Exciting news: New workflow tab to become default experience

[kate.mcnally]

Hi there Bubble community,

I’m Kate, a product manager at Bubble, and I’m here with an important update that we’re thrilled to share. Starting in early April, the new workflow tab will transition to full general availability (GA) for all users, meaning it will automatically replace the old experience for everyone. Since the beta launched in the fall, it’s received an overwhelmingly positive response and engagement, with nearly 34,000 users opting in and 92% of them staying in the experience.

This update represents a major improvement in how you’ll manage workflows in the Bubble editor‌ — ‌but it’s also a significant UX change. Once the new workflow tab rolls out to GA, the old interface will no longer be accessible. It’s a change we believe will significantly improve your ability to manage complex projects, whether you’re an experienced user or just getting started with Bubble, but we wanted to give you plenty of notice to prepare and explore the changes ahead of time.

Why are we making this change?

The updated workflow tab is designed to address challenges shared by our community, including:

• Providing more intuitive organization tools for complex workflows
• Making it easier to navigate the current interface, especially on large-scale apps
• Reducing confusion caused by coupling workflow names with events

What’s changing?

You can read through this thread to learn about all the changes we have added since the beta began, like an improved workflow canvas and better navigation tools.

Thanks to everyone who provided feedback during the beta, we’re excited to announce that we’ve also launched the following new features over the past few weeks:

@mghatiya

Can see only about 10 workflows at a time

• Better overview of workflows: Added grid view of all workflows

@Dexx

One suggestion would be to improve the visual cues for disabled workflows

• Better ability to see what’s enabled and disabled: We’ve updated the UI to show a red tag when the workflow is disabled

@J805

Going back and forth where it resets each time is getting super annoying.

• Improved UX to keep you in your flow: Tabs no longer reset as you switch from the backend workflow tab to the design tab to the workflow tab
• Enhanced zoom functionality: We’ve enabled the ability for trackpad zoom, shortcut key zoom, and zoom toggle control, all on the workflow canvas.

And another feature coming soon!

• Improved search: Re-introduce the menu bar search function. Search results will show actions with the associated workflow

@paul29

Ability to search for actions (currently you can only filter the workflows that have those actions in them. In the previous version, the dropdown showed you workflows and actions)

Learn more

For a deeper dive into the workflow tab update and the journey behind these improvements, check out our BubbleCon presentation. It covers the top updates, our goals for this change, and how it fits into the future of Bubble.

What’s next?

We’ll be rolling out the update in early April. No action is required on your end‌.

If you have not already, try the new workflow tab by opting in through the banner on the workflow tab or through Settings>Versions>Beta Features. While in beta, you can navigate between the new and old experience.

Otherwise, just keep building as usual! If you have any questions or feedback, feel free to reach out via the forums or support.

Thank you for being part of the Bubble community. We can’t wait for you to experience the workflow tab!

Happy building,
Kate and the Bubble team

[tomvigneres]

@kate.mcnally

Improved UX to keep you in your flow: Tabs no longer reset as you switch from the backend workflow tab to the design tab to the workflow tab

Almost perfect, the tab design keeps resetting when navigating to the backends-workflow.

Otherwise, this new version is very good, well done!

[dev35]

Agreed, the tab design keeps resetting when navigating to the backends-workflow.

[jonah.deleseleuc]

Great Can we get more workflow colors please? Instead of selecting from a list of colors, can there just be a color picker instead? That way, we can use style colors for workflows

Thank you ~

[sudsy]

Nice!

And plus one on this issue.

Also, can we please get a “collapse all” on the workflow tabs - both backend and frontend? Perhaps an icon next to the “add new folder” icon?

Being able to quickly reduce clutter by collapsing all folders would make it faster and easier to navigate - especially for heavy folder users. It would also approximate the old UI where the folders were in a single-column list, which was actually a very efficient navigation mechanism.

[rico.trevisan]

To whom it may concert, here an idea for next redesign, (from Noodl)

The marching ants showing activity is a killer feature…

[randomanon]

@tomvigneres

Almost perfect, the tab design keeps resetting when navigating to the backends-workflow.

