Zapier vs n8n

If the people who will build and change the automations work in marketing, sales or operations, and the job is to connect well-known apps (a form to a CRM, a payment to an invoice, a new lead to Slack), choose Zapier. It has the largest catalogue of ready-made integrations on the market, an editor anyone can follow, and nothing to install or maintain.

If your workflows have many steps, run thousands of times a month, touch sensitive data or need custom logic, choose n8n. It bills per workflow run instead of per step, it can run on your own servers, and it lets you write JavaScript or Python and call any API when a connector is missing. It is also one of the most complete tools for building AI agents with the model of your choice.

The deciding question is rarely a feature. It is who will maintain the automations, and how much they will run once they work.

Zapier is the best-known no-code automation platform. You build a Zap: a trigger in one app (a new form entry, a new deal, a new email), followed by one or more actions in other apps. The editor reads like a list of steps from top to bottom, and branches are added with Paths when you need them. Zapier connects to more than 9,000 apps, which is the largest catalogue of any automation tool, and for most mainstream SaaS products the integration is already there, maintained by Zapier or by the app’s publisher.

Zapier has grown into a platform around the Zap: Tables to store data, Forms to collect it, Canvas to map a process, Copilot to build Zaps from a description, Agents and Chatbots for AI, and Zapier MCP so that AI assistants can act in your apps. It runs only in Zapier’s cloud. You pay for a monthly volume of tasks, and every successful action counts as one or more tasks.

n8n is a workflow automation tool released under a fair-code licence. You place nodes on a canvas and link them: triggers, app integrations, logic, code and AI. It looks like a visual builder, but it is made for teams who want control: every node shows the data that goes in and out, any API is reachable through the HTTP Request node, and Code nodes accept JavaScript and Python.

You can use n8n Cloud, hosted by n8n in Frankfurt, or install n8n on your own server and keep every workflow, credential and execution log inside your infrastructure. n8n bills per workflow execution: a run of the whole workflow counts once, whether it has three nodes or forty. Its AI nodes let you build agents with memory, tools and retrieval, using Claude, GPT or an open model you host yourself. The trade-off: it asks for more technical comfort than Zapier, and if you self-host, updates and backups are yours.

The criteria we look at on every automation project. The last column says which tool has the edge, from the official documentation and our experience on client work.

The two tools do not count the same thing, and that matters more than the price grid. Zapier counts tasks: each action that completes successfully uses at least one task. Triggers and polling are free, and so are Zapier’s built-in tools such as Filter, Formatter, Paths, Delay, Looping, Tables and Forms. AI steps, code steps and MCP calls draw from the same task pool, and some of them use more than one task. A Zap with a trigger and five actions that runs 1,000 times uses about 5,000 tasks. From December 1, 2026, Zapier also bills Next Gen Zaps, its new kind of Zap, at the same rate per action, with at least one task per completed run.

n8n counts executions: one execution is one run of the whole workflow, whatever its number of steps or the volume of data. The same workflow uses 1,000 executions. All n8n plans include unlimited users, unlimited active workflows and every integration. And the community edition, self-hosted, has no execution limit at all: you pay for the server and the time to look after it.

The prices below come from the official pricing pages in November 2026, billed annually unless stated. Zapier publishes its prices in US dollars; n8n publishes its prices in euros only, including for customers outside Europe. Both tools change their grids often: we reread them before every estimate.

Take a typical lead workflow: a form submission triggers it, then five actions follow (enrich the contact, create it in the CRM, create a deal, notify sales in Slack, add a row to a reporting sheet). It runs 10,000 times a month.

On Zapier, the trigger is free and the five actions use 50,000 tasks a month. That sits between the 10,000-task tier ($129 a month on Professional, billed annually) and the 100,000-task tier ($489 a month). If you add an AI step to qualify each lead, the count rises again.

On n8n, the same workflow uses 10,000 executions: exactly the Pro plan, at €50 a month billed annually, with unlimited users. Self-hosted, it costs the price of a small server plus the time to maintain it.

The gap widens with each step you add, because Zapier counts steps and n8n does not. It narrows, or reverses, when automations are short and rare: a few two-step Zaps that run a few hundred times a month fit in Zapier’s entry plan, and the time a non-technical team saves is worth more than the difference. Our setup and maintenance work costs about the same on both platforms, so the platform line is usually what tips the balance.

Zapier is the easiest automation tool to start with. You pick an app, pick an event, map a few fields, test, and the Zap is live. Copilot can draft a Zap from a sentence, and thousands of templates cover the most common needs. For a marketing or sales team, that means automations they own without filing a ticket.

n8n asks for more from day one. Its canvas is visual, but you work with the data itself: JSON items, expressions to reference a field from a previous node, loops and merges you configure. People with a little technical background get comfortable quickly; people without it often need help the first time something breaks.

The flip side shows up when an automation grows. A Zap with fifteen steps and several Paths becomes hard to read and expensive to run. The same logic in n8n stays on one canvas, with the data visible at every step and a code node when a transformation is easier to write than to click. We often say Zapier is easier to start and n8n is easier to grow.

This is Zapier’s clearest advantage. With more than 9,000 apps, it connects to almost every SaaS product a small or mid-sized company uses, including many niche tools that have no integration anywhere else. Each integration exposes ready-made triggers and actions, so you rarely touch an API. For internal tools, Zapier offers a developer platform to build private integrations, and code steps for small transformations.

n8n advertises more than 2,000 integrations, which covers the mainstream stack (CRMs, email, spreadsheets, databases, payment, AI providers). When a node is missing, the HTTP Request node calls any REST or GraphQL API, you can paste a cURL command to set it up, and Code nodes in JavaScript or Python do whatever transformation you need. Self-hosted, you can also build and install your own nodes.

