Building Workflows

Processing Lists

Learn how to filter, organize, format, or repeat actions for the items in a list.

A list is a collection of items, such as form entries, database rows, orders, users, or results returned by an API.

Flowcrafter can narrow a list, organize its items, turn it into text, or run an action for every item. Start by deciding what you want the workflow to produce.

Choose what to do with the list

If you want to…	Use	Result
Run one or more nodes for every item	For Each	Each item repeats; Done runs once afterward
Keep only the items that meet certain conditions	Filter	One shorter list; no routing branch
Remove repeated items	Deduplicate	One list with duplicates removed
Organize items by a shared value	Group By	One group per value, with all matching items preserved
Send known categories down different paths	Split	One branch per non-empty bucket
Combine all the items into one block of text	Format List	One string for an email or another text field

These nodes can also be combined. For example, you could filter a list of registrations, remove duplicate email addresses, and then use For Each to contact every remaining person.

Decide whether the next action runs once or once per item

This is the most important choice when working with a list.

Use For Each when an action needs to happen separately for every item. For example:

Send a separate email to every registrant;
Make one API request for every order; or
Update every matching entry.

Use the other list nodes when you want to produce a new list or one combined result. The next node then runs once with that result.

For example:

Filter → Format List → Send Email creates one email containing the matching items.
Filter → For Each → Send Email sends a separate email for every matching item.
Group By → For Each lets you process each group separately.
Split sends different categories of items down different branches.

Start with a list

Lists can come from many places in a workflow, including:

Query nodes such as Get Entries, Get Users, or Get Database Rows;
A Webhook payload;
An HTTP Request response; or
An AI or other node that returns several items.

For Each processes a list from the node connected directly before it. Filter, Deduplicate, Group By, Split, and Format List can select a list from any earlier node.

Common patterns

Send one summary containing every item

Use Format List to turn the items into readable text, then insert that text into an email, notification, or API request.

Perform the same action for every item

Use For Each and place the repeated nodes on its Each item branch. Work that should happen only after every item has been processed belongs on Done.

A For Each workflow separates per-item work from the Done route

⚙️ Read the current item with flow tags

Inside Each item, the picker offers runtime flow tags:

Flow tag	Result
`{{ item }}`	Whole current item
`{{ item.email }}`	One property from the current item
`{{ loop_1.index }}`	Zero-based position
`{{ loop_1.number }}`	One-based position
`{{ loop_1.count }}`	Total item count
`{{ loop_1.remaining }}`	Items remaining after this one

The For Each runtime ID varies. Use Insert flow tag instead of typing loop_1 yourself. Outside the Each item branch, {{ item.* }} is unavailable.

A named node in the same branch returns the result for the current item. A named node from before For Each returns its single earlier result.

Work with only part of a list

Use Filter when you need the matching items and can discard everything else.

Use Split when different categories need different workflow branches.

Filter’s list source and matching rules

Use Deduplicate when you want to keep only the first item with a particular value, such as the first entry for each email address.

Use Group By when you want to preserve all the items but collect those with a shared value, such as orders belonging to the same customer.

Unsupported shapes

Flowcrafter blocks these workflows during activation:

Shape	Why
For Each inside another For Each’s Each item branch	Nested iteration cannot keep a safe independent cursor
Delay or Wait inside Each item	The item batch cannot park halfway through

Two For Each nodes in sequence are supported when the second starts from the first node’s Done output.

Item failures

The On Error setting controls what happens when one item fails:

Continue records the failed item, processes the rest, marks the result partial, and takes Done.
Stop ends on the first failure and does not take Done.

Learn more

Each node page explains its settings, output, limitations, and examples. Start with the links in the table above, or try these guides: