Starting the process of designing and building a business application can often be overwhelming. Microsoft’s Power Apps Plan Designer, a Copilot-first tool, seeks to simplify this process, enabling rapid solution development using natural language and visual inputs.
In this blog, we’ll explore what Plan Designer (preview) can do, its current limitations, and practical tips for using it effectively. Whether you’re a seasoned Power Platform professional or just starting, this review will help you understand how Plan Designer fits into the Power Platform toolkit.
What is Microsoft Power Apps Plan Designer?
Plan Designer is a preview feature within Power Apps designed to accelerate the creation of Power Platform solutions. By using natural language inputs and relevant visuals like screenshots or process diagrams, it generates user stories and then a starter solution comprising:
Dataverse tables,
Canvas apps,
Model-driven apps, and
Suggested Power Automate flows.
While it offers huge potential, the tool is still in preview and has a number of limitations.
My Scenario for Testing Plan Designer
To illustrate the findings discussed in this blog post, below is one of the prompts I used to test plan designer.
A forest management company wants to digitise their process for issuing permits for the public to access their forests for different activities.
The objectives of the solution are to:
Increase the efficiency of managing permit applications
Ensure that permit data is accurate and secure
Improve the permit experience for staff and the public
The current process is:
A permit officer collects information about the person applying for a permit. Details about the information are in the attached Forest permit document. These need to be captured by the solution.
The permit officer writes the information on a paper permit document (see Forest permit document attached)
The applicant signs the permit. A copy is retained by the company and another given to the applicant
Sometimes a payment is required, which needs to be recorded and tracked.
Sometimes keys to the forest are provided to the permit holder which need to be recorded and tracked to ensure that they have been returned.
Each week, the permit officer emails a report to other staff in the organisation so they are aware of who will be entering forests that week (see attached Forest permit report)
The forest management company is on a small budget and can only afford Power Apps per User licenses, this needs to be kept in mind when designing the solution.
I also uploaded a screenshot of the permit form that is to be digitised by the solution.
Strengths of Plan Designer
1. Rapid data model build
Plan Designer is great at creating initial data models quickly. For instance, generating a preliminary data model for the Forest Permit scenario took minutes, rather than hours if it was built manually. However, there are current data modelling limitations, which I assume will be fixed before Plan Designer exits its preview release state.
2. Comprehensive user story suggestions
I was impressed with the Copilot-driven user story generation. It came up with user stories that I hadn’t thought of, focusing on a complete end-user experience.
3. Data recognition from visuals
It performs well at analysing images. Using the scanned permit form that I uploaded, it was able to extract the fields and incorporate them into the data model.
4. Data modelling
It was able to determine that the fields that it extracted from the permit form should be split across two tables, the Applicant and Permit tables. For example, it recognised that the Vehicle Registration belonged to the Applicant table and not in the Permit table.
5. App creation
It efficiently builds a first version of canvas and model driven apps from the data model that it generates. Providing a functioning app within minutes and a great base to start further building the app and refining the user experiences. The canvas apps also have an appealing and professional user interface (which has historically been a weakness of canvas apps), using modern controls and leveraging Microsoft's Fluent UI framework. This should lead to more consistent canvas app user experiences.
Limitations of Plan Designer
There are a few limitations in the preview of Plan Designer, that need to be addressed before it is released to general availability. Otherwise, some of the limitations, like data modelling will potentially require more re-work than the time that Plan Designer initially saves.
1. Data modelling limitations
There is no ability to edit the data model during the design process. This means that you cannot change the data type of a column if Plan Designer gets it wrong, which it often does. Instead, you will have to delete the column and add it back in after Plan Designer creates the data model in Dataverse.
Existing Dataverse tables cannot be leveraged. This can result in creating unnecessary duplicates. For example, in a forest permit scenario, it created a new "Applicant" table instead of using the existing "Contact" table. It also means that only new, stand-alone solutions can be created through Plan Designer. There is no ability to add a new app or feature to an existing solution.
2. Adherence to Power Platform best practices
It fails to implement and/or offer guidance on Power Platform best practices around data modelling in Dataverse, licensing, security and data privacy, app choice (model-driven vs canvas app) and solution management.
For example, it avoids out-of-the-box (OOTB) fields like "Status" and creates additional columns to hold status values.
Users of Plan Designer still need to have a good understanding of Power Platform and be able to review and sense check what the Plan Designer has created. At the moment, I see Plan Designer as a tool for experienced Power Platform makers to accelerate data model and app development rather than a tool for beginners.
3. Potential for restricting creativity
Plan Designer’s focus on predefined apps and Power Automate flows can limit exploration of innovative solutions, such as using Power BI for reporting, Copilot for more interactive user experiences and other components of the Microsoft ecosystem that integrate seamlessly with the Power Platform.
Best Practices for Using Plan Designer
Based on my limited experience with the Plan Designer preview, here are some tips for approaching Plan Designer as a tool.
1. Treat it as a teammate, not a decision-maker
Think of Plan Designer as a collaborative tool that offers a starting point, not the final answer. Be prepared to challenge its recommendations to ensure they align with your user’s requirements.
2. Pair with expert knowledge
The tool assumes a baseline understanding of Power Platform essentials like data modelling, licensing, solution management and app selection (e.g., model-driven apps vs canvas apps).
3. Use for prototyping simple app-first scenarios
It is ideal for rapidly creating prototypes or simple, app-focused solutions where Dataverse serves as the database.
4. Combine with other tools
For brainstorming alternative user experiences and solutions that are not just apps, tools like ChatGPT or Copilot can complement Plan Designer.
How does Plan Designer work?
If you do a quick search on YouTube, there are a number of videos demonstrating how Plan Designer currently works. My favourites are:
For the Microsoft documentation on how to use Plan Designer see:
How to Get Started
Plan Designer preview is currently rolling out and is not available in some regions, at the time of writing. However, it is accessible in early-release environments in the US region.
Create an early release environment in the US region.
Navigate to Power Apps Preview.
Turn on the "Try the new Power Apps experience" option.
Conclusion
The Microsoft Power Apps Plan Designer show huge potential toward faster business solution development in the Power Platform. While it offers powerful tools for prototyping and initial data modelling, it does require expert oversight and a comprehensive understanding of best practices.
For now, use it as an accelerator, not a one-stop solution.
What’s your experience with Plan Designer? Let us know in the comments.
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