Customizing SharePoint Online with Apps and Flows

• Power Apps and Power Automate have become more closely integrated with SharePoint Online, replacing other customization methods.
• The services will be increasingly unavoidable over time as offerings like InfoPath and SharePoint Designer are discontinued.
• Although basic functionality of the services is included with SharePoint Online, extended features and guest users may need additional licensing.

SharePoint Online has integrated Power Apps and Power Automate extensively as customization and workflow technologies for sites, lists, and libraries.

These services extend and replace deprecated customization applications such as InfoPath and SharePoint Designer, but they could lead to higher costs: although these services can be used in some scenarios without additional licensing, advanced scenarios may require upgrades to user licensing and careful access control.

Common Scenarios

Organizations using SharePoint Online as an application platform (versus mostly as a file and content repository) will be likelier to customize the platform. Modern sites in SharePoint Online use Power Automate as an integrated workflow engine and Power Apps to customize forms in several ways.