Flow: How To Use Global Variables in Flow Builder ($Record)

Simply put, global variables capture various information at the moment the flow fires. Just like the recordId or $Record which captures the current record, you have other variables that capture who is the current user, what is the company, or when is the flow executed. You can easily identify a global variable in Flow Builder by the ’$” sign found at the start of its name (eg, $Record and $User)

Global variables are very powerful for building flow. Fortunately for us, they’re also easy to use, so let’s dive into what they are and how to use them in flows!

Explanation Of Each Global Variable

You can find the official explanations here, but again we want some really easy words and examples right? I will list them down in the order of most frequently used. (by me)

1. $Record
2. $Record__Prior
3. $User / $UserRole / $Profile
4. $Organization
5. $Flow
6. $Label
7. $Permission
8. $System
9. $Setup
10. $Api

$Record

What’s not to love about the $Record variable? It works just like recordId, and you don’ even need to configure anything! This variable only exists in autolaunch flow types (Anything except Screen Flow). You can use it to replicate IsChanged formula or update the record, but here are some important points to consider when using $Record:

$Record__Prior

It’s an amazing new feature after Spring’21 release. Here is the summary:

1. Only available in record-triggered flow type
2. Only available when choosing “record is updated” or “record is created or updated”
3. If the record is newly created, the values of this variable will be null
4. If the field is not updated when the flow fires, that field in $Record and $Record__Prior will have the same value (only changed fields at the time the flow was triggered will have values in $Record_Prior that are different from $Record)

$User / $UserRole / $Profile

Like the names imply, You can access the information, role, or profile of the person who’s currently running the flow through these global variables.

$Organizaion

As you may have guessed, $Organization gives you access to your own company’s (organization) information. This is the information you can find in Company Settings in Setup.

$Flow

Basically, $Flow allows you to reference a lot of the current information about the flow interview. To see what I mean, see the case examples below. Also, find more details in this Salesforce help document.

$Label

You can check out what a custom label is in this article. My understanding is that labels work like snippets. You can create a label that contains a specific value, and reference that label to show the message.

$Permission

$Permission will return True/False depending on whether the user has access to a specific custom permission. Learn more about custom permissions in this Salesforce help document.

$System

The only thing that is available is $System.OriginDateTime, which is a static value of 1900-01-01 00:00:00.

$Setup

You can use $Setup to get the Custom Setting from your org. However, if you want to get Custom Metadata Type, you will need to use a Get Records element. Check out this post on How To Use Custom Metadata Type.

$Api

Absolutely no clue what the use case is and how can this help. It looks like a very developer’y variable. Check out this article if you want to learn more about $Api.

Use Case Example (Shared by Eric Smith)

One of the uses of the $API global variable is to get the correct URL for the current domain. I’ve used it in a few different components. Let’s Get Toasty! and How to Include Chatter Posts on Printable Views.

LEFT({!$Api.Partner_Server_URL_340},FIND("/services", {!$Api.Partner_Server_URL_340})) & {!vContactId} 

(Updated Apr. 17)

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