What automation actually costs at your volume.
Zapier and Make bill per task. Self-hosted n8n bills for a server. Which is cheaper depends entirely on how much you run, so put your volume in and see. At low volume this tool will tell you to stay on Zapier.
Rates checked 25 Aug 2026 against each vendor’s entry tier. Zapier’s per-task price improves on higher plans, so its figure here is an upper bound, not a quote: check their current pricing before deciding anything.
- Zapierper task, vendor-hosted$800$9,597/yr
- Makeper operation, vendor-hosted$21$254/yr
- n8n, self-hostedserver only, you maintain it$15$180/yr
Self-hosting wins at this volume, but it is a real server that needs updating, monitoring and fixing when an API changes. Budget for that, whether you do it or we do.
Where self-hosting stops making sense.
The usual pitch is that self-hosted n8n is free and hosted tools are a rip-off. That is not true, and anyone selling it to you that way is not being straight.
Hosted tools win when your volume is low, your logic is simple, and nobody on the team wants to own a server. Zapier is genuinely excellent at that. The setup cost is minutes and the maintenance cost is zero.
Self-hosting wins on three things: cost once volume is high, because the bill stops scaling; data residency, because nothing leaves your infrastructure; and complexity ceiling, because you can drop into real code when the visual builder runs out.
The part usually left out is that a self-hosted instance is a machine somebody has to keep upright. Updates, monitoring, and fixing things when an API changes underneath you. That is a real cost whether it shows up as a bill or as somebody’s Tuesday.
Questions we get a lot.
Is n8n always cheaper than Zapier?
No. At low volume a hosted tool is cheaper and far simpler: the calculator says so when that is the case. Self-hosting has a roughly flat cost, so it wins as volume rises and loses at the bottom end. If you run a handful of automations a month, use Zapier and spend the difference on something else.
Where do these prices come from?
Each vendor’s published entry tier, checked in August 2026: Zapier from $29.99/month for 750 tasks, Make from $10.59/month for 10,000 operations. Zapier’s per-task rate improves on higher plans, so the figure shown here is an upper bound rather than a quote. Always check current pricing before committing.
Why does the n8n figure include a server cost?
Because self-hosting is not free. The n8n licence costs nothing, but it runs on a machine somebody pays for and maintains. We use $15/month for a small VPS that handles typical volumes comfortably. Quoting n8n as $0 would be the kind of dishonest comparison this tool exists to avoid.
What does "SadaWorks maintains it" add?
Monitoring, updates, and fixing workflows when a vendor changes an API: which they do. Automation fails silently, and a broken workflow nobody notices is worse than no workflow. If you have technical staff who can own it, self-managing is perfectly reasonable and the calculator prices that option too.
Does task volume mean the same thing on each platform?
Not exactly, and it is the most common way these comparisons mislead. Zapier counts a task per action step, Make counts an operation per module call, and a single workflow can consume very different amounts on each. Treat the comparison as directional; for an exact figure, we would map your specific workflows.
Want the number for your actual workflows?
Volume alone does not settle it: what each workflow does matters more. Send us what you are running and we will map it properly.
Book a Free Demo