Comparison

n8n vs. Make

n8n

n8n is a workflow automation tool under the sustainable use license. You can host n8n on your own server and deploy the Community Edition at no extra cost. The source code is available on GitHub.

n8n Cloud is n8n's hosted solution. In addition to all the self-hosted features, it provides added benefits such as:

• No technical setup or maintenance for your n8n instance
• 24/7 uptime monitoring
• Connect apps in just one click via OAuth
• One-click upgrades to the newest n8n versions
• Team collaboration

At the core of n8n is its fair and predictable pricing model. n8n Cloud tiers start at €20 per month for 2.5k workflow executions. Every plan comes with unlimited users, unlimited workflows, and access to all 500+ integrations.

n8n’s philosophy is simple: you should never be penalized for building powerful workflows.

That’s why n8n charges per execution, not per task. A simple two-step workflow and a complex 200-step AI-powered agent both count as a single execution. This provides predictable costs and allows you to scale your automations without the fear of a massive bill. You can save thousands per year compared to task-based alternatives.

Make

Make’s pricing is based on a consumption model, where the cost is tied directly to the number of individual actions your workflows perform.

Historically, Make has called these Operations. Every time a module in your workflow performs a task, whether it's reading a single customer record, writing one row to a spreadsheet, or posting a message, it consumes at least one operation. Any module that receives multiple bundles of data will multiply its cost. This means the final cost of an automation is directly linked to how many modules it has and how many data items it processes. A single, complex workflow that loops through hundreds of records can quickly burn through a large portion of your monthly budget with no changes to the workflow itself. Simply because you had a busier month.

Starting August 27th 2025, Make is transitioning its billing unit from Operations to Credits. While most standard actions will convert at a one-to-one ratio (1 operation = 1 credit), this new system introduces a key change: variable consumption. The main reason for this shift is to allow for dynamic pricing, where more complex or resource-intensive modules, especially those with AI, consume a different number of credits based on factors like token usage, file size or processing time.

In this model, you have to constantly monitor multiple, interconnected factors (operations, data, time, frequency). You need to budget not just for how many times your automations run, but also for how complex they are and what kind of tasks they're performing.

n8n

With n8n, you’re never building alone. n8n’s community forum has over 40K+ members ready to help. If you get stuck, you can post a question and get a fast response, often the same day. You’ll be talking with fellow automation builders, engineers, experts, power users who’re actively building and sharing solutions. On top of that, n8n has a dedicated support team on a community forum.

There are multiple other ways to contact n8n or use a large active community of n8n experts. Plus, n8n's documentation is updated regularly, so you can always find the latest info you need.

When your workflows are mission-critical and you need a direct line, the Enterprise plan offers direct support. It includes Email support and guaranteed response times for your most urgent issues.

So, you get the best of both worlds. A massive community of active builders to learn from day one and a direct line to the n8n team when you grow and need it. Build with total confidence.

Make

When it comes to getting support, your experience with Make will likely come down to which plan you're on.

For everyone, there’s a community forum where you can post questions and share tips with other users. It’s a great place to troubleshoot common issues and see how others are solving similar problems.

But if you need to talk directly to the official support team, you’ll be using a ticket-based system and this is where things can get complicated. Users on lower-tier plans have reported that responses can be slow or inconsistent, with some tickets going unanswered.

This can be a big challenge if you run into a critical issue, like a scenario that suddenly consumes your entire monthly budget in a couple of days. Some praise the support team as excellent and others find it disappointing, especially when seeking a quick resolution.

At the end of the day, while the community is a solid resource, getting dedicated, fast support is treated as a premium feature. For day-to-day issues, you’ll likely be digging into the community threads or official documentation to find the answers you need.

n8n

You can choose between different deployment options: self-host n8n on a Virtual Private Server (VPS), Heroku, your own server, or even a personal computer. You only pay for the infrastructure and deployment, n8n Community Edition comes free of charge. For extended self-hosting features you can consider a self-hosted Business plan that brings advanced collaboration features, multiple environments and built-in Git versioning.

Self-hosting n8n offers full control over your data and workflows, crucial for compliance with privacy regulations like GDPR or CCPA. It also enhances security by removing risks associated with third-party vendors.

You can choose how to set up your n8n instance:

• npm is a quick way to get started with n8n on your local machine. You must have Node.js installed;
• Docker installation that allows setting up n8n in a clean environment. It also offers an easier setup for your preferred database;
• Or launch n8n's Self-hosted AI Starter Kit which lets you install a fully featured local AI model, a vector store and PostgreSQL together with n8n.

