Domain 1 of 3 · Chapter 9 of 22

Create a human-in-the-loop agent flow

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Included in this chapter:

  • Where a person fits in the runtime path
  • The three actions that pause a flow for a person
  • Choosing the completion rule
  • Ordering reviewers when the sequence matters
  • Giving the reviewer enough to decide
  • Branching before the protected side effect
  • The two clocks: human time and the agent's response window
  • Returning a usable status and a durable record
  • Exam patterns and the traps behind them

Three human-in-the-loop actions compared

ConsiderationStart and wait for an approvalRun a multistage approval (preview)Request for information
What the human returnsOne decision per approver: Approve or Reject, or one option from your custom response listA decision per stage, where a stage is a person or an AI model, with conditions between stagesTyped values you define, from the five supported input types: Text, Yes/No, Email, Number and Date
Where you find itThe Approvals connector, which the connector reference lists as available in Copilot StudioThe Human review connector, in the Human review section of the Add an action paneThe Request for information action, also under Human review
How completion is decidedThe Approval type field on the action cardPer stage, plus conditions that can continue, approve, reject, route to another stage, or skip stagesThe first person to respond; subsequent responses aren't processed
Where reviewers respondApproval emails, the Power Automate approvals center, the Power Automate mobile app and TeamsMicrosoft Teams approvals app, Outlook, Power Automate portalOutlook only, and requests can't be sent to users outside your tenant
Documented limitation to plan aroundCustom responses can fail when Everyone must approve is sent to many users, because of data size limits on the results fieldPreview. ALM and sharing aren't supported, and you can't assign the same approver to different stagesInput names with spaces can make outputs come back wrapped in double braces
Reach for it whenA named decision gates a named side effectRoutine cases should clear themselves and only exceptions should reach a personThe flow is missing a fact only a person can supply

Decision tree

Must someone other than therequester decide?NoTool confirmation on the tool(Ask the end user before running)YesDoes the flow need a verdictto branch on?NoRequest for informationcollects typed valuesYesCan the decision arrive insidethe synchronous response window?NoAsynchronous business pattern:return a pending referenceand correlate the decision laterYesMust reviewers decidein a fixed order?YesSequential Approval typewith numbered stepsNoMore choices thanApprove and Reject?YesCustom responses typewait for all or one responseNoApprove/Reject types:Everyone must approveor First to respond
Cheat sheet

Cheat sheet

  • Use Start and wait for an approval when execution must pause for a decision
  • Choose the approval type that matches the decision rule
  • Use sequential approval when reviewers must decide in order
  • Give reviewers enough context to make the requested decision
  • Branch on approval before executing the protected side effect
  • Return a structured human-review status to the agent
  • Do not make a synchronous agent call wait indefinitely for approval
  • Persist the reviewer and outcome for sensitive operations

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Also tested in

References

  1. Agent flows overview
  2. Add tools to custom agents
  3. Standard approvals connector reference
  4. Multistage and AI approvals in agent flows
  5. Request information from human review in agent flows
  6. Create an approval flow that requires everyone to approve
  7. Create approval flows with custom responses
  8. Set up sequential approvals
  9. Manage sequential approvals with Power Automate
  10. Add an agent flow as a tool to an agent
  11. Asynchronous response support for agent flows
  12. Create an agent flow as a tool
  13. Design autonomous agent capabilities