The pricing pages are not comparable, because the three tools count different things. That is the whole decision, and it is usually made backwards.
| Tool | Entry price | Counts | Included |
|---|---|---|---|
| Make (Core) | ~$9/mo | Operations — each module execution | 10,000 |
| Zapier (Professional) | ~$19.99/mo | Tasks — each data-moving step | Multi-step workflows |
| n8n Cloud (Starter) | ~$20/mo | Executions — one per workflow run | 2,500 |
| n8n self-hosted | $0 | Executions, unlimited | You run it — 2 vCPU / 4GB minimum |
Entry pricing as published and verified in 2026. Check the vendor before you commit; these tiers move.
How many steps are in your typical workflow.
A five-step workflow run 1,000 times a month is 5,000 tasks on Zapier, roughly 5,000 operations on Make, and 1,000 executions on n8n. The same work, priced three ways. Long workflows make n8n cheap; short ones make the difference irrelevant.
Nobody on the team is technical, the workflows are short, and you want the largest library of pre-built connectors. You are paying a premium for the fact that it rarely needs thinking about. For many businesses that premium is correct.
You are comfortable with a visual builder, the logic branches, and you want a lot of volume for the money. The learning curve is real but short.
Workflows are long, volume is high, or the data cannot leave your infrastructure. Self-hosting is free in licence terms only — budget for someone who can keep a server running, or the outage costs more than the subscription ever saved.
Picking the tool before you have priced the problem. All three are cheap next to a build, and all three are wasted if pointed at a process that was not costing you much. Work out what the leak is worth first — the calculator takes a minute — and only then pick the instrument.
We sell no licences for any of these and take no affiliate revenue. Recommending "nothing, turn on the native integration you already have" is a normal outcome of the audit.
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