Best practice - Collect vs Patch in Dataverse

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Posted on by FlowFalcon

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Hi everyone, hope you're doing well 🙋.

I'm currently taking a non-official course on Power Apps and Dataverse, and I came across a question regarding best practices when inserting records into a Dataverse table.

In the course, they taught us to use the Collect() function to insert new records, and to use Patch() only for updating existing ones. However, I asked through another channel (ChatGPT), and was told that in real-world environments it's recommended to use Patch() for both inserting and updating. The reasoning was that Collect() doesn't handle errors, doesn't return the generated ID, and doesn't give as much control over the inserted record.

Could you please confirm if that's accurate? Is it considered a best practice to avoid Collect() when working with Dataverse?

I really appreciate any insights. And if any MVP or professional with experience in production scenarios could share their perspective, it would be incredibly helpful to have a solid reference.

Thanks in advance!

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Microsoft Dataverse with Power Apps

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Michael E. Gernaey 53,335 Super User 2025 Season 2 on at

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Hi @FlowFalcon

Just to be clear, Collect does NOT add records to Dataverse, it adds data to a Collection, which you can in fact, if you want, wrap in Error handling.

Patch is for actually "creating" new data in Dataverse, so they are not related, nor used for the same thing.

Patch is for putting data into Dataverse. You could patch a collection too, but I no of no one who does that, to add to collections its Collect or ClearCollect, which you can in fact put error handling around, but still is different than Patch. People use patch on Collections to CHANGE data in the Collection.

So the question is essentially a non-starter question, as it relates to Data creation versus data Collection.

Hope that clarifies, and no idea where you read Collect puts data in Dataverse or which AI told you that, but fire them immediately. :)

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WarrenBelz 153,040 Most Valuable Professional on at

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@FlowFalcon,

This is identical to this thread of yours - please do not duplicate posts as it only adds workload to the already small number of responders assisting you.

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