Approval missed on Teams mobile: why mobile Power Automate notifications arrive unreliably

A Power Automate approval doesn't fail to arrive on your phone because the flow would be faulty, but because the delivery chain behind it consists of four independent links: the assignment in the flow, your own IT's policies, the notification settings of the Teams app, and the battery management of the operating system. If any one breaks, the flow run still reports success.

In the run history there is a green check, the approval task exists, and yet the responsible person never heard a sound. The flow has done its job. The phone just didn't display it.

Where does the delivery chain of an approval break?

The notification disappears at four documented points, and none of them are in the flow itself.

• Assignment to individuals instead of to a group: Microsoft states explicitly in the documentation for group approvals that Teams notifications are not supported for group approvals and are only sent for approvals assigned to individual users (Microsoft Learn). Anyone who enters a distribution group in "Assigned to" gets an email and no push notification.
• An Intune policy from your own IT: For the "Organizational data notifications" setting in app protection policies there are three values: "Allow", "Block org data", and "Blocked". The last one suppresses the notification completely, the middle one replaces the content with "There is new activity" (Microsoft Learn). Both are set by IT, not by the person approving.
• A quiet time policy: Intune quiet time automatically silences Outlook and Teams notifications on iOS and Android. Microsoft itself warns for the type "Non-working hours" that accounts can miss Teams notifications if the Working Time API is not connected (Microsoft Learn).
• The device's battery management: Android shifts background CPU and network activity to the next maintenance window in Doze mode, since Android 6.0 for all apps (Android Developers). Manufacturer-specific power-saving features such as "Put apps to sleep" come on top (Microsoft Q&A). The approval then arrives, but late.

Why the Power Automate app is no longer available as a delivery path

Microsoft discontinued the standalone Power Automate app for iOS and Android on August 31, 2026, removed it from the app stores, and no longer provides updates or support for it (Microsoft Learn). Existing cloud flows continue to run unchanged.

The side effect for the delivery chain: The action "Send me a mobile notification" remains available in the designer, but has no target anymore as long as the flow is not modified. It continues to report success and notifies no one. Approvals themselves are not affected, they continue to run via Teams, via Outlook action messages, and via the Power Automate portal (Microsoft Learn).

How do you make the delivery reliable?

A mobile approval becomes reliable not through a better push, but through a second channel and a deadline that closes automatically.

• Always assign to individuals, never to a group, when a Teams push is expected. For groups, email remains the only way.
• Second channel from the start: Teams card and email in parallel. How the card is built is described in Teams notifications with Adaptive Cards.
• Reminder and escalation instead of hope: An approval that no one responds to for two days must make the flow do something. The pattern for this is described in the relay pattern at the 30-day timeout.
• Set up delegation, so absence doesn't replace the chain with silence. Details in Delegation rules for Power Automate approvals.

NordFlux therefore builds approval flows with two channels as a matter of principle and adds a reminder loop. This avoids the discussion of whether a release "never arrived". Support for this is available in Power Automate consulting and in automated approval workflows.

Frequently asked questions about mobile Power Automate approvals

Why does the flow run report success even though no one saw the approval?

Because Power Automate is only responsible for creating the approval task, not for displaying it on the end device. Teams, your IT's policies, and the operating system then handle the delivery. A green run proves that the task exists, not that anyone noticed it.

Does it help to turn off battery optimization for Teams?

It helps against delay, but not against complete failure. Doze and manufacturer-specific power-saving features delay notifications, a blocking Intune policy suppresses them entirely. So check the policies first before adjusting battery settings on each device individually.

What replaces the Power Automate app for mobile approvals?

The Approvals app in Microsoft Teams. It is Microsoft's named successor for viewing, responding to, and tracking approvals on mobile. For push notifications from a flow, the recommendation is to switch the action to Teams or email.