Available only on Enterprise plans. Please note: This feature is rolling out to Enterprise accounts slowly, so if you don’t see it on yours yet, it will be coming soon.
monday.com offers a variety of tools to help you build an efficient and effective workflow. There are two builders to help you simplify your day-to-day: the custom automation builder and monday workflows. In this article, we’ll go over the key differences between the two. Check out this simple guide to learn more about which tool is right for your team.
What is the custom builder?
The Custom Builder is used to build custom automations. It allows you to create automation combinations that fit your team’s needs and perfectly fit your workflow. You can also use our most popular combinations with the Custom Builder. 
When to use the custom builder
It’s good to use the custom automation builder over monday workflows if:
- You want to build automation with one or more steps on the same board.
- You have simple automations with a few simple steps
What is Monday workflows?
monday workflows is your tool for bringing all your workflow elements together. monday workflows includes automation, integration, conditions, and a simple builder to help you create the harmony your work needs. Fully customizable and all visual, the builder uses click and drag to make your workflow dreams a reality.
When to use Monday workflows
It is better to use Monday workflows over custom automations if:
- You have complex automations with multiple steps. After 6-7 steps it can be difficult to understand what the automation does, especially if you are using an automation created by a team member.
- You want to manage multiple automations in your account and need transparency about these automations at the same time
- You have a complex workflow with multiple conditions, and you need your automations to perform different functions depending on different scenarios.
Falsehood between the two builders
For a quick comparison between these tools, take a look at this table:
| attribute | Building custom automations | Monday workflows |
So what do all these features and differences mean? Let’s take a closer look.
Features available in both builds
Automations between boards
You can work between boards in both the Custom Automation Builder and Monday Workflows. However, in the Custom Automation Builder, you can only do this for a single automation.
For example, you can use the Create Item action on another board and link it in the custom automation builder. Here’s an example of a custom automation that connects boards: 
In contrast, Monday workflows give you the power to create multiple, clear use cases by collaborating across boards and allow you to create more than one automation at once.
Features only available in Monday workflows
If/Else conditions
With the customized automation builder, you can only set “if” conditions in your automation.
With workflows you can set multiple conditions because the option is ready to be deployed to multiple possible conditions. For example, you can set different automated steps based on different users assigned to an item, like this: 
Draft/Active status
Draft mode – In this mode, you can create and edit your workflow without it being active. Then click Create or Update to run it.
Active state – In this state, your workflow is running. Pausing will stop the workflow until you resume it. 
Dynamic values from any previous block
When working with automations, you can only refer to the trigger you are using. When working with workflows, if you want to get information from a previous step that was used in a different workflow block, you can choose the “Get Item Data” action. This will automatically populate the information from the step you selected. You can even add that data to an item on a different board entirely! 
Location
Location is supported by Monday Workflows. This means that if you change the language of your account in Monday, that change will be applied to your entire account, including Monday Workflows. 