What is Delegation in PowerApps?
Delegation refers to PowerApps pushing data processing to the data source, instead of retrieving all data and processing it locally. This improves performance, scalability, and ensures accurate results.
Think of it like this:
- Delegated: “Hey SharePoint, give me only the items where status = ‘Open’.”
- Non-delegated: “Hey SharePoint, give me everything. I’ll look for the open ones myself.”
If a query isn't delegable, PowerApps pulls only a subset of data (500–2000 rows) and processes the rest locally—leading to possible errors or missed data.
🚦 Why Delegation Matters
✅ Performance: Avoids loading huge datasets into memory.
✅ Scalability: Works with large data sources like SQL, SharePoint, Dataverse.
❌ Non-delegable operations risk:
- Incomplete data
- Incorrect results
- App slowness
✅ Dos and ❌ Don’ts of Delegation
✅ Dos
🔹 Use Delegable Queries
// Delegable with SharePoint
Filter(Tasks, Status = "In Progress")
// Delegable with SQL Server
SortByColumns(Filter(Employees, Department = "HR"), "LastName") 🔹 Keep Filters Simple
// Delegable
Filter(Orders, OrderDate >= Date(2024,1,1)) 🔹 Use Index Columns (SharePoint)
Index frequently-filtered fields to improve performance and delegation.
🔹 Handle Large Datasets Carefully
Use pagination and lazy-loading techniques with delegable filters.
❌ Don’ts
🔸 Avoid Non-Delegable Functions in Filters
// NOT delegable in most sources
Filter(Tasks, Left(Title, 4) = "Task") 🔸 Don’t Mix Delegable and Non-Delegable Expressions
// Mixing `StartsWith` (delegable) with `Or` and `Len` (not)
Filter(Customers, StartsWith(Name, "A") || Len(Address) > 10) 🔸 Don’t Ignore Warnings
Blue warning triangles indicate non-delegable queries.
🧰 Common Use Cases
🔸 Filtering SharePoint List
Filter(Projects, Status = "Active" && StartDate >= Today()) 🔸 Searching SQL Table
Search(Products, "Monitor", "Name") ⚠️ Search() is not delegable for all sources—prefer Filter() where possible.
🔧 Adjust row limits: Go to Settings → Upcoming features → Experimental → Set Data row limit (max 2000).
📌 Final Thoughts
Delegation is not just a performance tip—it’s a core design principle in PowerApps. Apps that ignore it may work in testing but break or slow down in production with real data.
✅ Design for delegation.
✅ Use supported functions.
✅ Watch those blue warnings.
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