Blue Prism vs Microsoft Power Automate comparison

SS&C Blue Prism and Microsoft are both solutions in the Robotic Process Automation (RPA) category. SS&C Blue Prism is ranked #4 with an average rating of 8.1, while Microsoft is ranked #2 with an average rating of 8.1. SS&C Blue Prism holds a 10.9% mindshare in RPA, compared to Microsoft’s 20.9% mindshare. Additionally, 88% of SS&C Blue Prism users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 87% of Microsoft users who would recommend it.

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Executive SummaryUpdated on Jan 12, 2025

In the realm of RPA solutions, Blue Prism and Microsoft Power Automate are key competitors, with Blue Prism having an edge in enterprise-level automation capabilities while Microsoft Power Automate excels in user-friendly interface and integration with Microsoft products.

Features: Blue Prism offers robust capabilities such as SQL database access, integration with analytics tools, and strong security and custom logic features. It effectively supports complex business processes and exception handling. Microsoft Power Automate is renowned for seamless integration with Microsoft products, offering a low-code environment and numerous connectors to simplify automation tasks.

Room for Improvement: Blue Prism needs to enhance AI capabilities, ease of integration with external systems, and community support. Its licensing model and attended automation features also require improvement. Microsoft Power Automate should expand RPA capabilities, improve integration with non-Microsoft products, and enhance its AI functionalities for complex workflows and better desktop automation features.

Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: Blue Prism provides multiple deployment options including on-premises and private cloud, but faces mixed reviews due to slow technical support. Microsoft Power Automate, while offering flexible public and hybrid cloud deployment through the Microsoft ecosystem, also has room for improvement in customer service efficiency.

Pricing and ROI: Blue Prism is perceived as expensive with complex licensing, yet provides considerable ROI for complex enterprise needs over time. Microsoft Power Automate, often bundled with Office 365, presents a cost-effective solution for smaller tasks, though its pricing can become intricate with premium connectors. Both claim ROI advantages, but Blue Prism may require longer engagements to maximize benefits.

To learn more, read our detailed Blue Prism vs. Microsoft Power Automate Report (Updated: March 2025).

Buyer's Guide

Blue Prism vs. Microsoft Power Automate

March 2025

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Review summaries and opinions

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:

Categories and Ranking

Automate

Mindshare comparison

As of March 2025, in the Robotic Process Automation (RPA) category, the mindshare of Automate is 1.3%, up from 1.0% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Blue Prism is 10.9%, down from 11.9% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Microsoft Power Automate is 20.9%, down from 21.5% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

Robotic Process Automation (RPA)

Q&A Highlights

Tarek Fanous

Unit Business Director (SAP) - FICO -PM at Abudawood

Mar 11, 2022

What are the main technical differences between Microsoft Power Automate and Blue Prism?

Adding to the answer here are the finer points: 1. Workflow technical features - a. ability to create a multi-level approval task. b. ability for the workflow engine to wait till the approval or rejection or any action is performed on the tasks. c. ability to delegate the task in the approval chain. e. Log of all activities within the workflow for the purpose of audit or tracing back the history. f. integration with third-party, internal or line-of-business applications for any data retrieval or data push to the system. g. drag and drop features (a kind of no-code solution) wherein the only configuration is required to create a workflow solution. h. user interface-driven or run as a back-end job to support the workflow process. 2. Robotics automation software features - a. a pure-play automation software that can detect images and other user interface elements on the application and interact with them. b. ability to mimic all human actions and steps while interacting with the software product. c. ability to interact with all types of software environments Citrix, Desktop, Server-based, Cloud, Web, Mobile, etc. d. ability to log activities performed on the application automated and perform all transactional activities and re-execute for any failed transactions. e. ability to interact with a standard application using either web services or another integration framework. g. OCR features to identify user interface elements, etc.

