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10 min read

What’s new: Power Apps May 2024 Feature Update

Welcome to the Power Apps monthly feature update! We will use this blog to share a summary of product, community, and learning updates from throughout the month so you can access it in one easy place. This month we’ve got a great set of updates for Makers, Admins, and users across Power Apps, Dataverse and Copilot.

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  • Public Preview for cross-tenant license recognition Power Apps using Dataverse 
  • Announcing preview for converting Owner team to Access team and reassigning team’s records 
  • Announcing the General Availability of Environment Groups in Power Platform Admin Center   
  • Introducing the General Availability of Environment Routing for Power Platform 
  • Develop a tenant environment strategy to adopt Power Platform at scale 
  • IP firewall support for TDS endpoint (preview) 
  • Announcing Power Platform Well-Architected 

Maker Productivity

  • Field selection in canvas apps by Copilot 
  • Announcing preview for bypass business logic 
  • Power Apps Canvas Modern Screen Templates (Wave 2) 

End user productivity

  • Find mobile apps quickly with new app launching improvements.
  • Major updates for modern controls and theming! 
  • Screens get optimized for iOS and Android automatically 

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Public Preview for cross-tenant license recognition Power Apps using Dataverse 

To reduce administrative overhead for multi-tenant organizations using Power Apps, we are super excited to announce public preview of cross tenant license recognition for canvas and model driven apps using Dataverse! When end-users access an app outside of their home tenant, Power Apps recognizes use rights the user has in both their home tenant or in the resource tenant (where the app is hosted). This is an enhancement to the cross tenant license recognition that already existed for canvas apps not using Dataverse.

Learn more at Share a canvas app with guest users (contains video) – Power Apps | Microsoft Learn

Announcing preview for converting Owner team to Access team and reassigning team’s records 

You can now convert owner team to access team and reassign team’s records to another user/team in Power Platform admin center.  Previously you can only perform these functions in the legacy Web application. Now you can perform these functions in Power Platform admin center. Admins can perform all Dataverse team management in a centralized location under the Environment/Settings/Users + Permissions\Teams area.  

Learn more at Teams in Dataverse – Power Platform | Microsoft Learn

Announcing the General Availability of Environment Groups in Power Platform Admin Center   

We are thrilled to announce the general availability of Environment Groups in the Power Platform Admin Center, a feature that revolutionizes the way enterprises manage their digital ecosystems. This new capability allows administrators to organize and oversee multiple environments with unprecedented ease and clarity, marking a significant leap forward in governance and operational efficiency.

With Environment Groups, you can now categorize environments into logical clusters, streamlining the management process and enhancing security oversight. This feature is designed to support the growing complexity of enterprise-scale deployments, providing a robust framework for administrators to maintain order as the number of environments expands.

Embrace the power of structured governance with Environment Groups, and take the first step towards a more organized, secure, and scalable Power Platform experience. This update is a testament to our commitment to continuous innovation and our dedication to empowering organizations to achieve more with Microsoft Power Platform.

Learn more at Environment groups – Power Platform | Microsoft Learn

Introducing the General Availability of Environment Routing for Power Platform 

We are excited to announce the general availability of Environment Routing in the Power Platform Admin Center. This innovative feature is set to transform the way organizations manage user access and workflows within the Power Platform ecosystem. Environment Routing enables administrators to direct users to the most appropriate environment based on predefined criteria, ensuring a seamless and efficient user experience. 

The introduction of Environment Routing marks a milestone in our journey towards providing a more intuitive and agile platform. It allows for smarter distribution of resources and more granular control over user access, which is essential for organizations operating at scale. This feature simplifies the user journey and enhances productivity by intelligently guiding users to the right environment, right when they need it. 

As we roll out Environment Routing, we invite you to explore its capabilities and integrate it into your governance strategy. This release underscores our commitment to delivering solutions that meet the complex needs of our customers, helping them to manage their Power Platform environments with greater ease and sophistication. 

Learn more at Environment routing – Power Platform | Microsoft Learn

IP firewall support for TDS endpoint (preview) 

Currently, the IP firewall is set up to support only the Dataverse OData endpoint, which means that IP-based access restrictions do not apply to the TDS endpoint. This implies that customers are unable to set up IP-based access controls for the TDS endpoint. However, the recent introduction of IP firewall capabilities for the TDS endpoint now allows customers to apply IP restrictions, enhancing the security of their TDS endpoint access. 

