{
    "title": "n8n Alternatives 2027: 8 Paid, Free & Open-Source",
    "url": "https://zekaiwork.com/alternatives/n8n/",
    "summary": "The best n8n alternatives in 2027 are Zapier (best overall, $19.99/mo), Make (best free plan: 1,000 credits a month) and Activepieces (best open source, MIT). n8n itself starts at €20/mo billed yearly. Zekai checked these prices on vendor pages on 11 Nov 2026; 5 more are compared below, including 3 open source.",
    "tool": {
        "name": "n8n",
        "starting_price": "€20/mo billed yearly",
        "free_plan": "Self-hosted Community Edition; cloud trial only",
        "price_checked": "2026-11-11",
        "pricing_url": "https://n8n.io/pricing/"
    },
    "task": "Workflow automation (no-code)",
    "prices_checked": "2026-11-11",
    "date_modified": "2026-11-11",
    "alternatives": [
        {
            "name": "Zapier",
            "type": "Free plan + paid",
            "starting_price": "$19.99/mo",
            "free_plan_limit": "100 tasks a month, 1 user",
            "best_for": "App-to-app automation for non-developers",
            "difference": "Zapier's Free plan allows 100 tasks a month for one user and Professional starts at $19.99; n8n Cloud offers only a trial with 1,000 executions.",
            "price_checked": "2026-11-11",
            "pricing_url": "https://zapier.com/pricing",
            "website": "https://zapier.com",
            "zekai_score": 9.1,
            "zekai_review": "https://zekaiwork.com/ai-tools/zapier/"
        },
        {
            "name": "Make",
            "type": "Free",
            "starting_price": "Free plan; paid price not published",
            "free_plan_limit": "1,000 credits a month",
            "best_for": "Visual scenario builder with credit billing",
            "difference": "Make's Free plan includes 1,000 credits a month, and most actions use 1 credit, while n8n counts a whole workflow run as one execution.",
            "price_checked": "2026-11-11",
            "pricing_url": "https://www.make.com/en/pricing",
            "website": "https://www.make.com",
            "zekai_score": 8,
            "zekai_review": "https://zekaiwork.com/ai-tools/make/"
        },
        {
            "name": "Power Automate",
            "type": "Paid",
            "starting_price": "$15/user/mo billed yearly",
            "free_plan_limit": "No free plan",
            "best_for": "Microsoft-centred flows with desktop bots",
            "difference": "Power Automate Premium is $15 per user a month billed yearly, with unattended desktop-flow bots at $150 a month; n8n Starter is a flat €20 a month.",
            "price_checked": "2026-11-11",
            "pricing_url": "https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/power-platform/products/power-automate/pricing",
            "website": "https://powerautomate.microsoft.com",
            "zekai_score": 8.5,
            "zekai_review": "https://zekaiwork.com/ai-tools/power-automate/"
        },
        {
            "name": "Gumloop",
            "type": "Paid",
            "starting_price": "$37/mo",
            "free_plan_limit": "No free plan",
            "best_for": "AI-agent workflows on a shared credit pool",
            "difference": "Gumloop Pro starts at $37 a month with 20k credits and unlimited seats after a 14-day trial; n8n Starter gives 2.5K executions.",
            "price_checked": "2026-11-11",
            "pricing_url": "https://www.gumloop.com/pricing",
            "website": "https://www.gumloop.com",
            "zekai_score": 8,
            "zekai_review": "https://zekaiwork.com/ai-tools/gumloop/"
        },
        {
            "name": "Activepieces",
            "type": "Open source",
            "starting_price": "$20/mo (hosted)",
            "free_plan_limit": "No limit (self-hosted)",
            "licence": "MIT",
            "best_for": "MIT-licensed no-code automation, self-hostable",
            "difference": "Activepieces' core is MIT-licensed, its Free plan has 1,000 credits a month for up to 5 users, and a run costs 1 credit regardless of steps.",
            "price_checked": "2026-11-11",
            "pricing_url": "https://www.activepieces.com/pricing",
            "website": "https://www.activepieces.com",
            "repository": "https://github.com/activepieces/activepieces",
            "zekai_open_source_page": "https://zekaiwork.com/free-open-source/activepieces/",
            "zekai_score": 8.2,
            "zekai_review": "https://zekaiwork.com/free-open-source/activepieces/"
        },
        {
            "name": "Windmill",
            "type": "Open source",
            "starting_price": "$20/builder/mo (hosted)",
            "free_plan_limit": "No limit (self-hosted)",
            "licence": "AGPL-3.0",
            "best_for": "Code-first workflows in Python, TypeScript, Go",
            "difference": "Windmill's Community Edition is AGPL-3.0 with unlimited executions and requires PostgreSQL; a paid builder seat is $20 a month plus compute workers at $50 each.",
            "price_checked": "2026-11-11",
