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Prices and details checked in October 2026. Prices change, so we give ranges where plans vary.
In the Zapier vs Make question, one detail on the pricing pages changes the whole bill: Zapier sells tasks in fixed tiers, never one by one. A workflow that burns 9,000 tasks a month is billed at the 10,000-task tier, which costs $129 on yearly billing. Make’s Core plan, with 10,000 credits, costs $9 on the same terms.
Three steps follow. You count what your workflows do, apply each company’s counting rule, then pick the cheapest tier that covers the result, with prices read on the official pages.
Contents
Step 1: count the steps and the runs
Open your three busiest automations. For each one, note how many steps it has and how many times it runs in a month.
The first step is the trigger, the event that starts everything. A new Shopify order, a new row in Google Sheets, a new lead from your website form.
Take a five-person marketing agency in Austin. Each new lead from its contact form goes to HubSpot, a Google Sheet, a Slack channel and a welcome email, with a few lookups in between. That makes one trigger and nine actions, and the form brings in 1,000 leads a month.
Now the three rules. Zapier bills a task for each successful action, and the trigger does not count, according to its pricing page. Make bills in credits, and most actions use one credit each; since 27 August 2025 it counts credits rather than operations. Its trigger counts too, while routers and error handlers are free. n8n bills one execution per complete run, “regardless of complexity,” in the words of its pricing page.
Step 2: apply each rule to the same workflow
Here is the agency’s workflow, run 1,000 times a month. Zapier and Make count units, so the table shows the tier each one forces you into. Prices are the yearly rates shown on each official page.
| Platform | Units used | Tier that covers them | Monthly cost |
|---|---|---|---|
| Zapier Professional | 9,000 tasks | 10,000 tasks | $129 |
| Make Core | 10,000 credits | 10,000 credits | $9 |
| n8n Starter | 1,000 executions | 2,500 executions | €20 |
The method is simple: take the cheapest tier that covers your units.
Zapier’s tier below this one, 5,000 tasks at $89, is too small for 9,000 tasks. The next one up is the 10,000-task tier. On n8n, the Pro plan at €50 only makes sense beyond 2,500 executions.
On this workflow, Zapier costs about 14 times as much as Make, $129 against $9. Quality has nothing to do with it: nine actions count nine times at Zapier, while n8n counts the whole run once.
Shorter workflows tell another story. Picture a freelance designer whose new Typeform answers land in a Google Sheet, 700 times a month. Zapier counts 700 tasks, which fit in the $19.99 tier of 750. Make counts 1,400 credits, more than the 1,000 of its free plan, so Core at $9 is needed. n8n Starter costs €20. The gap shrinks to about eleven dollars.
One more line deserves a pencil. Make bills its trigger for every scheduled check: 288 credits a day at a five-minute interval, according to Make’s help page. A check every minute would use up Core’s 10,000 credits in about a week. An instant webhook, or a fifteen-minute interval, avoids it.
Billing month to month costs more: $193.50 for the Zapier 10,000-task tier and $10.48 for Make Core. n8n also bills monthly; its page says yearly payment saves 17%.
Step 3: choose the tool that fits your numbers
Zapier: short workflows and rare apps
Zapier connects more than 9,000 apps, the widest catalog of the three. If your stack includes a niche CRM or an industry tool, it is often the only one with a ready-made connector. Team costs $69 a month billed yearly, starting at 2,000 tasks and 25 users.
A US online store owner described the bill on Trustpilot in September 2025. The shop links its Ecwid store to Gmail, OpenPhone and TextMagic to text order updates to customers. A Google Sheet of known fraudulent emails filters orders before they ship. The one complaint is the bill, around $200 a month “for few automations.” See Zapier’s plans.
Make: long workflows on common apps
Make lists more than 3,000 apps and a visual editor where each module is a bubble you drag into place. Core costs $9 a month on yearly billing for 10,000 credits. Pro costs $16 and Teams $29 on the same terms. The free plan includes 1,000 credits a month.