Learn more at IP firewall in Power Platform environments – Power Platform | Microsoft Learn

Announcing Power Platform Well-Architected 

Power Platform Well-Architected is a set of best practices, architecture guidance, and review tools that help customers design and develop Power Platform workloads that are built to change and built to last.  

Learn more at Announcing Power Platform Well-Architected | Microsoft Power Apps

Maker Productivity

Field selection in canvas apps by Copilot 

Field suggestion by Copilot is a feature for Power Apps makers that helps you choose the best fields to display in your app when you are binding a data source to a control. Instead of using the default fields that Power Apps picks for you, you can see up to 10 suggestions from Copilot that are based on the data schema and the context of your app. You can review the suggestions and make adjustments as you need, saving you time and improving the quality of your app. 

Learn more at How to use field suggestions by Copilot in Power Apps Studio – Power Apps | Microsoft Learn

Announcing preview for bypass business logic 

Bypass Business logic is useful for bulk data operations where you don’t want custom business logic to be applied, such as when you’re sure the data meets organizational requirements or when you plan to implement the logic by other means. We are introducing two optional parameters that developers can use during data operations 

  1. BypassBusinessLogicExecution: This parameter allows you to bypass synchronous logic, asynchronous logic, or both. 
  2. BypassBusinessLogicExecutionStepIds: With this parameter, you can pass a comma-separated list of plug-in step registrations to bypass only the specified plug-in steps. This provides more granular control over which business logic is bypassed. 

These new parameters target custom business logic applied to your organization, and when used, all custom plug-ins and workflows are disabled except for those that are part of the core Microsoft Dataverse system or part of a solution where Microsoft is the publisher. 

Learn more at New capabilities to bypass custom business logic (preview) – Power Apps | Microsoft Learn

Power Apps Canvas Modern Screen Templates (Wave 2) 

The 2nd release of modern screen templates in Canvas studio will be available in North America starting on 6/17. This release includes the new “Header and form” and “Header and table” templates. Makers can insert these new screens using the same “+ New screen” entry point and connect to a data source within a few clicks! These templates contain only modern controls, are responsive by default, and can be inserted using copilot as well.  

Learn more at Add a screen to a canvas app and navigate between screens – Power Apps | Microsoft Learn

End User Productivity

Find mobile apps quickly with new app launching improvements.

Power Apps mobile is now updated with features to help frontline workers find their apps quickly.

  • Featured apps are surfaced in the bottom navigation bar so users can easily find admin-featured apps without having to search.
  • Users can directly share apps with colleagues by swiping right on an app and selecting ‘Share’.
  • A new bottom context menu enables users to use features like sharing, marking as startup, and pinning app to home.
  • Swipe left on the app and select ‘Set startup’ to set an app to immediately open whenever Power Apps mobile is launched, saving time in getting to the right app

Learn more at Set an app as a startup app – Power Apps | Microsoft Learn

Major updates for modern controls and theming! 

Modern controls are now much more customizable and have tons of new features available. Button control gets icon support and custom theming get new capabilities including classic compatibility. Three more controls are generally available now with more to follow soon. 

Learn more at May 2024 updates for modern controls and theming | Microsoft Power Apps

Screens get optimized for iOS and Android automatically 

When opting-in your app to be “Device optimized” (preview setting) your app gets better look and feel while gaining on performance and reliability on mobile devices. With this update, makers no longer need to enable individual screens. Power Apps will automatically activate screens where all controls are “Device optimized”. 

Learn more at Optimize for devices overview (preview) – Power Apps | Microsoft Learn

We’ve also released new, and made updates to some of our documentation – see a summary before of some of the key updates:

For Admins

For Makers

For Users

For Developers

Please continue sending us your feedback on features you would like to see in Power Apps. We hope that you enjoy the update!

Clay Wesener
Clay Wesener
Partner GPM, Power Apps Studio
Clay leads the Power Apps Studio product team, enabling the next generation of developers and app makers on the Microsoft Power Platform with AI assisted development. This spans across our Power Apps maker tools, Copilot for Power Apps makers, Pro Dev tooling, Dataverse experiences, and Power Fx.