See all answers

Featured Reviews

Anabel Marco

Account Director at a tech services company with 11-50 employees

Automates processes efficiently with cost-effective scaling and robust customer support

Web scraping is quite good since it offers a lot of possibilities. Another important feature for me is its compatibility with MBI, the Power that is ISEQUADO Centers. I appreciate the ability to scale and increase the number of bots or studios without additional expense. Automate's non-reliance on additional orchestrators makes it quite cost-effective.

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Mohamed Salah Baccouche

Robotic Process Automation Consultant at Ernst & Young

Way more efficient for debugging than other tools but the UI is complicated

The UI is more complicated than other tools. In Power Automate, it doesn't even feel like you are working because the tool does the job for you. But in the solution, there are studio, process, and object interfaces and you have to decode your own objects. The free objects that are predefined are not good compared to other tools. There is still a lot of work to do on the solution's intelligent automation part.

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Nilesh Pundkar

IVR Developer at Orange

Good for email routing and management features but additional costs for plug-ins

Power Automate has fewer features and more limitations in general. It's not as mature a product as some of the others, like UiPath or Automate Anywhere. One of the main issues I've found is that Power Automate struggles with accessing Excel or other Office documents on servers. Even though it's a Microsoft product, we often have to log in through remote systems, and syncing can be problematic due to the way we use servers. At the very least, they should provide access to Office 365 directly, without requiring additional logins on servers. Most people utilizing Power Automate are already working within the Office 365 environment. Any proof of concepts (POCs) using Power Automate would naturally be built on top of Office 365.

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Quotes from Members

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:

Pros

"I would rate the technical support as a nine out of ten because it is quite fast and courteous."

"Overall, the whole product is really nice and provides significant benefits."

"The licensing of the product is very good. You only need to license it once and then you have it forever."

"The product effectively handles all the tasks we require."

"The pricing is excellent. I would give them perfect marks in that regard."

"I actually quite liked the no-coding functionality."

"The interface is simple, user-friendly, and very intuitive."

"We have found the pricing to be very reasonable."

More Automate pros

"Blue Prism is very good at doing background processing."

"One key feature is the workflow design is able to be customized according to the way that you want the automation to work."

"Its ability to talk to different systems that we have is a valuable feature. We use Pega, which is like a credit card processing system. We also use a Debit Process Manager, which is like the Visa debit application. In the bank, we have credit card and debit card sections, and we need to kind of investigate some of the transactions when customers are complaining about the charges. Blue Prism can log in to a different system to perform the exact actions that the agents are doing. This feature has been very helpful. Its ability to engage with external systems and websites is also very valuable. Each of our RPA projects could go across different systems. We have an in-house banking system. We also use the Visa network, and we have to go to different sites to do a lot of data scraping to ensure the data in our system matches the data in the Visa systems, and we just deal with some of the charges."

"Technical support has been responsive when we have needed their assistance."

"The main automation feature of Blue Prism is the most valuable."

"I like the cloud features such as IADA and Decipher."

"The object design way of implementing things actually brings a lot of reusability for us because you can design your objects once and leverage them in multiple automations."

"The entire tool is valuable because it is an enterprise tool. It is on par with other tools like Automation Anywhere or UiPath with the OCR/ICR facilities, analytics, and the entire package for enterprise-level security. It has the highest level of security as compared to any other tool."

More Blue Prism pros

"It is a very useful solution. You don't need to create an infrastructure in your environment just for triggers or executions. You don't need to invest in the infrastructure. With Power Automate, we can call or trigger custom web services and routines. We are also using the flow for gathering data from Microsoft Dynamics."

"Currently, we are mostly using the desktop part of it for data. We are basically extracting the data and then putting it in."

"I find WinAutomation's linear approach to the code and function calling valuable."

"I like Power Automate because it is very easy to use for users who don't have IT knowledge."

"Its integration with SharePoint and Outlook is the most valuable. I found it very easy to use. I could do everything that I wanted very quickly, and I didn't have any complications at all. I never had a problem in using Microsoft Power Automate."

"The initial setup was easy. It was very easy for people to pick up. The deployment took a few hours."

"The initial setup is pretty easy."

