Building an automation

Every automation is built in a visual editor: a canvas that shows your trigger and each step as connected blocks, in the order they run.

1. Go to Automations in the sidebar.
2. Click Create Automation. A blank automation opens in the editor.
3. Name the automation in the top bar, and add a description if it helps.

The trigger decides when your automation runs. There are four types: Status changes, Record created, Record updated, and On a schedule.

1. Choose the trigger type.
2. For record triggers, pick which kind of record to watch: clients, projects, quotes, invoices, or tasks.
3. Add Entry criteria if the automation should only fire when the record also matches certain conditions.

Steps are the work your automation does. Every connection on the canvas shows a plus button; click it to insert a step at that exact point in the flow.

1. Click the plus on the connection where the new step should go.
2. Pick a step from the picker. Steps are grouped by what they do: logic, records, communication, utilities, and flow. Type in the search box and press Enter to add the first match, or use the arrow keys to move through the list.
3. Configure the step in the panel that opens. Each step type has its own options, like which record to update or what an email should say. On a phone or narrow window, the panel slides up from the bottom of the screen.
4. Each step card summarizes its settings in a sentence. A dashed empty chip marks a value you still need to fill in, and a warning line on the card names anything that would block saving. The same warning shows at the top of the step's panel.
5. To Duplicate or Delete a step, use the buttons at the bottom of its panel, the ⋯ menu on the step card, or right-click the card. Conditions and loops can be deleted but not duplicated.
6. Repeat until the flow does everything you want. See Triggers and actions for the full catalog.

Scroll or drag to move around the canvas. To zoom, pinch on a trackpad, or hold ⌘ on a Mac or Ctrl on Windows while you scroll.

• The - and + buttons in the top bar zoom out and in. Click the percentage between them to jump to Zoom to fit, 50%, 100%, or 200%.
• Undo and Redo sit just left of the zoom controls. They step back and forward through your edits.
• The keyboard button next to Save lists every shortcut.

Save in the top bar stores your work as a draft. Nothing runs yet. Whenever your draft differs from what is live, a floating banner appears on the canvas with a publish button: Publish workflow the first time, Publish changes after that.

Edits you haven't saved show an Unsaved changes marker in the top bar, and Save stays disabled until there is something new to save.

1. Click Save to store the draft.
2. Test it first. See Testing and run history.
3. Click Publish workflow when you are ready. The automation goes live and starts running on its trigger.

A collapsible drawer on the left side of the editor holds two tabs: Resources and Debug. The Debug tab is where you run safe test runs against real data and review what each step did, covered in Testing and run history.