Why do people keep mentioning this as if it hasn’t been the case since forever?

The entire design tab has always reset when going to backend workflows, it makes designing a pain.

Really needs to be fixed.

[randomanon]

@rico.trevisan

To whom it may concert, here an idea for next redesign, (from Noodl)

I don’t like this one bit, extremely messy

[emir.ozgun]

Maybe good for overall debugging and to see the big picture

[Jett]

Noooo. You’re joking? NO!
You’re seriously going to force this and end the current interface?
With a 2 week notice?
Here I thought you guys actually understood that this doesn’t work for pro use / large apps. Maybe a whole lot has changed since my last feedback session, and now I have to pray that that’s the case. But if it’s not, this will be a disaster.

[NoCodePhill]

Thanks, I hate it.

[drixxon]

@kate.mcnally

Once the new workflow tab rolls out to GA, the old interface will no longer be accessible

aw man i don’t like this decicision at all.

i really appreciated how bubble never forced me to use the responsive editor until I was ready to learn it. it was a major improvement, but it took about a year for me to be ready.

i’ve been using the workflow tab for such a long time and I know where everything is. completely getting rid of it is just…wow.

[mitchbaylis]

Please do not push this live.

Yes, it is on the right track - but no it is not ready to be pushed to all users.

I saw your announcement so I decided to try the new workflow builder again. I had tried it for a day when it was first released and quickly turned it back off again because of all the bugs and issues.

I’ve had the new workflow builder on for the last 24 hrs again to test it… about half the bugs still exist. It makes the whole workflow builder experience much more painful to use. I’m turning it back off again - the old workflow editor is much better.

I would like to love the new design and I do think it is on the right path - something like make.com scenario builder is the right track and that is kind of where this is going but it still has too many bugs to be an improvement on the old workflow builder.

[tom29]

@kate.mcnally nice work!

[alves.nig]

Hello, Masters! So… do you think it would be a good idea to include the workflow boxes on the right screen, when clicking on each wu’s folder? This way, it wouldn’t be necessary to open the folder to see each action, it would already appear on the right side, on the wu’s actions screen. Excuse my wrong English…

[code-escapee]

@kate.mcnally it’s really really not a good idea to make the new workflow tab mandatory in its current state.

It’s also extemely disconcerting that Bubble feels that it’s exciting news to reduce the options for the workflow tab from two to one. What’s exciting about that? Those who preferthe new wf tab will continue to be on the new wf tab and those who prefer the old wf tab will be forced to the new wf tab → not one bubbler will gain from this news

[NoCodePhill]

It would appear that if you are in another branch and attempt to “Copy with workflows” to another branch, this does not work in the new editor. Just freezes the copy/paste group focus.

[javier6]

@kate.mcnally

Since the beta launched in the fall, it’s received an overwhelmingly positive response and engagement, with nearly 34,000 users opting in and 92% of them staying in the experience.

How many of those users who decided to stay opted in are power users who are consistently working on their bubble app?

My problem with this decision is it doesn’t solve any actual problems except for a prettier UI which is less functional. The same goes for the new “App Manager” dropdown. It’s reduced UX in favor of better UI.

If the new workflow area used tabs like in the example below to compare workflows side-by-side, or used actual nodes this would be different but I’m finding it hard to understand the thought process here.

[rico.trevisan]

@randomanon

I don’t like this one bit, extremely messy

You probably make your bed as you soon as you wake up. I’m not like that; I’m slightly more messy.

The visual can be as clean as your code. As you can see, I like mine like spaghetti.

BTW, you can move stuff around. to make it neater.

Anyway, I didn’t mean to hijack the thread, just longing for a visual editor for the workflow editor, too.

[revervemarketing]

I tried this out a couple of times. A few months ago and now. Honestly, you guys had it nailed already with the original view. Unfortunately, this feels like a design update more than it is a UX improvement. It’s like I’m getting an unwanted split screen view. Building workflows vertically feels more cramped than the split screen itself. Please consider having the option for the original workflow tab view.