In the Salesforce Winter ’23 release is a new feature – HTTP Callout.

This allows API calls to be configured and used from within flows, a true game changer for integrating external data into a flow and enriching Salesforce records.

Note: This is a beta feature that currently only supports GET operations (read from external source).

The inspiration for this article comes from a video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zk47mwYyi14 made by Andy Engin Utkan and Josh Dayment. Thanks to these two, I was able to replicate their example and then build a completely different one. Thanks guys!

Get the weather for Lead records

Note: If you do not have a preview org or a developer org that has already been updated to Spring 23 then you can’t test this yet. Feel free to read on and come back when your dev org has been upgraded.

Weatherstack has a free plan with 250 API calls that is perfect for testing a HTTP Callout from flow. Pass it a city and a measurement unit and it will return the current weather.

Go here: https://weatherstack.com/product to signup.

Select the Free Plan:

Enter your account details to create a new account.

Next, you will be taken to a dashboard that will display your new API Key:

Copy this API Access Key for the next step.

Create a new Custom Label

Create a new custom label in Salesforce to store this API Access Key

(Setup -> Custom Labels)

Create a new custom label and paste your new API key into the value field. You will use this to pass the key value to the HTTP Callout in your flow.  (Every key is different so don’t attempt to use mine)

Create new Named Credential for this API Service

This is to setup the API endpoint (where the call is going to) and how the authentication will work.

(Setup -> Named Credentials)

Select New Legacy (on dropdown arrow on right)

Complete as follows:

Add a Label and click tab to auto populate the name

Enter the provided URL: http://api.weatherstack.com/current

Be sure to select all three Callout Options.

Save to complete.

Create a Screen Flow

You will use a simple screen flow triggered by a button on the lead record to display the current weather for the city of your lead record.

New -> Screen Flow

Create a new variable named recordId that will be used to pass the current lead record into your flow.

Data Type = record

Object = lead

Available for input = checked

Add a new Action to the flow:

Note: If you do not see this “Create HPPT Callout (Beta)” then you don’t have a preview org or your developer org has not been upgraded to Spring 23 yet.

Give this new HPPT Callout Action a name (1) and select the Named Credential you created earlier (2).

Click Next

Now you will populate the three parameters you need to pass to the API:

• access_key
• query
• units

All are defined as strings and set to required:

You are still not ready to click DONE! There is one more thing to do:

You need to provide Salesforce with a sample response of what the reply from the API will look like. This way the fields returned (in JSON format) will all be nicely formatted for you to easily use in flow.

In the documentation for Weatherstack, they provide a sample API response but it was missing one new parameter and sometimes caused the flow to crash. I have updated the response with the new parameter so use this one below:

Copy the text above and paste into the Sample JSON Response as shown below (1)

Then click Review (2)

If the response is correct then the Data Structure will be displayed on the right.

Click Done

Now the HTTP Callout has been defined, you can configure it for use in this flow:

Note the following:

Access_key – (1) this is the label that you setup earlier with your API Key

Query – (2) here you use the city value from your lead record

Units – (3) you can use “m” for metric units or “f” for Fahrenheit units

Next, add a Screen Element to display the results

Add a Display Test component inside this screen:

Here’s the text you need to create (unfortunately you can’t just cut and paste this in)

Response Code:

{!Call_Weather.responseCode}

Weather for: {!Call_Weather.2XX.location.name} {!Call_Weather.2XX.location.country} at: {!Call_Weather.2XX.location.localtime} (localtime)

Temperature: {!Call_Weather.2XX.current.temperature}

Humidity: {!Call_Weather.2XX.current.humidity}

Feels Like: {!Call_Weather.2XX.current.feelslike}

Rainfall: {!Call_Weather.2XX.current.precip}

Wind Speed: {!Call_Weather.2XX.current.windx5fspeed}

Wind Direction: {!Call_Weather.2XX.current.windx5fdir}

Your finished flow should look like this:

Save and activate the flow

Run it in debug mode to test it works (select a lead in the recordId field)

Check for values returned here:

A response code of 200 is a success!

Save and name the flow

Next, create an Action on the Lead object to run the flow

Finally, put the button on the Lead page Layout

Open a lead record (make sure they have a city value in their address)

Click the Check Weather button:

Remember, you only have 250 free API calls on the free account so once these run out you will get an error in your response code indicating this. Don’t use the free account in production you will run out of free calls real quick!

You can find many free (and paid) APIs at https://ApiLayer.com to try for yourself by applying the same principles shown above.