Power Automate licensing explained: Premium, Process, and what Microsoft 365 includes

"Will this flow run without a paid licence?" has a precise answer — it just depends on which connectors the flow touches, where it runs, and who triggers it. The current model, checked against Microsoft Learn on 17 October 2026.

What the seeded licences cover

Licences for Microsoft 365, Dynamics 365 and Power Apps seed limited Power Automate rights: creating and running cloud flows with standard connectors. Premium and custom connectors generally need a standalone licence — with one important carve-out: a flow using premium connectors can run under a Power Apps licence when it's associated with and triggered from that app, and under a Dynamics 365 licence within the licensed app's context. An isolated flow that has nothing to do with the app needs its own Power Automate licence.

Premium licenses the person

Power Automate Premium (listed at $15/user/month on Microsoft's licensing FAQ, October 2026) is the per-user licence: unlimited cloud flows with standard, premium and custom connectors, attended RPA (one attended bot, including picture-in-picture runs), process mining, AI Builder credits, and a 40,000 actions/day entitlement per user. Microsoft notes it replaced the old per-user-with-attended-RPA plan that listed at $40 — more capability at a lower list price.

Process licenses the flow

Power Automate Process ($150/bot/month, same source) attaches to the automation instead of a person: one cloud flow (or a flow group), or one machine for unattended RPA. Anyone in the organisation can then trigger that flow — no per-user licences — and the flow gets its own 250,000 actions/day per licence, stackable for heavy processes. Hosted Process is the superset that adds a Microsoft-hosted machine, so unattended RPA runs with zero infrastructure of your own. Unattended automation of Microsoft 365 apps may additionally need the Microsoft 365 Unattended licence per product terms.

Whose licence does a run use

The part that decides whether a flow breaks when its maker leaves:

• A flow with a Process licence always runs under that licence, whoever triggers it.
• Automated and scheduled flows run under the owner's licence context.
• Instant flows — button presses, Power Apps triggers — run under the invoking user's context.

Pause animation

1. 1Process licence on the flow? Use it
2. 2Automated or scheduled? The owner's licence
3. 3Instant? The user who triggered it

That's why reassigning a departed owner's automated flows matters, and why a widely shared instant flow with premium connectors needs every user premium-licensed — or a Process licence on the flow.

Sources

• Types of Power Automate licenses — Microsoft Learn
• Power Automate licensing FAQ — Microsoft Learn
• Deep dive on specific licenses — Microsoft Learn
• Power Platform licensing FAQs — Microsoft Learn