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Is there an expression in Flow like =TODAY() in Excel that gives today's date as output?

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Posted on by AVH

Hi All,

I am looking for an expression much like 'utcNow()' that gives today's date as an output. That way I can compare it to the 'Due Date' column and send an email when a task is (over)due.

I Excel you can use the formula '=TODAY()' to do that, but that doesn't seem to work in flow.

Does a similar expression exist in Microsoft Flow?

Best regards,

AVH

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Building flows

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v-yuazh-msft Microsoft Employee on at

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Hi @ AVH,
Thank you for posting.
What is format of “Due Data” in your column?
You could add a “Compose” action and take a try to use expression below:
Expression:
formatDateTime(utcNow(),'yyyy-MM-dd')
Use this Expression would return a data like 2018-01-24

Image reference:

More details about the Workflow Definition Language, please check the link below:
https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/logic-apps/logic-apps-workflow-definition-language

I have a sharepoint list and the list have a Date type due data field.

I have made a flow to compare the due data with the date now. please refer to screenshots below:

The expression of first value as below:
formatDateTime(triggerBody()?['duedate'],'yyyy-MM-dd')

The expression of second value as below:
formatDateTime(utcNow(), 'yyyy-MM-dd')

The “Condition ” is used to compare the due data with the date now. The due data and the date now could be format to a same type.
When an item is create,the flow run successfully as below:

I hope my clarification has been helpful.
Please feel free to contact us if you have any other questions.

Regards,
Alice Zhang

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AVH 51 on at

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@v-yuazh-msft,

Got it!

Thank you very much for your input!

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SSafeAdmin 4 on at

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Hi there!
Thanks for your explanation - the easiest one I have found so far on this!
What if I wanted to the action to occur if the duedate value was today-30 days?

Thanks so much
Shannon

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mleon on at

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here you go 🙂

formatDateTime(addDays(utcNow(), -30), 'MM/dd/yyyy')

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ClaireAllen 762 on at

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Hello @v-yuazh-msft ,

I have a similar question,

I am creating a workflow where I have a document Library and when a document is modified I want a workflow to run on a calculated column which is =modified+365

I've tried the solutions mentioned, but my workflow did not work (I did changed the date to only 2 days for testing purpose)

I have a condition in the workflow, see image

Would you be able to advise where I went wrong,

Thank you

Claire Allen

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temoneyn 2 on at

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How can I have the date to come out the correct way MM.DD.YYYY as this formula is displaying the date YYYY.MM.DD, no matter how the expression is entered. This is the expression I have entered in my flow.
formatDateTime(utcNow(),'MM-dd-yyyy')

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ninjaryder1st 234 on at

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Hi Alice,

This is very good information and cool... but how does Powerautomate know to compose/calculate that date format from nothing? Where is the source date? I'm trying to write a flow from a trigger with trigger condition "when item is modified", to create a new file and copy some things from the former copied file.. but I want a new date instead of the former list item date to transfer over. The expression:
formatDateTime(utcNow(), 'yyyy-MM-dd')
is helpful but I'm not sure how SP or PA knows to compose this from the source date/date file is copied.

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chtryan 2 on at

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If i have timezone set to Australia / Melbourne and use the UTC function, will it pull from Melbourne or UTC time?

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Chriddle 8,672 Super User 2026 Season 1 on at

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The function is called utcNow() 😉

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