"It is a stable solution."

More Microsoft Power Automate pros

Cons

"The vendor is currently working on a solution that allows us to automatically create a process that is based on a document that we receive via email."

"They do not encrypt passwords, so this is an issue with HIPAA compliance."

"It's possible that they could use a stronger community for seeking guidance and help."

"We really need a free development environment for customers. Building and testing automation on production isn't ideal."

"The solution has a very weak knowledge base."

"It would be an improvement if Automate had better stability tools, whether by recommending a certain amount of memory because it can be a memory hog at times."

"The intelligent automation feature could be improved. It's interesting because it's simple, but the automation quality isn't always good. It's easy to use, but sometimes you need to make a slight improvement to the automation, and that's not so easy."

"The documentation is not that great."

More Automate cons

"Developing is more time consuming than with other products."

"They have OCR technology, but it's not that great."

"I would like to see bespoke dashboards allow the front-end to display what is required."

"All of the processes that we've automated have been completed successfully, and the bots are able to process them as expected."

"The reporting system, specifically the system admin reporting could be improved."

"It isn't very easy or intuitive for our developers to program the bot to make intelligent decisions. A bot, for the lack of a better word, is stupid, and it can only do what we program it to do. It cannot make intelligent decisions. For example, if we are reviewing Uber charges, they could be posting their transactions under different corporation names, even though they are under the same parent company or group. A human can easily understand that it is the name of the same company, and it just has an asterisk or space, but a bot cannot do that. When a bot cannot complete the transaction, it sends out an exception rate, business exception, or system exception for a human to do a manual review. The exception rate has been high because the bots cannot make decisions that we think are very simple, which is understandable because that's how they were programmed. There is potential in utilizing the higher intelligence side of the tool, but it is not easy to code higher intelligent actions. It is a very lengthy process to get the provisioning to ensure that it is kind of doing what it needs to do. Provisioning involves multiple things, and it is quite complicated and not the best experience, but it is not just because of Blue Prism. Blue Prism is easy, but it takes a long time to onboard into our in-house system."

"We would like to see intelligent process automation that integrates RPA and machine learning."

"We've found some challenges with Blue Prism, particularly when interacting with certain applications. The element inspection feature could be improved, especially for more complex applications."

More Blue Prism cons

"More OCR and AI capabilities are needed to improve the solution. Other solutions have better features, such as Blue Prism and UiPath."

"Better support is needed for building custom components on top of ProcessRobot."

"Power Automate could be improved by adding an internal fuzzy lookup or fuzzy match feature."

"What needs improvement in WinAutomation by Softomotive is its stability. Stability is quite important to me. Another area for improvement in the solution is robot scheduling because it's not 100% accurate, in particular, it's 90% accurate. The monitoring of the robot could also be improved because it's not very straightforward, and you have to look in a few places or at least two places which means that monitoring is not a one-glance process."

"It would be great if it was able to integrate more with various other platforms. It would make development easier."

"Looping can be a bit tricky."

"The connectors and the integration capability can be improved. Microsoft RPA is a growing platform, and it is not yet particularly mature."

"WinAutomation is scalable to a certain extent. I would rate it seven for the scalability, which could be better. Softomotive is better scalable than WinAutomation in this regard."

More Microsoft Power Automate cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The pricing is quite reasonable. We can run the process with one bot. The limitation is at the server level because they have some resources, and sometimes that is enough. It isn't too expensive, so you can get a good return off of one, and you can also have a pack of five bots that is quite competitive."

"I believe the price falls within a reasonable range, which significantly influenced our decision regarding the product. This aspect is crucial for any technological solution, especially in our country where enterprises might be hesitant to invest heavily in something untested or uncertain about its practicality and potential returns."

"Once you buy the software, you just pay for the support for backend help."

"It has gone up in price. The price of Fortra's Automate has increased since we first started using it. It does a lot but also costs a lot. It was a lot more affordable before Fortra owned the software."

"I'm only involved in running the product and maintaining the systems, so I can't speak to the cost."

