Automation steps: what an automation can do

An automation's steps are the work it does after the trigger fires. The AI builder chooses and sets up the steps from your description, and each one appears as a card on the flow map.

The kinds of step

Trigger: the first card. It shows what starts the automation.
Action: a custom step the AI builder writes for you, with a plain name such as "Find overdue invoices". One action step can query a table, get, create, update or delete records, notify your team inside the app, send a text message, ask AI to write, summarize or classify something, call another system over HTTP, and prepare data for a later step.
Send email: sends an email. The card shows the recipient and the subject, and the edit icon opens the email editor.
Condition: an if/else branch. The automation follows the "yes" path or the "no" path depending on the answer, for example "is the order total over $500?".
Loop: repeats a step for each item in a list, such as each line item on an order.
App action: runs an action in an app you have connected, such as posting a message in Slack or finding recent emails in Gmail. The card shows the app's logo. See Use a connected app in an automation or with an AI agent.

Each card carries a small badge that tells you its kind at a glance, such as Email, If, Loop or App.

How data moves between steps

A step can use the trigger's data and the results of the steps before it. A step that looks up a customer, for example, makes that customer's fields available to the email step after it.

You do not wire this up yourself. Describe what you need ("email the customer on the order") and the AI builder connects the steps.

Changing a step

Click a step to open the assistant with that step referenced, then say what should be different. To add one, click Add step under the last card. You are describing a change, not editing a form, so be specific: "also include the job address in the email" works better than "improve the email".

Saved credentials

If a step needs an API key for an outside service, save the key once instead of pasting it into a conversation.

On the Automations page, click Credentials.
Add a name in capitals with underscores, such as SUPPLIER_API_KEY.
Paste the value and save.

Steps can then use the credential by name. Values are encrypted and cannot be viewed again after saving. You can replace or delete a credential later.

What costs credits

Steps that ask AI to do something use your workspace's AI credits. Steps that only read or write records, send email or branch on a condition do not.