
• 5,000 AI Builder credits
• A smaller Dataverse storage allotment (50 MB database/200 MB file, since it's not user-specific storage

It’s ideal for shared enterprise workflows or RPA bots.

Power Automate hosted process

This is a premium plan similar to the above Process plan, but with a Microsoft-hosted RPA infrastructure. It costs $215 per bot/month (annual commitment).

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The Hosted Process plan includes all the features of the Process plan (unattended RPA, etc.) and provides a cloud-hosted virtual machine for your RPA bots.

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In other words, Microsoft will provision and manage the VM in Azure on which your desktop flows run, so you don’t have to maintain your own RPA runtime machines.

When does a paid Power Automate premium license make sense?

If you’re evaluating whether to pay for the premium plan, here are key points to consider:

• Utilizing premium connectors: If your workflows require integration with services like Salesforce, SAP, or Oracle, you'll need a premium license.
• Implementing RPA: A premium license is necessary for attended and unattended desktop flows.
• Exceeding API request limits: The Microsoft Power Automate free plan has a daily limit of 6,000 API requests. If your workflows demand higher throughput, premium plans offer increased limits.

When to consider the per-user vs per-flow plans

Per-user plan: Ideal for individuals or teams where each user needs to create and manage their workflows.​

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Per-flow plan: Best suited for organizations that require specific workflows to be accessible by multiple users without assigning individual licenses.

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When evaluating the total cost of ownership (TCO), consider the scalability of your workflows, the number of users involved, and the complexity of the processes. Per-flow plans offer cost savings for shared workflows, while per-user plans provide flexibility for individual automation needs.

Power Automate free vs paid: Side-by-side comparison

Not sure if the free version will cover what you need, or if it’s time to upgrade? 

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Here’s a quick look at what you get with Power Automate’s free versus paid options.

Limitations of Power Automate (Even paid)

Even with paid plans, Power Automate has some critical limitations and constraints to be aware of. 

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Here are some key limitations as of 2025:

• API request limits and throttling: Each licensed user and flow has a limit on the number of Power Platform requests (connector calls) per 24 hours.
• Limited extensibility via code: Writing custom code within a flow is not natively supported. You are constrained to the provided actions and connectors. 
• User interface and complexity limits: Flows are edited in a graphical interface. The interface can become slow or unwieldy for very complex workflows with dozens (or hundreds) of actions. ‍
• Microsoft ecosystem lock-in: Integrating with non-Microsoft services often requires premium connectors or additional configurations.‍
• Limited dev tooling or Git integration: Although Git integration is available in preview, it currently has limitations and is not recommended for production environments. ‍
• Challenging on-premise data handling without extra setup: Accessing on-premises data sources requires setting up and maintaining an on-premises data gateway. This setup can be complex and may introduce latency or connectivity issues.

Superblocks: A powerful alternative to Power Automate

Superblocks is an AI-powered developer platform used to quickly build automation and internal tools. It differs from Power Automate in philosophy and capabilities.

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Below is a comparison of Microsoft Power Automate and Superblocks across key factors:

Detailed comparison:

• Custom workflows with Python, Node.js, and SQL: Power Automate doesn’t support writing full code inside workflows. You’re limited to predefined actions and expressions, or you have to rely on external services like Azure Functions. Superblocks lets you write Python, JavaScript (Node), and SQL directly in your workflows.
• No per-user limits or premium gating: Power Automate enforces per-user API quotas and restricts certain integrations behind premium licensing. Superblocks’ pricing model doesn’t have premium connector limits. In fact, the plans support unlimited apps and workflows.
• Git workflows and dev tooling: Power Automate has limited version control and no real Git integration for flows. Superblocks supports Git out of the box, so you can manage changes in workflows like any other code project with branches, commits, and pull requests.
• Deployment flexibility: Power Automate runs entirely in Microsoft’s cloud. Superblocks can be used as a managed cloud service, or you can deploy the on-premise agent on your own VPC.
• Easier integration with internal systems: Power Automate is optimized for Microsoft 365 services. It can integrate with other tools but often requires premium connectors or custom setups. Superblocks connects to any REST/GraphQL API, third-party service, or database directly.

Check out the pricing on Appsmith for a low-code competitor who focuses on building internal tools. 

Frequently Asked Questions

Can I use Power Automate without Office 365?

Yes, but the free features are limited. A standalone Power Automate license is required to access premium features.

What are Power Automate premium connectors?

These connectors to services like Salesforce, Oracle, and SAP require a premium license.

What is the per-flow license, and who needs it?

The per-flow license allows unlimited users to access a specific flow, which is ideal for enterprise-wide processes.

Does Power Automate include RPA?

 Yes, but only in the higher-tier plans. Attended RPA is available in the Per User with RPA plan, and unattended RPA is available in the Per Flow plan.

Learn how RPA compares to low-code.

Is Power Automate HIPAA or SOC 2 compliant?

Microsoft Power Platform, including Power Automate, meets various compliance standards, including HIPAA and SOC 2.

What’s the best Power Automate alternative for developers?

 Superblocks is a strong alternative, offering more flexibility and support for traditional programming languages.

Try Superblocks for free

Teams that rely heavily on Microsoft 365 and want something non-technical users can quickly learn will probably get the most out of Power Automate. But if flexibility, deeper integrations, and developer-first tooling matter, Superblocks is worth considering.

It’s built for modern software practices. It treats workflows like code, with structured deployments, Git integration, and observability and access control built in. At the same time, it still offers low-code builders, pre-built components and integrations, and AI-assisted development to speed up development.

Here are the key features that make this possible:

• Multiple ways to build: Generate code with AI, design with the visual app builder, start from UI templates, or extend applications using React, Python, Node.js, or SQL for full customization.
• Full code extensibility: Use JavaScript, SQL, and Python for fine-grained control over execution logic. Customize your UIs by bringing over your own React components.
• Exportable code: Own your applications fully. Superblocks lets you export all your apps as standard React apps so you can host and maintain them independently.
• Integrations with systems you rely on: Provides 60+ native integrations for databases, AI tools, cloud storage, and SaaS apps — no need to pay extra.
• Enterprise-grade security: Supports granular RBAC and SSO and comes with built-in audit logs for app security.
• Git-based source control: Supports Git-based workflows and integrates directly with CI/CD tools like GitHub Actions, CircleCI, and Jenkins so that you can deploy updates like any other codebase.
• Hybrid deployment: Deploy OPA within your VPC to keep all your data and code executions within your network. Keep managing your app, workflows, and permissions through Superblocks Cloud.
• Observability: Receive metrics, traces, and logs from all your internal tools directly in Datadog, New Relic, Splunk, or any other observability platform.

If you’d like to see how these features can help your business stay flexible and in control, explore our Quickstart Guide, or better yet, try it for free.