"Compared to other products, the pricing model for this solution is much more convenient, flexible, and adaptable to the Portuguese reality."

"While solutions like UiPath and Blue Prism cost around $11,000-$12,000 for each license, this product costs around $7,000 and you can keep it forever."

"The cost is a bit high for a small business like ours, but we manage with Fortra's Automate."

More Automate pricing and cost advice

"My clients tend to feel that the overall implementation cost is a little high."

"The billing is on a yearly basis. They send us the bill every year. My business unit is billed by the technology team, so I don't know exactly how much they pay. In my business unit, we have our first-year license costs, and then we have our ongoing costs. Our bots cost projected per license is $8,600. Our projected support cost for every year is about $38,000. Our operation agent costs anywhere between $50,000 to $55,000, so the saving is there, but it is still kind of expensive for us, but I'm looking at it from the technology kind of billing us for it. This is the cost that we have for our technology team, which is different from the licensing of Blue Prism."

"Our customers pay for an annual license."

"Blue Prism is an expensive solution, especially in Southeast Asia, while in Europe and the UK, it can be considered moderate in terms of cost."

"I chose Blue Prism because it is priced well. The pricing was right for me at that moment even though Automation Anywhere is better in other aspects."

"Other than your infrastructure, in terms of servers that you have to set up, I don't think that there are any costs in addition to the standard licensing fees."

"The licensing is approximately $1,100."

"The pricing is really good for an enterprise-level solution. It's quite scalable and it's quite comparable with the market."

More Blue Prism pricing and cost advice

"This solution is reasonably priced and offers a free trial period."

"The pricing of this solution is very good and for me, it's the best option there is."

"Microsoft Power Automate is part of our Office 365 package, there are no additional licensing costs."

"There is a per-user licensing model for individual users."

"The licensing price should be more cost-effective."

"When accompanying customers, we discuss the license requirements. Based on these requirements, we suggest whether a per-user plan or multiple platforms per-user plan would be best."

"Microsoft Power Automate is expensive. The full license is quite expensive."

"You pay for use and if you want a premium connector or adapter, but a lot of things are available for free."

More Microsoft Power Automate pricing and cost advice

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Answers from the Community

Tarek Fanous

Unit Business Director (SAP) - FICO -PM at Abudawood

Mar 11, 2022

What are the main technical differences between Microsoft Power Automate and Blue Prism?

2 out of 4 answers

Shiv Chandra

Senior Consultant at a manufacturing company with 10,001+ employees

Mar 10, 2022

Hi @Tarek Fanous, Happy to talk you through what I have experienced in RPA. Feel free to reach out to me via DM or LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/sh...

Read full answer

Evgeny Belenky

Director of Community at PeerSpot (formerly IT Central Station)

Mar 10, 2022

Hello @Okay Akdeniz, @Biswajit Mohanty, @KinjalDangeria, @Nancy_Sachdeva, @Shantanu Chande and @Mattia Mezzacapo, Can you please help @Tarek Fanous by sharing your insights?

Read full answer

See all 4 answers

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Financial Services Firm

15%

Computer Software Company

14%

Healthcare Company

Manufacturing Company

Financial Services Firm

22%

Computer Software Company

11%

Manufacturing Company

10%

Government

Financial Services Firm

15%

Computer Software Company

13%

Manufacturing Company

10%

Insurance Company

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

Questions from the Community

What do you like most about HelpSystems AutoMate?

We use it for specific cases, mainly secure file transfers, which are vital for us. And it works for us.

See all answers

What is your primary use case for HelpSystems AutoMate?

I am a consultant and I am making a lot of processes in human resources, payroll, certifications, trainings, web scra...

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What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Fortra Automate?

The pricing is quite good compared to its competitors. Competitors are often more expensive than Automate. I would ra...

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Should I choose Blue Prism or Microsoft Power Automate?

Hello Netanya, it depends on your needs and your expertise. In my humble opinion you can start a big RPA project imp...

