How does the Inclusive gateway work in BPMN 2.0?

Inclusive Gateway in BPMN 2.0 is used for modeling points of divergence and convergence of flows, where multiple alternative paths can be executed simultaneously.

How it works:

• During divergence (diverging Inclusive Gateway), the process can follow one or more paths at the same time, depending on the conditions on the outgoing flows. Unlike the Exclusive Gateway, which chooses exactly one path, the Inclusive Gateway allows selecting any number of paths.

• During convergence (converging Inclusive Gateway), the gateway waits for the completion of all active incoming flows that were initiated at the divergence stage. That is, it synchronizes only those flows that were actually activated, ignoring the others.

This allows modeling complex scenarios where several alternative branches can run in parallel, but not necessarily all.

Example:

If the conditions on branches A and B are true, the process will follow both branches simultaneously. The Inclusive Gateway at convergence will wait for both A and B to complete before continuing.