Overview
This rule flags Salesforce Flows that exhibit high logical complexity, making them difficult to understand, troubleshoot, and maintain. While Flows are an excellent low-code tool, their visual nature can sometimes mask underlying complexity, leading to designs that are overly convoluted, have too many decision points, or attempt to handle too many disparate responsibilities within a single Flow.
Code Reviews classifies this as a Warning because, similar to complex Apex code, an excessively complex Flow doesn't necessarily cause immediate functional errors but significantly increases the risk of misconfigurations, bugs, technical debt and maintenance headaches. It also makes future enhancements or debugging efforts substantially more time-consuming and prone to errors. Past a certain degree of complexity, the advantages of a low-code solution diminish, and Apex becomes the more maintainable and scalable option.
Why This Matters
Excessively complex Flows can lead to:
Reduced Readability and Comprehension: Despite being visual, a Flow with too many elements, interconnected paths, or deeply nested logic becomes a web of complexity making it hard for any developer (even the original creator) to quickly grasp its purpose and behavior.
Higher Maintenance Costs: Debugging issues, modifying existing logic, or adding new features to a complex Flow requires meticulous tracing of paths and conditions, increasing the time and effort required.
Increased Likelihood of Defects: With many decision points and branches, it's easier to introduce logical errors or miss edge cases, leading to incorrect automation behavior.
Difficulty in Testing: Thoroughly testing all possible paths and scenarios in a highly complex Flow is incredibly challenging and time-consuming. This can lead to insufficient test coverage, making it hard to find bugs before they impact users.
Performance Degradation (Indirect): While not a direct governor limit, overly complex Flows can consume more transaction resources due to the number of elements executed, potentially contributing to CPU time limits or making the automation less efficient.
Scalability Challenges: As business processes evolve, integrating new requirements into a monolithic, complex Flow can become nearly impossible without a complete redesign.
Data Setup for Testing: The manual effort required to set up the precise data needed to test all parts of a complex Flow can be a significant hurdle and a major drain on development resources.
What Triggers This Rule
This rule specifically identifies Salesforce Flows that contain an excessive number of Decision elements this number is set to 10 by default but can be changed by the user. The presence of too many decision points is a direct indicator of high logical complexity, making the Flow difficult to understand, debug, and maintain.
How to Configure the Maximum Number of Decisions
Code Reviews allow you to set the maximum number of decisions permitted, based on your team’s needs. To adjust the threshold that triggers this rule, navigate to the Engaging Policy, select the pencil icon, locate the Excessive Flow Complexity rule, and select the pencil icon again to update the decision limit.
Recommended Approach
Simplify and modularize your Flows by:
Applying the Single Responsibility Principle: Design each Flow (or Subflow) to handle a single, distinct business process or a clear set of related actions.
Breaking Down Complex Logic with Subflows: Use Subflows to encapsulate reusable chunks of logic. This makes the main Flow cleaner and improves reusability.
Limiting Decision Branches: Keep the number of direct branches from a single decision element manageable. If a decision has too many outcomes, consider using multiple, sequential decision elements or restructuring the logic.
Using Entry Conditions Effectively: Leverage the "Entry Conditions" of record-triggered Flows to narrow down when a Flow runs, rather than putting all the filtering inside the Flow with numerous decision elements.
Considering Apex for High Complexity: If a process involves many complex calculations, intricate looping logic across many records, or frequent integration with external systems that require fine-grained control, Apex might be the more appropriate and maintainable solution.
Summary
Excessive Flow complexity hinders maintainability, increases the likelihood of errors, and makes troubleshooting a nightmare. By designing Flows that are focused, modular, and leverage Subflows effectively, you create automations that are easier to understand, test, and scale. Code Reviews flags this as a Warning to encourage best practices in Flow design and to help developers recognize when the benefits of low-code are outweighed by the challenges of excessive complexity.