For a fully managed experience, n8n cloud uses Microsoft Azure for hosting. The physical hardware powering n8n, and the data stored by the platform, is hosted in the Azure Germany West Central data center in Frankfurt. This ensures data residency and compliance for n8n European customers.

Make

Make is a fully managed, cloud-only platform.

This means that all of your workflows, credentials, and the data you process will live exclusively on Make's infrastructure, which is hosted on AWS either in the United States (Virginia) or in the European Union. For their largest enterprise customers, they offer deployment to a private AWS environment.

Enterprise clients can also install on-prem Agent for secure data access. Scenarios are still executed in the cloud.

Ultimately, the model is designed for teams who prefer a hands-off approach and are comfortable handing over control of their data's physical location to a third-party, managed ecosystem.

n8n

n8n is building its own native integrations and is accepting community-built connectors to its library (approved community nodes are available for anyone, even on cloud tiers).

Universal connectors: if a certain integration doesn't exist, you can connect to virtually any service with a connector for REST APIs (HTTP requests), GraphQL, and Webhooks or even write your own JavaScript / Python code inside a workflow to do pretty much anything.

Build your own nodes or even radically change the system or its UI to better suit your use case. This unique capability lets you transform any internal tool or third-party API into a first-class, reusable component within the n8n ecosystem.

Use verified partner-built nodes to power your workflows. These are ready-to-go tools that help you do things like scrape search engine results, pull fresh content from social media, or even gather data to train your own AI chatbots. Check some of our recent additions: SerpApi, ElevenLabs, Brave Search, Qdrant, and Bright Data.

The code for n8n is available on GitHub and the n8n team is always keen to accept new contributions from the community.

This is all possible because of n8n's visible-source foundation. The platform is built to be extended, and n8n actively encourages community contributions on GitHub, ensuring the ecosystem is always growing.

Make

If you need an integration that isn't already on Make's platform, you’ll need to use the official Make Developer Hub. Here, you can use a dedicated "Apps Editor" to build, test, and deploy custom apps. This allows you to create private integrations for your internal tools or even build a new app that you intend to share publicly.

However, the deployment process involves a formal submission and review process. While you can build and use a private app within your own Make account, if you want to make it available to the public, it must be submitted to the Make team for a formal review. Only after it's approved is it listed in their public app directory for other users to find and install.

For connecting to unsupported APIs, the go-to solution within Make is the universal HTTP module. While this is a powerful tool for making direct API calls, it means you'll be working with raw requests and manual configurations for every step of your workflow.

This approach maintains a curated, standardized library of apps, but it means you don't have the option to build your own private integrations with a custom UI. You are either dependent on the generic HTTP module's capabilities or on the official roadmap for a native-like experience.

n8n

n8n offers you a visual interactive development environment where you can instantly see your flow logic. It acts as a visual flowchart and clearly represents your automation's execution path, including complex branching and merging.

At any point in your workflow, you can click on a node and see the raw JSON data flowing through it. There are no black boxes. Debugging becomes intuitive and lets you understand exactly how your data is being transformed. It mirrors the process of inspecting variables and objects while coding.

The expression editor lets you write JavaScript snippets directly within the interface, with instant access to the data from previous steps. You aren't confined to a restrictive set of pre-defined mapping tools and can resort to custom code whenever you need it.

Plus, the entire experience is built on a fast and clean canvas. You can even embed screenshots, videos and drop sticky notes right onto your workflow to document complex logic or leave reminders for your team.

n8n helps you organise development logic and provides deep, granular control at the same time.

Make

When it comes to managing data in Make, you won't be using a familiar language like JavaScript. Instead, you'll need to learn and master Make's proprietary functions and formulas. This means that for common tasks like transforming an array or formatting a date, you'll be translating your logic into Make's specific syntax. This can cause a learning curve, and when you get stuck, you're searching for answers within a much smaller universe than, say, the entire JavaScript community.

What about when things go wrong? Building robust error handling requires a very manual approach. You need to add special error handler routes to each individual module that you anticipate might fail. This can be time-consuming to set up and even more difficult to maintain, as you have to meticulously account for every potential point of failure across your entire workflow.

As your automations grow, you may also face some structural issues. The platform makes it easy to split your workflow into different branches, but bringing those branches back together into a single path is not straightforward. This can make building multi-path logic more challenging than you might expect.

It’s a system with its own paradigm for managing data and logic. It requires you to work within the confines of its visual tools and proprietary language.