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I am evaluating Blue Prism and UiPath for RPA for my company. Which one do you recommend?

I'm very familiar with UiPath and the RPA industry: was hired by Daniel Dines in 2015 when there were 35 employees an...

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What do you like most about Blue Prism?

It is a stable solution.

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RPA that Bots can run without centralized control?

Yes, Attended Bots which can run without centralized control Module. RPA Tools like Automation Anywhere, uiPath ,Pow...

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How do I choose between UiPath and Microsoft Power Automate?

Microsoft‌ ‌Power‌ ‌Automate‌ ‌is‌ ‌intuitive‌ ‌and‌ ‌easy‌ ‌to‌ ‌integrate‌ ‌and‌ ‌use.‌ ‌I‌ ‌like‌ ‌that‌ ‌there‌ ‌...

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How is Automation Anywhere compared to Microsoft Power Automate?

‌Neither‌ ‌solution‌ ‌requires‌ ‌any‌ ‌coding‌ ‌experience,‌ ‌and‌ ‌both‌ ‌are‌ ‌easy‌ ‌to‌ ‌use‌ ‌and‌ ‌have‌ ‌great...

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Comparisons

UiPath vs Automate

Compared 36% of the time

Automation Anywhere vs Automate

Compared 8% of the time

VisualCron vs Automate

Compared 5% of the time

More Automate Competitors

UiPath vs Blue Prism

Compared 33% of the time

Automation Anywhere vs Blue Prism

Compared 12% of the time

Pega Robotic Process Automation vs Blue Prism

Compared 4% of the time

Blue Prism Cloud vs Blue Prism

Compared 2% of the time

More Blue Prism Competitors

UiPath vs Microsoft Power Automate

Compared 29% of the time

Automation Anywhere vs Microsoft Power Automate

Compared 17% of the time

IBM Robotic Process Automation (RPA) vs Microsoft Power Automate

Compared 7% of the time

Pega Robotic Process Automation vs Microsoft Power Automate

Compared 4% of the time

ABBYY Vantage vs Microsoft Power Automate

Compared 2% of the time

More Microsoft Power Automate Competitors

Product Reports

Buyer's Guide

Automate

March 2025

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Buyer's Guide

Blue Prism

March 2025

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Buyer's Guide

Microsoft Power Automate

March 2025

Download Microsoft Power Automate product report

Also Known As

HelpSystems Automate, Automate

No data available

Power Automate, Microsoft Flow, MS Power Automate, WinAutomation by Softomotive, ProcessRobot by Softomotive, Minit

Overview

Automate offers a user-friendly solution with a drag-and-drop interface for efficient task automation and integration with major platforms like SAP and Azure, making it ideal for quick deployment with minimal coding and training.

Automate provides powerful features for businesses seeking efficient automation, offering compatibility with databases, email integration, and cloud platforms. Its simple interface supports both beginners and experienced users, simplifying tasks like invoice processing, HR automation, and data transformation. Cost-effective pricing and flexible licensing enhance its appeal while integration capabilities and scheduling tools ensure smooth workflow automation.

What are Automate's Key Features?

Drag-and-Drop Interface: Simplifies automation with intuitive design.
Integration Capabilities: Connects with platforms like SAP and Azure for seamless data flow.
Database and FTP Triggers: Enhances automation potential through direct data interaction.
Efficient Scheduling: Automates tasks with precise timing and control.
Web Scraping: Automates data extraction for quick analysis and reporting.

What Benefits and ROI Should Users Expect?

Rapid Deployment: Minimizes coding efforts for quick implementation.
Cost-Effectiveness: Offers flexible pricing models to suit budget constraints.
Operational Efficiency: Reduces manual workloads and enhances productivity.
Comprehensive Integration: Facilitates improved data management across systems.
Scalability: Adapts to growing business needs with ease.

In industries such as healthcare, banking, and logistics, Automate is used for tasks like invoice payment automation, data transformation, and task automation. This leads to streamlined processes and reduced manual workload, illustrating its value in enhancing operational efficiency through diversified workflows.

