--- sourceDocument: Zurich Build workflows sourceDocumentLink: https://www.servicenow.com/docs/r/zurich/build-workflows Release : - zurich ft:locale : - en-US ft:publication_title : - Zurich Build workflows ft:clusterId : - crworkflow bundleId : - crworkflow workflow : - Creator --- # Playbook # Exploring Playbook {#ariaid-title1} * Release version: Zurich * * Updated July 31, 2025 * * ![](https://www.servicenow.com/docs/portal-asset/ico-clock) 2 minutes to read Summarize ![AI sparkle icon](https://servicenow.com/docs/portal-asset/ai-sparkle-icon) Summarized using AI This content was generated using new OpenAI-powered functionality. Results are provided on an as is basis and are not guaranteed to be accurate or complete. ## Summary of Exploring Playbook Playbooks in Workflow Studio enable ServiceNow customers to design and manage unified, cross-enterprise automated workflows. These playbooks help process owners create digitized, end-to-end business processes by connecting multiple flows, subflows, and actions into a single sequence. Playbooks guide agents and fulfillers through complex tasks, improving customer experience and efficiency. Since the Xanadu release, Playbooks are integrated within Workflow Studio, providing a centralized environment for authoring, configuring, and monitoring automation components such as flows, subflows, actions, and decision tables. Show full answer Show less ## Key Features * **Unified Process Design:** Organize Workflow Studio content into comprehensive playbooks that represent complete business processes. * **Reuse and Integration:** Leverage existing flows, subflows, and actions to automate activities within playbooks, promoting reusability and consistency. * **Task Visualization:** Use digitized task boards or diagram interfaces to visualize and manage playbook activities and stages. * **Guided Execution:** Help agents and fulfillers navigate complex processes with clear stages and next-step guidance, enhancing task resolution. * **Cross-Platform Embedding:** Design playbooks in Workflow Studio and embed the Playbook Experience into ServiceNow legacy workspace, UI Builder, Mobile Platform, Service Portal, and more. * **Data and Process Control:** Define consistent record life cycles, specify conditions and execution order for activities and stages, and pass data seamlessly between them. * **AI Integration:** Agentic Playbooks incorporate AI agents to assist in task completion and output generation, boosting operational efficiency. * **Domain Separation Support:** Maintain data and process separation through domain contexts, controlling user access and administrative scopes. ## Playbooks Components * **Playbooks:** Represent cross-enterprise business processes and are maintained by playbook owners. * **Triggers:** Define when a playbook starts based on specific record events. * **Stages:** Logical groups of activities forming parts of the overall business process. * **Activities:** Individual Workflow Studio flows, actions, or subflows that execute playbook automation and user interactions. ## Practical Guidance for Customers * Familiarize yourself with foundational Workflow Studio automation features such as flows, subflows, and actions before building playbooks. * Design well-structured playbooks that automatically trigger on relevant records, reuse existing content, and clearly guide users through defined stages and next steps. * Leverage available resources for learning process automation basics, playbook setup, triggers, and activity definitions to effectively create and customize playbooks. * Understand when to use flows versus playbooks based on the scope and complexity of your automation needs. * Utilize Workflow Studio's integrated environment for streamlined authoring and monitoring of all automation components. ## Expected Benefits * Consolidation of disparate business processes into a consistent, manageable workflow. * Improved customer experience and task resolution through guided agent workflows. * Enhanced operational efficiency by automating complex, cross-functional processes. * Greater control over process execution, data flow, and user access with domain separation and condition-based activity sequencing. Workflow Studio playbooks enable process owners to author cross-enterprise workflows and create a single, unified process. Build the underlying processes for playbooks that Playbook Experience agents and fulfillers use. Note: Starting in the Xanadu release, the following updates were made: * Playbooks is now part of [Workflow Studio](https://www.servicenow.com/docs/RStzNHw8AWnDqrO8_NB_2g "Integrate workflow authoring, configuring, and monitoring into a single page experience. Consolidate playbooks, flows, actions, decision tables, and integrations into one design environment."). Workflow Studio gives you a streamlined way to author, configure, and monitor playbooks, flows, subflows, actions, and decision tables in one place. * Processes are now called Playbooks, though Playbook Experience remains a separate application that is not accessible from within Workflow Studio yet. * The core Playbooks builder in Workflow Studio is available with the ServiceNow AI Platform® by default, but the latest updates are available for download through the application in the ServiceNow® Store. {#process-automation-designer__ul_xjq_bgd_xhc} ## Playbooks benefits {#process-automation-designer__section_ors_tk3_pkb} Workflow Studio Playbooks enables you, as a business playbook owner, to organize Workflow Studio content into unified and digitized cross-enterprise processes. With Playbooks, you gain these benefits: * Connect multiple flows and actions into an end-to-end business workflow. * Reuse existing Workflow Studio flows, subflows, or actions to automate playbook activities. * Organize playbook activities in a digitized task board or diagram interface. * Guide agents and fulfillers through complicated playbooks from start to finish, improving customer experience and task resolution. Build your playbooks in Workflow Studio, and then design and embed your Playbook Experience in legacy workspace, UI Builder, ServiceNow Mobile Platform, Service Portal, and more. * Consolidate separate business processes across the organization. * Define a consistent record life cycle from creation to completion. * Pass data between the activities and stages of a business process. * Specify the conditions and the order in which activities and stages run. * Visualize and manage the activities and stages of your process. {#process-automation-designer__ul_tnx_lq3_pkb} ## Creating a well-designed playbook {#process-automation-designer__section_omb_qm3_pkb} The automated business processes that you design guide your end users and help them focus on the tasks and information that matter to them. A well-designed playbook can do these things: * Start up, or trigger, automatically for the types of records that your end users care about * Reuse activities from existing [Workflow Studio](https://www.servicenow.com/docs/RStzNHw8AWnDqrO8_NB_2g "Integrate workflow authoring, configuring, and monitoring into a single page experience. Consolidate playbooks, flows, actions, decision tables, and integrations into one design environment.") content * Has well-defined stages that end users can follow for a record * Clearly show the next steps that end users must take to move through a record's life cycle {#process-automation-designer__ul_bnr_wm3_pkb} ## Playbooks content {#process-automation-designer__section_eth_lnb_blb} Playbooks has these components: Playbooks : A playbook is a ServiceNow AI Platform® representation of a cross-enterprise business process for your organization. A playbook owner is responsible for creating and maintaining a playbook. Triggers : A trigger specifies when to start running your playbook. Stages : A stage is a grouped sequence of activities in a playbook. A playbook owner creates a stage to specify a logical grouping of activities. A stage in your overall business process. Activities : An activity defines the [Workflow Studio](https://www.servicenow.com/docs/RStzNHw8AWnDqrO8_NB_2g "Integrate workflow authoring, configuring, and monitoring into a single page experience. Consolidate playbooks, flows, actions, decision tables, and integrations into one design environment.") content that powers the playbook's automation. An activity can also specify the user-facing experience that the playbook produces when it runs. For more information about how to use and navigate the Playbooks user interface, see [Playbook builder](https://www.servicenow.com/docs/j9A0J0yySFL82VrEi8P__A "Playbooks are a component in Workflow Studio. Workflow Studio gives you a streamlined way to author, configure, and monitor playbooks, flows, subflows, actions, and decision tables in one place."). ## Getting started {#process-automation-designer__section_ds5_3v3_pkb} Before you get started with Playbooks, Familiarize yourself with any features that your business uses to automate operations on the ServiceNow AI Platform, such as [flows](https://www.servicenow.com/docs/IMxzawf6MSxs6gGrjksm~w "Flows automate a repeatable multi-step