n8n alternatives, 2026.Q3: every real option, ranked
The short answer
Edition v2026.Q3 · pricing and status verified 2026-08-06.
Zapier is the strongest n8n alternative for most — non-technical teams whose bottleneck is the SaaS long tail — if an app has an API, Zapier almost certainly already connects it. Then: Make · Gumloop · Activepieces. Below, all 17 real options in the workflow automation category, with pricing and honest watch-outs — plus the 3 "alternatives" other lists still recommend that are dead, renamed, or sunsetting.
Why people look past n8n at all: Fair-code (Sustainable Use License), not OSI open source — no reselling the self-hosted edition. Per-execution cloud pricing jumps steeply from Pro (€50) to Business (€667). Verified ARR trails the hype: $40M as of Jul 2025 (Sacra); the '$100M+' figures circulating in 2026 are single-source.
The top n8n alternatives, ranked
2ZapierZapier
Free 100 tasks/mo · Professional from $19.99/mo · Team from $69/mo · Enterprise custom · Agents add-on free–$33.33/moBest for Non-technical teams whose bottleneck is the SaaS long tail — if an app has an API, Zapier almost certainly already connects it.
Watch Task-based pricing punishes scale — high-volume workflows cost multiples of Make or self-hosted n8n. Closed source, no self-hosting, and the Agents product is a metered add-on. Last verified revenue is 2023; 2026 figures in circulation are aggregator projections.
3MakeMake (Celonis)
Free 1,000 credits/mo · Core $12/mo (10k credits) · Pro $21/mo · Teams $38/mo · Enterprise customBest for Visual power users who want branching, iterators, and data-mapping depth Zapier hides — at roughly half Zapier's price per unit of work.
Watch The 2025–26 shift from 'operations' to credit-based pricing reset what a dollar buys — recheck your math before migrating. AI-agent features trail n8n and Gumloop in depth, and there is no self-hosted option; Celonis ownership means enterprise roadmap gravity.
4GumloopGumloop (YC W24)
Pro $37/mo (20k credits, unlimited seats) · Enterprise custom · 14-day trial — no permanent free tierBest for Ops and GTM teams at AI-forward companies who want agentic workflows (scraping, enrichment, LLM steps) without engineering time.
Watch No free tier anymore — trial only — and credit burn on LLM-heavy flows adds up. Far fewer native integrations than the incumbents; no self-hosting (VPC on Enterprise only); valuation and revenue undisclosed.
5ActivepiecesActivepieces (MIT community edition)
Free (cloud or self-host, MIT community edition) · Plus $16/mo · Team $166/mo · Ultimate custom · Embed from $36k/yrBest for Lock-in-averse builders and SaaS companies embedding automation in their own product — the only true-MIT option in the top tier.
Watch A fraction of the incumbents' integration catalog (200+ native pieces vs thousands), and the useful enterprise features — agents, SSO, audit logs — need a paid license even self-hosted. Community is an order of magnitude smaller than n8n's.
Every other live option in workflow automation
| Tool | Maker | What it is | Entry |
|---|---|---|---|
| Lindy | Lindy (Flo Crivello) | Pivoted from agent-builder to 'the ultimate AI executive assistant' ($49.99–$199.99/mo, per-inbox); ~$49.9M raised (Series B led by Battery) — now closer to an AI-assistant element than Wf | $49.99/mo |
| Workato | Workato | Enterprise iPaaS heavyweight — 14,000+ app connections, Genies pre-built agents, MCP Gateway; 8x Gartner iPaaS MQ Leader (2026). Procurement-grade, quote-only pricing | custom quote |
| Tray.ai | Tray (ex-Tray.io) | Enterprise iPaaS rebranded around AI in 2024; Merlin agent builder on a composable integration core | custom quote |
| Power Automate | Microsoft | The Microsoft-shop default — cloud flows + RPA, Copilot-assisted building, bundled reach via M365; clunky outside the Microsoft graph | from ~$15/user/mo |
| IFTTT | IFTTT | The consumer original (2011) — applets for smart-home and personal automation; not a serious business tool anymore | free · Pro ~$3.5/mo |
| Windmill | Windmill Labs | Open-source (AGPL) developer workflow engine — scripts in Python/TS/Go become flows and UIs; the code-first self-host alternative to n8n | free self-host |
| Node-RED | OpenJS Foundation | The OSS flow-based veteran (ex-IBM, 2013) — still everywhere in IoT/edge automation, not built for the SaaS/AI era | free |
| Parabola | Parabola | Spreadsheet-shaped data workflows for ops teams (e-commerce, logistics); AI steps added, niche but loved | free tier |
| Bardeen | Bardeen | Pivoted from general browser-extension automation to agentic GTM scraping/enrichment for sales teams — its old turf now belongs to element Bu · Browser Agent | free tier |
| Trigger.dev | Trigger.dev | Open-source code-first background jobs and AI workflows for TypeScript devs — workflows as code, not canvas | free tier + usage |
| Inngest | Inngest | Durable functions and event-driven workflow orchestration for developers; AgentKit extends it to agents | free tier + usage |
| Temporal | Temporal Technologies | Durable-execution engine underpinning many agent products — infrastructure one layer below this element, included for orientation | free self-host · cloud usage |
| Zapier Agents / Copilot | Zapier | Zapier's own agent layer, listed for clarity: an add-on product line (free–$33.33/mo) atop the platform ranked #2 above, not a separate company | free tier |
The "n8n alternatives" to avoid — no longer what they were
Listicles still recommend these. As of 2026-08-06, they are not what the listicles think.
| Tool | Status | What happened |
|---|---|---|
| Pipedream | acquired | Code-level workflows + 3,000+ connectors for AI agents; definitive agreement with Workday Nov 19, 2025, closing by Jan 31, 2026 — being folded into Workday's agent platform |
| Relay.app | dead | The human-in-the-loop pioneer with per-step approvals; shutting down — free accounts Aug 15, paid Sep 14, 2026, no acquirer named |
| Huginn | fading | The self-hosted 'agents' pioneer (2013, Ruby) — conceptually ahead of its time, development long quiet |
How to choose
- If the task is repeated and deterministic — a trigger, some transforms, an output
- Use a workflow, not an agent. It never hallucinates, costs cents, and every tool here handles it; reach for agent nodes only where judgment is genuinely required.
- If you're technical, want data on your own boxes, or want workflows and agents in one canvas
- n8n — free self-hosted forever, real code when nodes run out, accepting fair-code license limits and steep cloud tier jumps.
- If your bottleneck is the long tail of SaaS apps, or wiring an agent harness to your stack
- Zapier — 9,000+ apps and one MCP connection beats everyone; budget for task-based pricing at scale.
- If you want maximum visual control per dollar and no engineer in the loop
- Make — Core at $12/mo with the deepest no-code scenario builder; just re-run the math after the credits repricing.
- If you're embedding automation inside your own SaaS, or refuse non-OSI licenses
- Activepieces — MIT core with uncapped self-hosting, or the $36k/yr Embed tier instead of building an integration engine yourself.
This analysis is drawn from the Workflow Automation element dossier — the ranked top 5, the comparison matrix, and the complete field of 16 more tools live there, with every source. Data: wf.json (CC BY 4.0).
Every claim above is dated and sourced from the elems dossiers — 1,421 tools tracked across 58 categories, verified 2026-08-06, including the 276 we found dead, renamed, acquired, or sunsetting. Rankings are editorial, never paid — the charter.
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