Fortra

Blue Prism is an intelligent, business-developed, no-code automation platform for SaaS deployments as well as for on-premises, public cloud, multi-cloud, and hybrid environments. Unlike other automation technology, Blue Prism combines robotic process automation with expanded artificial intelligence and cognitive capabilities. Blue Prism gives users instant access to the tools you need for building and delegating automations, as well as a digital workforce that is already AI-equipped.

With Blue Prism’s code-free RPA, deployed through use of their Robotic Operating Model, your business can scale efficiently, improve customer satisfaction, reduce costs, and augment its talent to take on new responsibilities. Blue Prism helps to accelerate operational agility and efficiency by making it easy to automate the most important processes. Allocating everyday tasks to your Digital Workforce gives you immediate increased capacity and allows your teams to focus on their strategic goals. In addition, it delivers a return on investment, increases efficiency gains, and can even introduce new revenue streams.

“Workforce of the Future”

Blue Prism’s all-in-one intelligent automation platform consists of:

Design Studio with drag-and-drop process automation building, reusable “objects” across your business, and updates to objects and processes saved throughout the process library.
Control Room where you can assign processes to digital workers, scale digital worker and task volume ondemand, and gain real-time transparency of process proficiencies.
Digital Workforce of autonomous software robots that can learn and mimic business processes like humans and are equipped with six intelligent automation skills:
1. Knowledge and Insight - The ability to harvest, understand, and deliver insights from multiple disparate data sources.
2. Visual Perception - The ability to read, understand, and contextualize visual information.
3. Learning - The ability to derive contextual meaning and adapt to evolving process patterns.
4. Planning and Sequencing - The ability to optimize workloads and identify opportunities for better outcomes.
5. Problem-solving - The ability to autonomously solve system, logic, and business problems.
6. Collaboration - The ability to seamlessly work with both people and systems.

Reviews from Real Users

Blue Prism stands out for its enterprise-level functionality, which is why many companies choose it over its competitors. PeerSpot users note that the solution is easy to use, stable, and robust scalability-wise. The security is also top-notch. One user pointed out that "One of the most powerful features in Blue Prism is exception handling. It's one of the features that really differentiates it from other platforms." Blue Prism helps businesses with everything from compliance to quality control and error-avoidance.

SS&C Blue Prism

Microsoft Power Automate is a powerful tool that streamlines and automates tasks within an organization.

It is used for workflow automation, data integration, and creating automated notifications and approvals.

Power Automate connects different applications and services, such as SharePoint, Excel, and Outlook, to automate data transfer and synchronization.

Microsoft

Sample Customers

Aldergrove Financial Group, Preferred Health Professionals, Mindbeam Technologies, First Credit Union in British Columbia, Vestcom International, Prime Liberty Benefits, University of Tampa, CNLBancshares, World Precision Instruments, BJ's Restaurants, Globe Pequot Press, Accudata Technologies, Norton Healthcare, Pacific Toxicology Laboratories

Coca-Cola, Walgreens, American Express, Royal Bank of Canada, Pfizer, Shop Direct, O2, Siemens, Ascension Healthcare, Jaguar Land Rover

1. Coca-Cola 2. General Electric 3. Siemens 4. Accenture 5. Deloitte 6. Johnson & Johnson 7. Ford 8. Nestle 9. Procter & Gamble 10. IBM 11. Amazon 12. Google 13. Microsoft 14. Adobe 15. Cisco 16. Oracle 17. SAP 18. Intel 19. HP 20. Dell 21. Verizon 22. AT&T 23. T-Mobile 24. Walmart 25. Target 26. Home Depot 27. McDonald's 28. Starbucks 29. Nike 30. Apple 31. Facebook 32. Twitter

Buyer's Guide

Blue Prism vs. Microsoft Power Automate

March 2025

Free Report: Blue Prism vs. Microsoft Power Automate

Find out what your peers are saying about Blue Prism vs. Microsoft Power Automate and other solutions. Updated: March 2025.

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