A US reviewer on Trustpilot wanted a simple thing: each new five-star review posted on the company’s Facebook Page. Zapier could not handle it, the reviewer wrote, and Make does it on the free plan. The interface felt less simple than a rival’s, but not enough to justify paying more. See Make’s plans.
n8n: one price per run
n8n lists its plans in euros. Starter gives 2,500 executions for €20 a month. Pro raises that to 10,000 for €50; both are billed yearly, with a free trial and no credit card. Business, at €667 a month for 40,000 executions, is self-hosted only and sells features such as single sign-on, not cheaper volume.
The free Community Edition runs on your own server. You pay for the machine and for the hours someone spends keeping it updated. See n8n’s plans.
The three platforms at a glance
| Criterion | Zapier | Make | n8n |
|---|---|---|---|
| Unit billed | task: one successful action | credit: most actions use one | execution: one full run |
| Does the trigger count? | no | yes, each time it runs | part of the execution |
| Free plan | 100 tasks a month, two-step Zaps | 1,000 credits a month | self-hosted Community Edition |
| Entry plan, billed yearly | Professional, $19.99 a month, 750 tasks | Core, $9 a month, 10,000 credits | Starter, €20 a month, 2,500 executions |
| Entry plan, billed monthly | $29.99 | $10.48 | about 17% more than yearly |
| Next plan, billed yearly | Team, $69 a month, 2,000 tasks | Pro $16, Teams $29 a month | Pro, €50 a month, 10,000 executions |
| Apps | more than 9,000 | more than 3,000 | every integration on every plan, plus an HTTP node |
| Best fit | two or three steps, rare apps | long flows, common apps | long, frequent flows |
The table settles the Zapier vs Make choice for most teams once the step count is known.
What users report
Another American reviewer on Trustpilot, in June 2024, runs Zapier across many company processes. The setup was smooth and everything worked as expected, with pricing judged fair, if on the high side.
On Make, a US user wrote in September 2025 that the platform is very powerful but somewhat complicated at first. With help from an AI language model, the reviewer built workflows that now cover several business functions, and found support useful when things got stuck.
The n8n reviews come from builders. An experienced Make developer in the US, writing in April 2025, found n8n harder than Make but gave it the edge for control, JavaScript support and self-hosting. Another US user runs a few voice-agent workflows that save many hours every day.
How we chose
Zapier and n8n prices come from their official pricing pages, read in October 2026. Make’s rates, for 10,000 credits a month, were read on its pricing page on 28 October 2026, and the credit rules come from Make’s help pages.
User stories come from Trustpilot reviews written in English by customers in the United States, dated between June 2024 and May 2026. Prices exclude sales tax, which depends on your state.
Before you buy
Run step 1 on paper before any trial. Ten minutes with your three busiest automations gives you the only numbers that matter.
On Make, switch triggers that do not need to be instant to a longer interval. On any yearly plan, put the renewal date in your calendar the day you subscribe, since Zapier and Make both price yearly payment lower than monthly.
Your questions
Zapier vs Make: which one costs less for a small team?
Make, once a workflow passes two or three steps: in the agency example, $9 against $129. For very short flows, Zapier Professional stays within about eleven dollars.
Can I move my Zaps to Make or n8n?
Treat it as a rebuild, not a move. Each platform describes a workflow in its own way, so recreate them one by one, costliest first. Keep the old plan until the new one matches a full month of results.
Is self-hosted n8n free for a business?
For internal business use, yes: the Sustainable Use License limits use to internal business, non-commercial or personal purposes. The server and its upkeep still cost money.
Which one to choose
In the Zapier vs Make vs n8n race, the step count picks the winner. Few steps and a rare app point to Zapier. Many steps on common apps point to Make, and high volume with long flows points to n8n.
For most small teams, Make Core at $9 a month is the safest first bet.
More of our guides
Automations often end in a newsletter, and our Brevo vs Mailchimp comparison prices the sending side. The logins your Zaps rely on are safer in a team password manager, and marketers who track the leads these flows collect can read Ahrefs vs Semrush.
How we work
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