Using PagerDuty actions in action flows

Before you can include external actions in your action flows, you must connect the action builder to the external system.

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Summary: ◀▼

You can connect action flows to PagerDuty to automate incident management tasks like creating, updating, acknowledging, resolving incidents, and adding notes. Use a dedicated service account for secure integration. Available actions also include searching incidents and looking up users. This integration helps streamline collaboration and incident handling by linking support workflows with PagerDuty's incident and user management features.

By connecting the action builder to external systems, such as PagerDuty, admins can integrate Zendesk with external systems in automated workflows, improving collaboration and maintaining a seamless experience across multiple platforms.

Note: The steps associated with external systems in action flows are referred to collectively as external actions.

This article contains the following topics:

• Using PagerDuty actions in action flows
• Connecting PagerDuty to action builder

Connecting PagerDuty to action builder

Before you can include external actions in your action flows, you must connect the action builder to the external system.

When connecting to external systems for use in action flows, the following best practices are recommended:

• All external actions performed by an action flow are attributed to the user who connected the external system. Therefore, it's a best practice to use a dedicated service account rather than personal credentials when connecting to each external system.
• All integrations request access to necessary scopes. However, it's important that you review and validate the scopes before authorizing the connection to the external system.
• When managing credentials for API key-based tools, such as OpenAI, it's best to store keys in a secure vault or credential manager.

To connect action builder to PagerDuty

1. In Admin Center, click Apps and integrations in the sidebar, then select Actions > Action flows.
2. Create or edit an action flow.
3. Open the step sidebar.
4. Under External actions, click PagerDuty.
5. Click Connect.
6. Follow PagerDuty's prompts to authenticate and complete the connection.

   The PagerDuty connection uses the OAuth 2.0 authorization code flow to securely access your PagerDuty account. Review the permissions carefully before authorizing the connection. These permissions allow action flows to manage incidents and users in your PagerDuty account on your behalf. When you connect PagerDuty, you will be redirected to PagerDuty to authorize access.

   The From Email field is required for certain PagerDuty token types. If your integration requires it, provide the email address of the user performing the action.

   Note: All external actions performed by an action flow are attributed to the user who connected the external system. Therefore, it is a best practice to use a dedicated service account rather than personal credentials when connecting to each external system.

After you've connected to the system, you'll see an indicator that it's connected and details about the instance you're connected to, as well as the actions available for PagerDuty.

Using PagerDuty actions in action flows

The following PagerDuty actions are available:

• Create incident
• Update incident
• Lookup incident by ID
• Search incidents
• Create note on incident
• Acknowledge incident
• Resolve incident
• Lookup user

Creating an incident

Use the Create incident action to create an incident in PagerDuty tied to a specific service, useful for human-created incidents or orchestration flows that require immediate incident creation.

This action has the following inputs and outputs:

	Variables
Inputs	Required: Title, Service Optional: Details, Urgency, Assignee User ID, Incident Key, From Email The Urgency field accepts two values: high or low.
Output	Incident details including ID, incident number, status, title, service information, and HTML URL.

Updating an incident

Use the Update incident action to update fields of an existing incident such as title, status (acknowledge or resolve), urgency, priority, or assignee, useful for lifecycle changes or reassignments.

This action has the following inputs and outputs:

	Variables
Inputs	Required: Incident ID Optional: Status, Title, Urgency, Priority, Assignee User ID, Resolution, From Email The Urgency field accepts two values: high or low. The Status field accepts values: triggered, acknowledged, or resolved.
Output	Incident details including ID, incident number, status, title, urgency, service information, priority information, and HTML URL.

Looking up an incident by ID

Use the Lookup incident by ID action to retrieve a single incident by its unique ID for inspection or conditional logic.

This action has the following inputs and outputs:

	Variables
Inputs	Required: Incident ID
Output	Incident details including ID, incident number, status, title, description, urgency, service information, and HTML URL.

Searching incidents

Use the Search incidents action to list or search incidents with optional filters such as status, date range, service, or urgency. This action is useful for reporting or bulk automation decisions.

This action has the following inputs and outputs:

	Variables
Inputs	Optional: Status, Service, Urgency, Since, Until, Limit, Offset The Urgency field accepts two values: high or low. The Status field accepts values: triggered, acknowledged, or resolved. The Since and Until fields use the ISO 8601 date format (for example, 2026-01-15 T10:00:00Z).
Output	Array of incidents with pagination information including more flag, limit, offset, and total count.

Creating a note on an incident

Use the Create note on incident action to add a timeline note to an incident that is visible in the incident timeline. This action is useful for sharing updates or context.

This action has the following inputs and outputs:

	Variables
Inputs	Required: Incident ID, Content Optional: From Email
Output	Note ID, content, and creation timestamp.

Acknowledging an incident

Use the Acknowledge incident action to acknowledge an incident and indicate that someone has taken ownership, implemented as an update to incident status.

This action has the following inputs and outputs:

	Variables
Inputs	Required: Incident ID, From Email
Output	Incident details including ID, incident number, status, title, service information, and HTML URL.

Resolving an incident

Use the Resolve incident action to resolve an incident and close it, implemented as an update to incident status.

This action has the following inputs and outputs:

	Variables
Inputs	Required: Incident ID Optional: From Email
Output	Incident details including ID, incident number, status, title, service information, and HTML URL.

Looking up a user

Use the Lookup user action to retrieve a single PagerDuty user by ID or email. Provide either User ID or Email. If User ID is provided, it takes precedence.

This action has the following inputs and outputs:

	Variables
Inputs	Optional: User ID, Email
Output	User details including ID, name, email, role, and HTML URL.