How To Send Emails From Power Apps [using Various Methods]

When building business applications using Power Apps, many organizations want their apps to do more than just collect data. For example, imagine an employee submitting a leave request or a manager approving a task. In these situations, users often expect an automatic email notification so that the next person in the process is informed immediately.

However, many beginners face a common challenge: Power Apps does not have a simple “Send Email” button like traditional applications. Instead, you typically need to connect Power Apps with services like Outlook or Power Automate to trigger the email when a button is clicked.

By using connectors such as Office 365 Outlook or integrating Power Automate flows, you can easily send emails when users perform actions like submitting a form, clicking a button, or updating a record.

In this article, we will explore how to send emails from Power Apps step-by-step, including practical examples.

Why Would You Want to Send Emails from Power Apps Anyway?

Before we jump into the how, let’s talk about the why. Here are some common scenarios:

You’ve built an approval app and need to notify managers when someone submits a request
You want to send confirmation emails to users after they fill out a form
You need to alert your team when certain conditions are met in your app
You want to send reports or summaries to stakeholders

The point is – email integration makes your apps actually useful in the real world.

The Two Main Ways to Send Emails

Here’s the thing: there are two primary methods to send emails from Power Apps.

Office 365 Outlook connector (the easy way)
Power Automate (the flexible way)

Let me explain both, and you can pick what works for you.

Method 1: Using the Office 365 Outlook Connector

This is the quickest way to get started. It’s built right into Power Apps, and you don’t need to set up anything fancy.

Step 1: Add the Connection

First, you need to add the Office 365 Outlook connection to your app.

Open your Power App in edit mode
Click on Data in the left sidebar (it looks like a cylinder icon)
Click Add data
Search for “Office 365 Outlook”
Click on it and connect

That’s it. You’ve now added the connector to your app. You can see in the screenshot below:

Step 2: Add a Button

Let’s add a button that will actually send the email.

Go to Insert in the top menu
Click Button
Place it wherever you want on your screen
Change the button text to something like “Send Email” (click on the button and edit the Text property)

Step 3: Write the Email Formula

Now here’s where the magic happens. Click on your button and find the OnSelect property in the dropdown at the top left.

Here’s the basic formula:

Office365Outlook.SendEmailV2(
    "recipient@email.com",
    "Subject Line Here",
    "Body of the email goes here"
)

Let me break this down:

The first part (recipient@email.com) is who you’re sending to
The second part is your subject line
The third part is the email body

Making It Dynamic

Nobody wants to send the same email every time. Let’s make it dynamic.

Say you have a text input where users type their email (let’s call it TextInput_Email), another for the subject (TextInput_Subject), and one for the message (TextInput_Body).

Your formula would look like this:

Office365Outlook.SendEmailV2(
    TextInput_Email.Text,
    TextInput_Subject.Text,
    TextInput_Body.Text
)

Now the email will send whatever the user types in those fields.

You can see in the screenshot below that I sent an email to my email address.

Sending to Multiple People

Want to send the email to multiple recipients? Just separate the email addresses with a semicolon:

Office365Outlook.SendEmailV2(
    "person1@email.com;person2@email.com;person3@email.com",
    "Subject Line Here",
    "Body of the email goes here"
)

Adding CC and BCC

The SendEmailV2 function has more parameters you can use:

Office365Outlook.SendEmailV2(
    "recipient@email.com",
    "Subject Line Here",
    "Body of the email goes here",
    {
        CC: "cc@email.com",
        BCC: "bcc@email.com",
        Importance: "High"
    }
)

Those curly brackets contain optional parameters. You don’t have to use all of them – just pick what you need.

Using HTML in Your Email Body

Plain text emails are boring. You can use HTML to format your emails:

Office365Outlook.SendEmailV2(
    "recipient@email.com",
    "Subject Line Here",
    "<html><body><h1>Hello!</h1><p>This is a <strong>formatted</strong> email.</p></body></html>",
    {
        IsHtml: true
    }
)

Notice the IsHtml: true parameter. That tells Outlook to render the HTML instead of showing the raw code.

Adding a Confirmation Message

You probably want to let users know the email was sent. Add this formula after your email code:

Office365Outlook.SendEmailV2(
    TextInput_Email.Text,
    TextInput_Subject.Text,
    TextInput_Body.Text
);
Notify("Email sent successfully!", NotificationType.Success)

That semicolon separates the two actions. The Notify function shows a green success message at the top of the screen.

Check out Power Apps Concatenate Strings

Method 2: Using Power Automate (The Better Way for Complex Scenarios)

The Office 365 connector works fine for simple emails, but Power Automate gives you way more control. Plus, it doesn’t freeze your app while sending the email.

Why Use Power Automate Instead?

Here’s when you should consider Power Automate:

You need to send emails with attachments
You want to add conditions (only send if something is true)
You need to pull data from SharePoint or other sources before sending
You want the email to send in the background without the user waiting
You need error handling and retry logic

Create Your Flow

Let’s build a simple flow together.

