Zapier vs n8n (2026)

Pick Zapier if nobody on your team codes and you need to connect a long list of apps: it lists more than 9,000, has a free plan, and Copilot drafts a Zap from a plain-English description. Pick n8n if your workflows have many steps or run thousands of times a month, because it charges once per run while Zapier charges for every action step, or if you want to host it on your own server. A five-step workflow that runs 2,000 times a month needs Zapier's 10,000-task tier at $129 a month billed yearly, and fits n8n Starter at $20. n8n expects someone who is comfortable with APIs and JSON, and its cheaper plans come with forum help only (prices checked November 4, 2026).

Pricing compared

The two companies count usage in different ways, and that decides most of the price gap.

Zapier bills by tasks. Each successful action step uses one task, so a Zap that adds a contact to your CRM, posts in Slack and updates a spreadsheet uses three tasks every time it runs. Triggers, polling checks, failed steps and the built-in Filter, Formatter and Paths steps don't count. As of November 4, 2026, Professional costs $29.99 a month, or $19.99 a month billed yearly, for 750 tasks. The 2,000-task tier is $73.50 monthly or $49 billed yearly, and 10,000 tasks costs $193.50 monthly or $129 billed yearly. Team, which adds up to 25 users and shared Zaps, starts at $103.50 monthly or $69 billed yearly for 2,000 tasks. If you switch on pay-per-task billing, extra tasks cost 1.25 times your base rate on yearly plans and 2.5 times on monthly plans, and Zaps stop at three times your allowance.

n8n bills by executions, and one execution is a whole workflow run from trigger to finish. In US dollars, Starter costs $24 a month, or $20 a month billed yearly, for 2,500 executions. Pro costs $60 monthly or $50 billed yearly for 10,000 executions, and $144 monthly or $120 billed yearly for 50,000. Starter and Pro have unlimited users. The self-hosted Business plan, with SSO, Git version control and environments, starts at $960 a month, or $800 a month billed yearly, for 40,000 executions. Enterprise is priced by quote.

Three example workflows, priced on yearly billing:

Workflow	Zapier (billed yearly)	n8n Cloud (billed yearly)
5 steps (trigger plus 4 actions), 2,000 runs a month	8,000 tasks: $129 a month	2,000 executions: Starter, $20 a month
1 action on a schedule every 5 minutes, about 8,640 runs	8,640 tasks: $129 a month	8,640 executions: Pro, $50 a month
1 action, 80 runs a month	Free plan	Starter, $20 a month, or self-host free

At low volume Zapier is the cheaper of the two, because its Free plan covers 100 tasks and n8n Cloud has no free tier. Once a workflow has several steps or runs every few minutes, n8n costs a fraction of Zapier's price. The Community Edition costs nothing beyond the server you run it on, but you handle updates and backups yourself.

Apps and integrations

Zapier's biggest advantage is the size of its directory. It says it connects 9,000+ apps, and its directory counted 10,447 on November 4, 2026. If you use a niche booking tool, an industry CRM or a regional payment service, there's a good chance it has a Zapier app with ready-made triggers and actions. Premium apps and webhooks need a paid plan.

n8n lists 500+ native integrations. For anything else, you use the HTTP Request node to call the app's API, and you can paste a cURL command from the app's documentation to build the request. That works with almost any service that has an API, but you have to read the API docs, set up authentication and map the fields yourself. If a tool you depend on is missing from n8n's list and you don't want to do that work, Zapier is the safer choice.

Both tools accept incoming webhooks. Zapier's Code by Zapier step and n8n's Code node both run JavaScript or Python when a built-in step can't do what you need. On n8n Cloud, Python code can't import libraries, and JavaScript can't load outside npm modules; a self-hosted instance can add them.

