How does the Outlook 365 search determine "received:today" and "received:yesterday?"

[kylep]

Does the search use server time?

Does "recieved:today" include the past 24 hours from the time the search is run?

We're having inconsistent results when using "received:today" and "received:yesterday" so we're trying to figure out how it's searching.  

Example: We're running a "received:today" email search through Flow around 8p local time and it finds an email sent at 6p, but it's not finding emails sent at 3a and 6a.  

When I run a manual email search using "received:today" at 11a today it's finding emails from 2p yesterday.  I'm assuming the server time is 3 hours ahead of us, but why wouldn't the above search work?

[v-yuazh-msft]

Hi @ kylep,

Could you please share a screenshot of the configuration of your flow?

Do you want to search the emails that is received at today with local time?

All times in Microsoft Flow are in Universal Time (UTC) by default.

Does the UTC time 3 hours ahead of your local time?

If you would like to search the emails that is received at today with local time, such as if search the emails that is received from time of 00:00 to 23:59 today with local time, you could take a try to convert the time as screenshot below:

The expression in the condition as below:

@and(greater(items('Apply_to_each')?['DateTimeReceived'], addHours(body('Convert_time_zone'), -3)),less(items('Apply_to_each')?['DateTimeReceived'], addHours(body('Convert_time_zone_2'), -3)))

If the UTC time 8 hours ahead of your local time, you could modify the expression in the condition as below:

@and(greater(items('Apply_to_each')?['DateTimeReceived'], addHours(body('Convert_time_zone'), -8)),less(items('Apply_to_each')?['DateTimeReceived'], addHours(body('Convert_time_zone_2'), -8)))

The flow would run successfully as screenshot below:

Regards,
Alice Zhang

[kylep]

Is it possible to search for emails in the last 24 hours?

[v-yuazh-msft]

Hi @ kylep,

If you would like to serch for the emails in the last 24 hours from the time now, you could create the flow as below:

The expression in the condition as below:

@greater(items('Apply_to_each')?['DateTimeReceived'], addHours(utcNow(), -24))

The flow would runsuccessfully as below:

Regards,
Alice Zhang

[kylep]

How do we post images here?

Our flow goes like this:

Recurrence: Runs once a week at 19:00

Get emails | Search query: (from:sender@outside.com)AND(subject:servername)AND(received:today) | Top: 1

Condition: @empty(body('Get_emails'))

If yes: Send email

If no: Do nothing

We want to search the last 24 hours from 19:00. Emails are sent daily so we don't want to grab emails from before the 24 hour window.

Will the @greater(items('Apply_to_each')?['DateTimeReceived'], addHours(utcNow(), -24)) work?

[v-yuazh-msft]

Hi @kylep,

For you "Recurrence: Runs once a week at 19:00" and "We want to search the last 24 hours from 19:00",could you explain more about how frequency would your flow run?Does the flow would run every week or every day?

If the flow would run every week,please choose on which day the flow would run and set the trigger as below:

If the flow would run every day,please set the trigger as below:

In addition,if you would like to check if there are email arrives from the last 24 hours from19:00,and the email is send by "sender@outside.com", the email's subject is "servername", and if the email exists,you would send the email,you could take a try to create a flow as below:

The expression in the Conditionas below:

@and(and(equals(items('Apply_to_each')?['From'], 'sender@outside.com'),equals(items('Apply_to_each')['Subject'], 'servername')),greater(items('Apply_to_each')?['DateTimeReceived'], addHours(utcNow(), -24)))

If there are email arrives from the last 24 hours from19:00,and the email is send by "sender@outside.com", the email's subject is "servername", and if the email exists, the result of condition2 would be true,and the flow would run successfully as below:

Please take a try and let me know if your issue are solved.

Regards,
Alice Zhang

[anhthuch4ng]

Hi @kylep,

You should be able to upload photos to your forum posts now!

Have you had a chance to apply @v-yuazh-msft's suggestions to your Flow above?
If yes and you found that solution to be satisfactory, please go ahead and mark @v-yuazh-msft's reply as the "Accepted Solution". 🙂


Happy Flowing,

-AT (Flow Community Admin)

[kylep]

What is Base time?

The solution won't work, because we're getting the emails before any variables are being initialized.