Almost nobody leaves n8n over the price of a run, since one execution covers any number of steps and few rivals bill that way. They leave over everything around the run: a self-hosted server to keep patched through n8n's long list of published security advisories (more than 200 on GitHub, ten on 30 September alone), a licence that bars reselling it, a canvas that assumes a developer, or a hunch that an agent should be writing the steps.
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Stay on n8n if your workflows are long, branchy and run thousands of times a month, and someone on the team is happy to own the upgrades, because nothing else here pairs per-run billing and free self-hosting with 2,366 integrations.
checked 2026-10-13 · n8n is Priced in EUR, not USD. Cloud Starter is €24/mo billed monthly (€20/mo billed annually) for 2,500 executions; Pro is €60/mo (€50 annually) for 10,000; Business is €800/mo (€667 annually) for 40,000 and is self-hosted only. · by dan scutaru
better: Hosted, with the visual canvas closest to n8n's, routers and branches included. 3,000+ apps, and a free plan of 1,000 credits a month with no end date, which n8n Cloud does not have.
you give up: Make bills nearly every module that processes data, the trigger included, so a ten-step run costs about ten credits where n8n counts one execution. No self-hosted edition: it is cloud-first on every plan.
better: Nothing to install and the longest app list going, 9,000+, so the connector you need almost certainly exists. A free plan of 100 tasks a month with no end date.
you give up: Every action step is a task. The free plan stops at one trigger and one action, multi-step Zaps start at $29.99 a month for 750 tasks, and 10,000 tasks cost $193.50 a month.
better: If your company runs on Microsoft 365, work accounts can already build cloud flows with standard connectors at no extra cost. It also automates desktop apps that have no API by mimicking mouse and keyboard.
you give up: The free licence cannot share flows and stops at standard connectors. Premium connectors need Premium, $15 per user a month billed yearly, so the bill follows headcount, not runs.
better: The core is MIT, so you can host it for clients or ship it inside a product. It also bills like n8n: on its cloud one run is one credit however many steps it has, with 1,000 free a month and 10,000 for $20.
you give up: 760+ integrations against n8n's 2,366. Agents, projects, API keys and the embedding SDK sit in enterprise folders under a separate licence, and the white-label Embed plan starts at $36,000 a year. AI steps on its cloud cost 2 to 20 credits each.
better: A plain Apache 2.0 licence under the OpenJS Foundation: use it, host it, sell it. Light enough for a Raspberry Pi, and still shipping, with 5.0.8 out on 8 October.
you give up: Built for devices and event streams, not SaaS. The only HubSpot node in its library was last updated in 2022, so for business apps you often call the API yourself. The editor is not secured by default: anyone who reaches its address can deploy changes until you lock it down.
better: Every step is a real script, in TypeScript, Python, Go, Bash, SQL, Rust and more, and flows are built from those scripts. The free self-hosted Community Edition has unlimited executions and up to 50 users, 10 of them with SSO, which n8n's free edition lacks entirely.
you give up: Teammates who do not code cannot maintain it. The Community Edition images include proprietary code you may not resell or run as a managed service without a deal, so it fixes no licence problem. Paid plans start at $120 a month.
better: Durable execution for workflows written in Go, Java, Python, TypeScript, .NET, PHP or Ruby, with timers that can sleep for months. The server is MIT licensed, and Temporal Cloud has no base fee: $50 per million actions to start.
you give up: No connectors, no canvas, no templates. You write every API call yourself and either run the cluster or pay for Cloud, which wants a card even for its $150 of trial credit. Overkill for a form that posts to Slack.
better: Built around AI agents rather than node graphs, with 35+ models, unlimited seats and shared credentials on Pro, $37 a month for 20,000 credits.
you give up: No free plan, only a 14-day trial. Credits pay for tokens and API calls at list price plus an 8% orchestration fee, 16% if you bring your own keys, and agents stop when the credits run out unless you turn on pay as you go. Its pricing table now labels workflows 'Legacy'.
better: Open source and self-hostable, made for AI apps: chatbots, agents and agentic workflows over your own data, published as a web app or an API. The cloud Sandbox is free with 200 message credits.
you give up: The licence is Apache 2.0 with conditions: no multi-tenant service and no removing Dify's logo from its frontend without a commercial licence. Cloud Professional is $59 a month per workspace. If most of your workflows have no AI step, it is the wrong tool.
better: You describe the job and Claude writes and runs the code. Routines run it on Anthropic's cloud on a schedule, from an API call or on GitHub pull requests and releases, all included in Claude Pro at $20 a month.
you give up: Routines are a research preview, the shortest schedule is hourly, and runs draw on the same usage limit as your chats. A routine belongs to your account, not your team, and a green run only means the session finished, not that the job worked. Claude models only.
The headline price means little until you know the unit. n8n and Activepieces charge per run, however many steps it has. Zapier charges per action step and Make per module, trigger included, so a long workflow costs several times a short one. Power Automate charges per person: Premium is $15 a user a month.
Gumloop and Claude Code bill the model's work, so the cost follows how hard the agent thinks, not how often it runs. Windmill's paid plans charge per developer and per worker, Temporal per million actions. Before you compare, count steps per run and runs per month for your busiest workflow.
Make is the closest thing to n8n you do not have to host, and the difference is the meter. Take a trigger and nine steps, run 1,000 times a month. On Make that is at least 10,000 credits, which starts at Core, $9 a month billed annually. On n8n Cloud it is 1,000 executions, inside Starter at €20 a month billed annually. At that size Make is cheaper.
Double the steps and Make's count doubles while n8n's stays put, so long workflows tip the other way. Routers cost no credits on Make, which helps branchy scenarios. Credits bought on top of a monthly plan expire after a month.
n8n is not open source. Its Sustainable Use License covers internal business, personal and non-commercial use, and you may not charge others for it. Most open source alternatives carry fine print too. Activepieces is MIT except its enterprise folders. Windmill's source is AGPLv3, but the Community Edition images contain proprietary code you may not resell. Dify is Apache 2.0 with a ban on multi-tenant hosting. Node-RED (Apache 2.0) and Temporal (MIT) are the plain ones.
If you only automate your own company's work, n8n's licence already allows it, and switching for licence reasons buys you nothing.
Only self-hosted: the Community Edition has no licence fee and no execution cap, and you run the server. n8n Cloud has a trial of 1,000 executions, then Starter at €24 a month, billed in euros. The full answer →
For personal chores, sometimes. OpenClaw is a free, MIT-licensed assistant you run on your own machine and message from WhatsApp or Telegram, built around an agent you talk to. n8n runs fixed steps you can inspect run by run, which is what you want for invoices and CRM updates. OpenClaw's skills come from a public registry, so read what you install.
For devices, sensors and home automation, yes, and its Apache 2.0 licence lets you do anything with it. For business apps, no: n8n lists 2,366 integrations, while Node-RED leans on community nodes, some of them years old.
Inside a Microsoft 365 company, often yes: flows with standard connectors cost nothing extra and it can drive desktop apps. Outside Microsoft's apps, n8n is usually the better buy, because Power Automate's premium connectors cost $15 per user a month while n8n charges per run, not per person.
Yes. Make (1,000 credits a month), Zapier (100 tasks) and Activepieces (1,000 credits) all have hosted free plans with no end date, which n8n Cloud lacks. Self-hosted, Activepieces, Node-RED and Windmill's Community Edition cost nothing but the server.