This work presents the first evidence of helical flow in RFX-mod q(a) < 2 tokamak plasmas. The flow pattern is characterized by the presence of convective cells with m = 1 and n = 1 periodicity in the poloidal and toroidal directions, respectively. A similar helical flow deformation has been observed in the same device when operated as a reversed field pinch (RFP). In RFP plasmas, the flow dynamic is tailored by the innermost resonant m = 1, n = 7 tearing mode, which sustains the magnetic field configuration through the dynamo mechanism (Bonomo et al 2011 Nucl. Fusion51 123007). By contrast, in the tokamak experiments presented here, it is strongly correlated with the m = 1, n = 1 MHD activity. A helical deformation of the flow pattern, associated with the deformation of the magnetic flux surfaces, is predicted by several codes, such as Specyl (Bonfiglio et al 2005 Phys. Rev. Lett. 94 145001), PIXIE3D (Chacón et al 2008 Phys. Plasmas15 056103), NIMROD (King et al 2012 Phys. Plasmas19 055905) and M3D-C1 (Jardin et al 2015 Phys. Rev. Lett. 115 215001). Among them, the 3D fully non-linear PIXIE3D has been used to calculate synthetic flow measurements, using a 2D flow modelling code. Inputs to the code are the PIXIE3D flow maps, the ion emission profiles as calculated by a 1D collisional radiative impurity transport code (Carraro et al 2000 Plasma Phys. Control. Fusion42 731) and a synthetic diagnostic with the same geometry installed in RFX-mod. Good agreement between the synthetic and the experimental flow behaviour has been obtained, confirming that the flow oscillations observed with the associated convective cells are a signature of helical flow.