Building workflows and ease of use

A Zap reads top to bottom: pick the app and event that starts it, then add the actions that follow. Each step asks you to choose an account and fill in fields from a list, and Copilot can draft the whole Zap if you describe it in plain English. Filters and Paths handle conditions and branches. Zapier also puts Tables (small databases) and Forms in the same account, so a sign-up form can feed a table and a Zap without a separate tool. Free accounts can only build two-step Zaps and check for new data every 15 minutes; Professional checks every 2 minutes and Team every minute.

n8n gives you a canvas of connected nodes. You can see the data that enters and leaves every node, which makes a broken run quicker to trace once you know what you're looking at. Branches, sub-workflows and error workflows are built on the same canvas. The trade-off is that n8n shows you the JSON, and many fixes involve an expression or a few lines in a Code node. Its Assistant builds and fixes workflows from a description and uses monthly credits on Cloud (1,600 on Starter).

If the people building automations are marketers or operations staff, Zapier will get them to a working Zap faster. If you have a developer or a technical marketer, n8n's canvas gives more control over long workflows.

AI features and agents

Zapier adds AI inside Zaps with AI by Zapier steps, which pull details out of an email, sort requests or write a reply without your own API key. AI steps use tasks at rates that depend on the model. Zapier Agents are AI assistants that work across your connected apps; Free includes 400 activities a month, and Agents Pro raises that to 1,500 for $33.33 a month billed yearly. Zapier MCP lets Claude, ChatGPT and Cursor run actions in your Zapier-connected apps, is included in every plan, and uses two tasks per tool call.

n8n is built for teams who want to assemble their own agents. The AI Agent node lets the AI model you connect decide which tools and nodes to call, and you set which tools the agent can reach. You can make the agent stop for a person's approval before an action runs, such as sending an email or updating a CRM record. An MCP Server Trigger exposes your workflows to MCP clients, and an MCP Client node lets a workflow call outside MCP servers. Evaluations let you test an AI workflow against a dataset and compare answers as you change prompts or models.

Pick Zapier if you want AI to reach thousands of apps with little setup. Pick n8n if you want to control the model, the steps and the approvals.

Hosting, data and licensing

Zapier runs only in the cloud. n8n Cloud stores hosted data in the EU, on servers in Frankfurt, Germany, and you can also run n8n yourself with Docker, Docker Compose or npm, on your own hardware or with cloud providers such as AWS, Azure, Google Cloud and DigitalOcean. That matters if customer data has to stay on servers you control.

The free Community Edition comes under n8n's Sustainable Use License. You can use it to run your own business, and you can build automations for clients on your instance and charge for setup and maintenance, as long as the clients can't create or edit workflows. You can't host n8n as a service where customers build their own workflows, or remove its branding, without a commercial license. Agencies planning to resell automation should read the license FAQ before they commit.

Support

Zapier's Free plan relies on the help center and community forum. Every paid plan adds email support, the 2,000-task Professional tiers and Team add live chat, and Team and Enterprise get priority support.

n8n's community forum is open to everyone and is the main route for technical help on Starter, Pro and the self-hosted Business plan. Cloud customers on those plans can email n8n about billing and account issues, but n8n's docs point technical questions back to the forum. Only Enterprise includes email support for technical problems, with an SLA. If you want someone at the vendor to help fix a broken workflow, Zapier gives you that on a much cheaper plan.

Who each suits

Zapier suits small businesses and marketing teams without a developer who need to connect many different apps and run each automation a few hundred times a month. Its free plan, Copilot and email support make it the easier start, and its directory is the most likely to include the tools you already use.

n8n suits technical teams, agencies building automations for clients on their own instance, and anyone whose workflows run thousands of times a month. Paying per run, unlimited users and the option to self-host can cut the bill sharply, if someone on the team is happy to work with APIs and look after a server.

If most of what you want to automate is email marketing around sign-ups, purchases and clicks, you may need less of either. Platformly runs those flows on the same contact and sales records as its emails, and connects to Zapier for the apps it doesn't cover.