How to Find Which Power Automate Flow Sent an Email

Introduction

Have you ever received an email from an automated process and wondered:

Which Power Automate flow sent this email?

This can become a problem when an organization has hundreds of Power Automate flows.

For example, imagine receiving this email every day:

Subject: Power Automate Demo Email - 2026-08-19T...

You know it came from Power Automate, but you don't know which flow generated it.

In this article, we will create a simple Power Automate flow and then use Microsoft 365 Message Trace and email headers to find the exact flow that sent the email.

Part 1 — Create a Demo Power Automate Flow

First, let's create a simple flow that sends an email.

Go to Power Automate → Create → Scheduled cloud flow.

Give the flow the name:

Demo - Daily Reminder Email

Choose a recurrence trigger.

For testing, you can configure it to run once a day.

Flow structure

Recurrence
     ↓
Send an email (V2)

Configure the Recurrence Trigger

Set:

Frequency: Day

Interval: 1

For example:

Frequency: Day

Interval: 1

Part 2 — Configure the Email

Add:

Office 365 Outlook → Send an email (V2)

For the To field, enter your email address.

For example:

[email protected]

Use this subject:

Power Automate Demo Email - @{utcNow()}

And use this body:

Hello,

This is a demo email sent using Power Automate.

We are going to use this email to identify the Power Automate flow that sent it.

Thank you.

Save the flow.

Part 3 — Wait for the Email

Once the flow runs, you should receive an email similar to:

Power Automate Demo Email - 2026-08-19T06:30:00Z

At this point, imagine that you don't remember which flow sent the email.

This is where the troubleshooting process starts.

Part 4 — Open Message Trace

Go to:

Microsoft 365 Admin Center → Exchange Admin Center

Then select:

Mail flow → Message trace

Search for your demo email.

You can use:

Field	Example
Date	19-Aug-2026
Sender	Your automation mailbox
Recipient	Your email
Subject	Power Automate Demo Email

You should see your email in the results.

Part 5 — Open the Message in Explorer

Select the email.

Click:

View in Explorer

This opens the email in Microsoft Defender Explorer.

You should see the email listed in Explorer.

Click the email to open its details.

Part 6 — View the Email Headers

Now open the message headers.

At first, the headers can look complicated.

For example, you may see something like:

Received: from ...

Authentication-Results: ...

Content-Type: ...

From: ...

To: ...

Subject: ...

Message-ID: ...

Don't worry about all of these values.

We are interested in the Power Automate-related headers.

Part 7 — Find the Power Automate Header

Search the headers for:

x-ms-mail-application

You should see something similar to:

x-ms-mail-application: Microsoft Power Automate

This tells us that the email was sent through Power Automate.

Now look for:

x-ms-mail-workflow

You may see:

x-ms-mail-workflow:

x-ms-workflow-name: 70cdab69-363a-43f3-9c2c-330ba645c84d;

x-ms-workflow-run-id: 08584144665462124499000912914CU13;

x-ms-client-request-id: d94b47d1-fe0e-4951-9e5d-a8e7c0609533;

Now we have something very useful.

Part 8 - Find the Flow in Power Automate

Now go back to:

Power Automate

Make sure you are in the same environment.

You can identify the environment using:

x-ms-mail-environment-id

For example:

x-ms-mail-environment-id: 53c989d3-ab06-4edc-8157-06d8640eea7f

x-ms-workflow-id: 70cdab69-363a-43f3-9c2c-330ba645c84d

The flow we created earlier should match:

Open the flow.

Part 9 — Verify the Run

Open:

Run history

Find the run that executed at approximately the same time as the email.

For example:

19-Aug-2026

05:30 PM IST

Open the run.

You should see:

Recurrence

↓

Send an email (V2)

Now you have successfully connected:

Email → Message Trace → Email Headers → Workflow ID → Power Automate Flow → Flow Run

The Main Concept

You can add this simple diagram to the article:

Email received
      ↓
Message Trace
      ↓
View in Explorer
      ↓
Email Headers
      ↓
x-ms-mail-workflow
      ↓
Workflow ID
      ↓
Power Automate
      ↓
Run History
      ↓
Exact Flow Run

This will make the article very easy to understand.

Conclusion

Finding which Power Automate flow sent an email can be difficult when you have many flows in your environment. Instead of checking each flow one by one, you can start with the email and trace it back to the flow.

Using Message Trace, Microsoft Defender Explorer, and the email headers, you can find useful Power Automate information such as the Workflow ID, Run ID, and Environment ID.

The next time you receive an email and wonder "Which Power Automate flow sent this?", don't start searching through hundreds of flows. Start with the email headers.