process. When the flow trigger conditions are met, the flow runs a sequence of reusable actions and flow logic to complete the process."), [subflows](https://www.servicenow.com/docs/EHdX1sVtPgyl8zJFRWVcww "Subflows automate a repeatable multi-step process that also produces an output needed by another process. When a playbook, flow, or script calls a subflow, the subflow runs a sequence of reusable actions and flow logic to complete the process and produce output values."), and [actions](https://www.servicenow.com/docs/sCFzAUSgRhey8mSJP5r8bw "Actions automate a repeatable task or operation within a flow. Flows run actions by passing them data as inputs. Actions run a sequence of steps to complete the task, and pass data to the flow as outputs."). If you're a playbook owner who wants to learn the basics of digitizing your business process, check out the following resources: * [Get started with ServiceNow® Process Automation](https://www.servicenow.com/docs/kWJJIbCsBP_gvZudScAUhg "Learn how Process Automation applications can help you use the ServiceNow AI Platform to transform your manual business processes into digitized, automated workflows.") * [Get started with processes](https://www.servicenow.com/docs/qI5crqJPVRYf5RhKvPyTWQ "Learn the basics of designing an automated process for your organization. Get an overview of how Workflow Studio Playbooks work in the ServiceNow AI Platform.") * [Design your first automated process](https://www.servicenow.com/docs/CfPumr1LrWfCc0f82cxfcQ "Create a sample playbook to standardize and automate how Service Desk agents handle chat interactions with VIP users.") * [View your process executions](https://www.servicenow.com/docs/k_rtcjyFt_fp5QhEQR7NIQ "A process execution is a single, runtime instance of a playbook. Process execution records provide runtime information about playbooks, such as the current state and input record.") {#process-automation-designer__ul_dh4_mlm_tlb} If you're a ServiceNow Process Automation administrator who wants to set up and customize Playbooks, check out the following resources: * [Triggers](https://www.servicenow.com/docs/7iQik3hN0uPGkwk1mO_fMA "Triggers specify when to start running your playbook.") * [Process definitions](https://www.servicenow.com/docs/0I6HLftfLimSlFvG8nfVrw "Playbooks are ServiceNow AI Platform representations of cross-enterprise processes for your organization. Create and activate a playbook to run your digitized business process on the ServiceNow AI Platform.") * [Activity definitions](https://www.servicenow.com/docs/hC2JPXxYVpwMpyvSURl_5w "Activity definitions describe how the activities in your playbook get the data that they need when your playbook runs.") {#process-automation-designer__ul_oyv_wlm_tlb} * **[Getting started with process automation](https://www.servicenow.com/docs/kWJJIbCsBP_gvZudScAUhg)** Learn how Process Automation applications can help you use the ServiceNow AI Platform® to transform your manual business processes into digitized, automated workflows. * **[When to use flows and playbooks](https://www.servicenow.com/docs/g1bpqYNHffBppW6Fcldrrg)** Use these general guidelines to determine when to create a flow or a playbook. * **[Playbook Experience](https://www.servicenow.com/docs/EYJCxheSfwebJbAwFCmodA)** Understand how Workflow Studio Playbooks work in the ServiceNow AI Platform® to automate cross-functional processes and consolidate them into task-oriented views for your end users. * **[Playbook builder](https://www.servicenow.com/docs/j9A0J0yySFL82VrEi8P__A)** Playbooks are a component in Workflow Studio. Workflow Studio gives you a streamlined way to author, configure, and monitor playbooks, flows, subflows, actions, and decision tables in one place. * **[Agentic Playbooks](https://www.servicenow.com/docs/5lLCNcV5KPN5xtlCvPwAhw)** Agentic Playbooks use AI agents to help you work more efficiently. AI agents complete tasks and generate outputs for your playbook activities. * **[Playbooks across ServiceNow AI Platform](https://www.servicenow.com/docs/tNM1qw_U20~yU6n9fxlt0A)** Playbooks capabilities are available in other ServiceNow® products and for specific industries. * **[Domain separation and Playbooks](https://www.servicenow.com/docs/x1oboJmiv3j4KMq9YWs~uQ)** Data separation is supported for Playbooks. The domain value of the triggering input record determines the domain context. Domain separation enables you to separate data, processes, and administrative tasks into logical groupings called domains. You can control several aspects of this separation, including which users can see and access data.