In practice: if your stack is made of popular SaaS tools and nobody wants to read API documentation, Zapier’s catalogue saves real time. If your stack includes an in-house tool, an ERP or an API without a connector, n8n’s flexibility saves more.

Both platforms now treat AI as a core feature, with different philosophies. Zapier puts AI everywhere a business user already works. AI steps classify, summarise or draft text inside a Zap. Copilot builds Zaps from a description. Zapier Agents is a separate product, with its own plans, where you describe an AI teammate that browses the web, reads your connected data and takes actions in your apps: the free tier includes 400 activities a month and Agents Pro 1,500 for $33.33 a month billed annually. Zapier MCP lets assistants such as Claude or ChatGPT call actions across Zapier’s catalogue, and those calls draw from your task pool.

n8n is built for people who design the agent themselves. Its AI Agent node combines a model, memory, tools and retrieval from your own documents, and you choose the model: Claude, GPT, Gemini, or an open model running on your own server. n8n can act as an MCP server or call MCP servers, can ask a human to approve a tool call before it runs, and can publish a chat interface for an agent. Evaluations help you test an agent before it reaches production, and n8n Cloud plans now include AI credits so you can call models without your own API keys. Self-hosted, the whole chain can run without any data leaving your infrastructure.

Our rule of thumb: for an AI step inside a simple business automation, or an assistant a non-technical team sets up itself, Zapier is quick and convenient. For an agent that reasons over several steps, works on internal documents or must stay under your control, we build on n8n or in code.

Zapier is cloud only: there is no version you can install on your own servers. Its data privacy page states that it hosts data on AWS servers in the United States, and that it does not offer to store data only in the EU. For European companies, transfers rely on Zapier’s Data Processing Addendum and its certification under the EU-US Data Privacy Framework. Zapier holds SOC 2 Type 2 and SOC 3 reports and keeps up to 69 days of Zap history by default. For most marketing and sales flows, that framework is enough.

n8n gives you the choice. n8n Cloud stores data in the EU, on servers in Frankfurt. Self-hosted, n8n runs wherever you decide: your cloud account, a European host, or a server in your own network. Workflows, credentials and execution logs then never leave infrastructure you control, which is often what a security team, a health or finance client, or a public buyer asks for first.

Self-hosting is not free of work. Someone has to apply updates, watch the server, back up the database and rotate credentials. When we host n8n for a client, it is part of the maintenance plan; when the client hosts it, we document every step so their team can run it.

n8n is not open source in the strict sense. It uses the Sustainable Use License, which n8n calls fair-code: the source is public and you can self-host it for free for your internal business purposes. Automating your own company’s processes, or a client’s processes on the client’s own instance, is allowed. What the licence restricts is selling a product whose value comes mainly from n8n itself, for example offering hosted n8n to your customers or letting them connect their own accounts and build workflows inside your app. Some features, such as SSO, environments and Git version control, need a paid Business or Enterprise licence key.

Zapier has no such question: it is a proprietary service you rent. For an agency like ours, the practical consequence is simple. We build n8n automations on the client’s own instance or cloud account, never on a shared one, so the client owns them and the licence stays clear.

On Zapier, the main limits are tied to your plan. Polling triggers check for new data every 15 minutes on Free, every 2 minutes on Professional and every minute on Team and Enterprise; instant triggers based on webhooks fire right away. When you reach your task tier, Zaps either continue in pay-per-task billing (1.25 times the plan rate on annual plans, 2.5 times on monthly plans) or pause until the next period. Zapier runs the infrastructure, sends error notifications and keeps version history of each Zap on paid plans.

On n8n Cloud, plans set the number of concurrent executions (5 on Starter, up to 50 on Pro) and the maximum run time (5 minutes on Starter, 40 minutes on Pro). Self-hosted, the limits are those of your server, and queue mode with several workers lets n8n handle heavy loads. Error workflows, automatic retries and searchable execution logs are available, and Enterprise adds log streaming to tools such as Datadog.

On both, an automation is a small piece of software. It needs an owner, a log someone reads, and an alert when it fails. We set those up before we hand anything over.

The same question gets a different answer depending on who asks. Here is how we usually answer it.

We build most client automations on Make or n8n, and we keep Zapier when a client already runs on it or when its catalogue is the only one with the integration they need. What we would choose on typical projects, and why.

Teams usually move when the Zapier bill grows faster than the business, when Zaps get too long to read, or when security asks for self-hosting. There is no import button: Zaps are rebuilt in n8n, not converted. That is also an opportunity, because several Zaps often become a single workflow with branches. We plan a migration like a small project.

Our notes from the projects we run or take over on each platform. The full details are in our Zapier and n8n reviews.

Pick Zapier if a non-technical team needs to connect popular apps quickly, if your automations are short and run a few thousand times a month at most, or if a tool you depend on only integrates with Zapier. Pick n8n if your workflows are long or frequent, if you want AI agents built your way, if a developer is around, or if your data must stay in Europe or on your own servers.

Both are good products, made for different teams. The question to settle first is who will own the automations, and how much they will run once they work. If you are also looking at Make, the third option in this category, read our Make vs n8n and Zapier vs Make comparisons.

Prices, limits and features were checked on these official pages in November 2026. Both vendors change their offers often: check the current figures before you commit.