Step 1: Start a New Flow

Go to Power Automate
Click Create
Choose Instant cloud flow
Name it something like “Send Email from Power App.”
Select PowerApps as the trigger
Click Create

Step 2: Add Input Parameters

You need to tell the flow what information the Power App will send.

Click + New step
Search for “PowerApps” and select Ask in PowerApps (you’ll do this for each piece of info you need)

Actually, scratch that. The easier way is to just add the email action first, and Power Automate will automatically create the inputs.

Step 3: Add the Email Action

Click + New step
Search for “Send an email”
Choose Send an email (V2) from Office 365 Outlook

Now fill in the fields:

To: Click in the box and select Ask in PowerApps
Subject: Click and select Ask in PowerApps
Body: Click and select Ask in PowerApps

Power Automate will automatically create input parameters for each one.

Step 4: Save Your Flow

Click Save at the top. Your flow is now ready to use.

Connecting the Flow to Your Power App

Now let’s hook this up to your Power App.

Step 1: Add the Flow to Your App

Open your Power App in edit mode
Click Power Automate in the left sidebar (it looks like a lightning bolt)
Click Add flow
Find your flow in the list and click on it

Step 2: Call the Flow from a Button

Click on your button and set the OnSelect property to:

'SendEmailfromPowerApp'.Run(
    TextInput_Email.Text,
    TextInput_Subject.Text,
    TextInput_Body.Text
)

Notice the single quotes around the flow name – you need those if your flow name has spaces.

The order of the parameters matters. They need to match the order that Power Automate expects them (usually the order you added them in the flow).

Step 3: Add a Success Message

'SendEmailfromPowerApp'.Run(
    TextInput_Email.Text,
    TextInput_Subject.Text,
    TextInput_Body.Text
);
Notify("Email sent!", NotificationType.Success)

Read Power Apps Modern Checkbox Control

Send Emails When Forms Are Submitted

Here’s a super common scenario: you want to send an email automatically when someone submits a form in your app.

Let’s say you have a submit button that saves data to SharePoint. Here’s how to add email functionality:

Patch(
    YourSharePointList,
    Defaults(YourSharePointList),
    {
        Name: TextInput_Name.Text,
        Email: TextInput_Email.Text,
        Comments: TextInput_Comments.Text
    }
);
Office365Outlook.SendEmailV2(
    "manager@company.com",
    "New Form Submission",
    "A new form was submitted by " & TextInput_Name.Text
);
Notify("Form submitted and email sent!", NotificationType.Success)

This does three things in order:

Saves the data to SharePoint
Sends an email
Shows a confirmation message

Common Problems and How to Fix Them

Let me save you some headaches by sharing issues I’ve run into.

Problem: “Name isn’t valid”

This usually means you haven’t added the Office 365 Outlook connector to your app. Go back to the Data section and add it.

Problem: Nothing happens when I click the button

Check your OnSelect formula for syntax errors. Look for:

Missing quotes around text
Missing commas between parameters
Typos in field names

Problem: Email sends, but looks terrible

If you’re using HTML, make sure you’ve set IsHtml: true in your formula. Also, test your HTML in a regular email client first to make sure it works.

Problem: Flow doesn’t run from Power Apps

Make sure you’ve actually added the flow to your app through the Power Automate panel. Also check that the number of parameters in your Run formula matches what the flow expects.

Problem: “You don’t have permission to send as this user”

This happens when you’re trying to send from a shared mailbox. You need to either send from your own mailbox or have your IT admin set up proper permissions.

Best Practices

Here are some tips I’ve learned the hard way:

Always add error handling: Emails can fail for lots of reasons. Use the IsError function to check if something went wrong.

Set(EmailResult, Office365Outlook.SendEmailV2(
    TextInput_Email.Text,
    TextInput_Subject.Text,
    TextInput_Body.Text
));
If(
    IsError(EmailResult),
    Notify("Email failed to send!", NotificationType.Error),
    Notify("Email sent successfully!", NotificationType.Success)
)

Don’t send emails in a loop without testing: If you accidentally create a formula that sends 1000 emails, you’re going to have a bad day. Test with small numbers first.

Use Power Automate for important emails: If the email absolutely must be sent, use Power Automate. It has retry logic built in.

Keep email bodies simple: Complex HTML can break in different email clients. Stick to basic formatting.

Store email templates somewhere: Instead of hardcoding email content, consider storing templates in SharePoint or a collection. Makes updates way easier.

Wrapping Up

In this tutorial, I explained different methods to send emails from Power Apps. Start with the simple Office 365 connector method for basic needs, then move to Power Automate when you need more power.

The key things to remember:

Add the Office 365 Outlook connector to your app first
Use SendEmailV2 for basic email sending
Switch to Power Automate for complex scenarios
Always test with your own email first
Add error handling so you know if something fails

Now go build something useful. And when your app sends that first email successfully, you’ll feel pretty good about it.

Got stuck somewhere? Double-check your formula syntax – that’s usually where the problem is. And make sure you’ve set up the right permissions in your Microsoft 365 environment.