Make vs Zapier vs n8n for a small service business

This is the difference that matters most, because it decides what you'll actually pay.

Zapier counts tasks: each successful action step is one task, and the trigger doesn't count. According to Zapier's pricing page, the Free plan gives you 100 tasks a month for two-step Zaps only. Professional starts at $19.99 a month billed annually ($29.99 monthly) for 750 tasks, and adds multi-step Zaps, webhooks and premium apps. Team starts at $69 a month billed annually for 2,000 tasks and up to 25 users. Go over your allowance and you pay per extra task.

Make counts credits: each module action usually uses one credit, and some AI features use more. Make's pricing includes a Free plan with 1,000 credits a month and a 15-minute minimum interval between scheduled runs. Paid plans start from $9 a month for Core with 10,000 credits, with Pro from $16 and Teams from $29, according to Make's own comparison page. Annual billing is cheaper than monthly. Make also runs a start-up offer for businesses under 20 employees; check the pricing page for terms.

n8n counts executions: one execution is one full run of a workflow, however many steps it has. On n8n's pricing page, the cloud Starter plan is €24 a month (€20 a month billed annually) for 2,500 executions, and Pro is €60 a month (€50 billed annually) for 10,000. All plans include unlimited users and workflows. There's a free cloud trial, and a free self-hosted Community Edition, released under n8n's Sustainable Use License, which is "fair-code" rather than standard open source.

Say you run a 10-person cleaning firm with one workflow: a new enquiry comes in, and four actions follow (add to the CRM, send a confirmation, create a task, post in the team chat). It runs 500 times a month.

• On Zapier, that's four tasks per run: about 2,000 tasks a month.
• On Make, it's roughly one credit per module: about 2,000 to 2,500 credits a month, depending on how the trigger is set up.
• On n8n, it's one execution per run: 500 executions a month.

Now add a second workflow with 15 steps that runs 50 times a month. The per-step tools climb quickly; n8n barely moves. Run your own numbers through each vendor's calculator, because the cheapest tool for a two-step workflow is rarely the cheapest for a long one.

Zapier is the simplest. You build step by step in a straight line, and it has the largest app directory: more than 9,000 apps, according to Zapier. If you want something working this afternoon without help, it's the obvious start.

Make shows your workflow as a visual map, which makes branching ("if the enquiry is for a deep clean, do this; otherwise, do that") easier to see and build. Routers and filters are available on the Free plan. There's more to learn than Zapier, but more control once you have.

n8n is the most technical. It's visual too, but it assumes you're comfortable with data structures and, for self-hosting, with running a server. In return you get a lot of flexibility, including custom code steps.

If customer personal data flows through these tools, this matters for UK GDPR. Our UK GDPR checks before you plug AI into customer data cover the wider picture.

• Zapier says on its data privacy page that it stores data on AWS in the United States, with no EU-only hosting option. It's certified under the Data Privacy Framework including the UK Extension, and offers a data processing addendum.
• Make lets you choose a US or EU data centre when you create your organisation, and that choice can't be changed later. Make notes that some of its AI features route data to the US regardless.
• n8n says its cloud service is hosted in the EU (Frankfurt). If you self-host, the data stays wherever you run it, and so does the responsibility for securing it.

None of these is automatically right or wrong. You need to know which applies and reflect it in your supplier records and privacy notice.

• Choose Zapier if nobody on the team is technical, your workflows are short, and you want the widest choice of apps with the least setup.
• Choose Make if your workflows branch, you want more steps for the money, or you'd like an EU data centre without hosting anything yourself.
• Choose n8n if you have someone technical, your workflows are long or run often, or you want to self-host for control over the data.

Whichever you pick, build it in an account you own, give every workflow a named owner, and set up an alert for failed runs. Then measure whether it's working, starting with the numbers every service dashboard needs. Our Workflow automation page explains how we approach it, and there's more in all our guides.