Using the Loop Native Action

The Loop native action repeats child actions in a playbook. Use a forEach loop to iterate over an array, or a While loop to repeat while a condition is true.

This topic focuses on While loop timing inputs. Starting in Turbine 26.2.0, Delay and Duration are labeled and entered in seconds in the canvas UI.

Choose Your Path

I want to…	Start here
Configure a While loop on the canvas	Configure a While Loop
Understand Delay and Duration units	Delay and Duration Units (26.2.0)
Confirm upgrade impact for existing playbooks	Existing Playbooks After Upgrade
Use playbook expressions for timing	Playbook Expressions

Configure a While Loop

Add a Loop action from the canvas Add panel.

On the action details panel, set Type of loop to While.

Click Edit Condition and define when the loop should continue.

Click Configure to open the While loop inputs.

Set delay (in seconds), duration (in seconds), and limit as needed.

Add child actions on the loop entry branch and save the playbook.

Input	Description
condition	Boolean expression that must be true for the loop to continue
delay (in seconds)	Wait time before each iteration after the first
duration (in seconds)	Maximum time the loop may run
limit	Maximum number of iterations allowed

Use limit and a well-defined condition together so a While loop cannot run indefinitely. Duration provides an additional time-based guardrail.

Delay and Duration Units (26.2.0)

Before Turbine 26.2.0, the While loop Delay and Duration fields accepted numeric values in milliseconds, but the canvas did not show the unit. Users often assumed seconds, which caused loops to wait or run much longer than intended.

Starting in 26.2.0:

Field	What you enter in the UI	What the playbook stores
delay (in seconds)	Seconds (for example 2)	Milliseconds (for example 2000)
duration (in seconds)	Seconds (for example 10)	Milliseconds (for example 10000)

The canvas converts static numeric values when you open and save the While loop dialog:

On load — stored milliseconds are divided by 1000 and shown as whole seconds in the UI.

On save — whole-number seconds you enter are multiplied by 1000 before the playbook is saved.

The Turbine engine still evaluates Delay and Duration in milliseconds at run time.

Existing Playbooks After Upgrade

The 26.2.0 unit change is UI only. Playbook JSON and API payloads are not migrated to a new unit.

Stored value (unchanged)	What you see after upgrade	Run-time behavior
delay = 2000	2 in delay (in seconds)	Still waits 2000 ms (2 seconds) between iterations
duration = 10000	10 in duration (in seconds)	Still stops after 10000 ms (10 seconds) total loop time

Existing customer playbooks keep the same timing after upgrade. The UI displays equivalent seconds for clarity; run time does not change unless you edit and save new values.

If you open a While loop, change Delay or Duration, and save, the UI saves your entry as seconds converted to milliseconds. Review timing after edits to avoid unintentionally longer or shorter waits.

Playbook Expressions

You can map delay, duration, or limit to playbook properties or expressions instead of static numbers.

Value type	UI behavior	Run-time behavior
Static number	Shown and edited in seconds; converted to milliseconds on save	Engine uses stored milliseconds
Expression or property reference	Passed through without seconds conversion in the dialog	Evaluated result is treated as milliseconds by the engine

If you use an expression for delay or duration, supply or calculate values in milliseconds even though the field label says seconds. For example, to wait two seconds via a variable, the evaluated value must be 2000, not 2.