            "pricing_url": "https://www.windmill.dev/pricing",
            "website": "https://www.windmill.dev",
            "repository": "https://github.com/windmill-labs/windmill",
            "zekai_open_source_page": "https://zekaiwork.com/free-open-source/windmill/",
            "last_release": "2026-10-30",
            "zekai_score": 7.5,
            "zekai_review": "https://zekaiwork.com/free-open-source/windmill/"
        },
        {
            "name": "Sim",
            "type": "Open source",
            "starting_price": "$25/user/mo (hosted)",
            "free_plan_limit": "No limit (self-hosted)",
            "licence": "Apache-2.0",
            "best_for": "Open-source AI agent workflow builder",
            "difference": "Sim is Apache-2.0, sells Pro at $25 per user a month, and its Free plan is 1,000 one-time credits; n8n Starter is a flat €20 with unlimited users.",
            "price_checked": "2026-11-11",
            "pricing_url": "https://www.sim.ai/pricing",
            "website": "https://www.sim.ai",
            "repository": "https://github.com/simstudioai/sim",
            "zekai_open_source_page": "https://zekaiwork.com/free-open-source/sim/",
            "zekai_score": 8.2,
            "zekai_review": "https://zekaiwork.com/free-open-source/sim/"
        },
        {
            "name": "Langflow",
            "type": "Open source",
            "starting_price": "Free (self-hosted)",
            "free_plan_limit": "No limit (self-hosted)",
            "licence": "MIT",
            "best_for": "Visual builder for multi-agent AI flows",
            "difference": "Langflow is MIT-licensed, installs via uv on Python 3.10-3.14 or a Docker image, and targets multi-agent AI flows with no execution quota.",
            "price_checked": "2026-11-11",
            "pricing_url": "https://github.com/langflow-ai/langflow",
            "website": "https://www.langflow.org",
            "repository": "https://github.com/langflow-ai/langflow",
            "zekai_open_source_page": "https://zekaiwork.com/free-open-source/langflow/",
            "zekai_score": 8.8,
            "zekai_review": "https://zekaiwork.com/free-open-source/langflow/"
        }
    ],
    "faq": [
        {
            "q": "What is the best alternative to n8n in 2027?",
            "a": "Zapier is the best overall n8n alternative on this page ($19.99/mo). For no cost, Make has a free plan (1,000 credits a month). To self-host, Activepieces is open source (MIT)."
        },
        {
            "q": "Is there a free version of n8n?",
            "a": "Yes. n8n has a free plan: Self-hosted Community Edition; cloud trial only. Paid plans start at €20/mo billed yearly, checked on 11 Nov 2026."
        },
        {
            "q": "Is there a 100% free alternative to n8n?",
            "a": "Yes. Activepieces, Windmill, Sim, Langflow are open source and free to self-host. Zapier, Make have a free plan with limits, shown in the table."
        },
        {
            "q": "What is cheaper than n8n?",
            "a": "Power Automate starts at $15/user/mo billed yearly, against €20/mo billed yearly for n8n, as listed on each vendor's pricing page on 11 Nov 2026."
        },
        {
            "q": "How much do n8n alternatives cost for a team of 5?",
            "a": "If each of 5 people buys the entry paid plan, at the prices Zekai checked on 11 Nov 2026, the monthly cost is Power Automate $75/mo, Zapier $99.95/mo, Activepieces $100/mo, against n8n $100/mo for n8n. Team and business plans can cost more per seat. The Zekai Cost Finder on this page recalculates for any team size."
        },
        {
            "q": "Which is better, Zapier or n8n?",
            "a": "Zapier's Free plan allows 100 tasks a month for one user and Professional starts at $19.99; n8n Cloud offers only a trial with 1,000 executions. Choose Zapier if you want a permanent free hosted tier and per-task billing with no servers to run. Stay with n8n if you want unlimited workflows and users on every paid plan."
        },
        {
            "q": "Why are people leaving n8n?",
            "a": "The documented reasons are: In August 2025 n8n removed active-workflow limits, moved Enterprise to execution-based pricing and added a self-hosted Business plan; community users reported Starter execution limits as too low (7 Aug 2025); n8n's pricing page lists no free cloud plan, and its docs list SSO, Git version control, projects, environments and external secrets as missing from the free Community Edition (11 Nov 2026). Each is sourced in the section above."
        },
        {
            "q": "What is better than n8n?",
            "a": "Zapier is easier to start with, Make is a visual alternative, and Activepieces offers an MIT-licensed core. Windmill suits teams that write code, as the comparison above shows."
        }
    ],
    "publisher": "Zekai (zekaiwork.com) — independently reviewed; prices read on vendor pages on the dates shown.",
    "licence": "Free to quote with a link to https://zekaiwork.com/alternatives/n8n/. Bulk copying or republishing the dataset is not permitted."
}