Add an element

This article explains how to add an element to an existing XML file or XML data.

Write to a fileExplains how to write XML data that you have retrieved or created to a file.

The action to use

This article uses the “Insert XML element” action.

Details of the “Insert XML element” action

The action has the following parameters.

Parameter	Value
XML document	The target XML data (must be an XML node object)
XPath query	Specify, in XPath format, the parent element to insert the element into
XML element to insert	The XML data to insert

Implement the action

Add the sample flow by copying and pasting

As a sample, this article uses a flow that saves XML data to a file, reads the data back, and adds an element to it.

Copy the following code and paste it into the Power Automate Desktop flow designer to add the actions.

SET FilePath TO $'''C:\\Users\\Public\\Documents\\sample.xml'''
XML.WriteXmlToFile.WriteToFileFormatted File: FilePath Xml: $'''<sample><data><content>This is test data</content></data></sample>''' Encoding: XML.FileEncoding.UTF8 Indentation: 2
XML.ReadFromFile File: FilePath Encoding: XML.FileEncoding.UTF8 XmlDocument=> XmlDocument
XML.InsertElement Document: XmlDocument XPathQuery: $'''/sample/data''' Element: $'''<insert>Content added from PAD</insert>'''

Before the flow runs, the XML looks like this.

<sample>
  <data>
    <content>This is test data</content>
  </data>
</sample>

After the flow runs, the content of the XmlDocument variable changes as follows.

<sample>
  <data>
    <content>This is test data</content>
    <insert>Content added from PAD</insert>
  </data>
</sample>

Implement in Power Automate Desktop

1. In “Search actions”, type “Insert XML element”.

2. Set the parameters as follows.

   Parameter	Value
   XML document	%XmlDocument%
   XPath query	/sample/data
   XML element to insert	<insert>Content added from PAD</insert>

3. When you run the flow, the specified element is added to the target XML data.

This action changes only the content of the variable (the XML node); the original XML file isn’t updated. To save the change to the file, write it with the “Write XML to file” action afterward.

Possible exceptions

An error occurs if the XPath syntax is wrong or if you specify an invalid XPath.

Even if the syntax is correct, an error occurs if the specified XPath doesn’t return an element (for example, when no element matches).

An error also occurs if inserting the element itself fails.

We recommend adding error handling with an “On block error” block.