n8n vs Make vs Zapier: What a UK Small Business Actually Pays in 2026

Last checked: October 2026 — automation pricing changes often, so treat the exact figures as roughly right for now, not fixed.

If you've spent any time researching automation tools, you've seen the headline prices: Zapier from around £15 a month, Make from under a tenner, n8n free if you run it yourself. Those numbers are technically true and almost useless for working out what you'll actually pay.

The reason is that the three tools count usage in completely different ways. So the headline price tells you very little about your real bill once you're running actual workflows. This guide explains what each one costs a small business, where the cheap plans stop being cheap, and how to choose without getting caught out.

(On currency: all three price in US dollars or euros, so the £ figures below are approximate conversions and will shift with the exchange rate — and your card may add a conversion fee on top. Treat them as rounded, not exact, and don't budget to the penny.)

The one thing that decides your bill

Ignore the plan names for a moment. The number that really matters is how each tool counts a "unit" of automation, because that's what you're paying for.

• Zapier charges per task. A task is one action that runs. A five-step automation that runs 100 times a month uses about 400 tasks (Zapier doesn't charge for the trigger step, only the actions after it — so four of the five count each time).
• Make charges per credit. Every step in a workflow uses one credit each time it handles something. That same five-step workflow running 100 times can use around 500 credits. (Make used to call these "operations" — older guides still do — but it's the same thing.)
• n8n charges per execution (one execution = one full run of a workflow, however many steps it has). That same workflow running 100 times is 100 executions — not 400 or 500.

That difference is the whole game. The exact same piece of work can cost very different amounts depending on which tool you build it in. How much more depends on the job, but the pattern holds: paying per step (Zapier and Make) gets expensive as workflows get more complex, while paying per run (n8n) doesn't.

What each one costs, plainly

Here's where the paid plans actually start in 2026, and the catch that comes with each.

Zapier

• Free: £0 — 100 tasks a month, and automations limited to two steps. Fine for one very simple job. Not enough for anything with more than a couple of steps, which is most useful automations.
• Professional: around £15 a month (paid yearly) for 750 tasks, rising from there.
• The catch: most people underestimate how many tasks they'll use by three to five times, because they think in "automations" but get charged per action. A few multi-step automations running several times a day will pass 750 tasks quickly. Zapier is the most polished tool and connects to the most apps, but you pay well for that.

Make

• Free: £0 — 1,000 credits a month, two active workflows, and it only checks for new activity every 15 minutes (not instantly). Actually usable for testing and one or two light automations.
• Core: around £8–9 a month for 10,000 credits.
• The catch: credits disappear faster than the big "10,000" figure suggests, because every step counts. A workflow that re-scans a 400-row spreadsheet each time it runs can use well over 1,500 credits in a single run. Make is the best-value choice for non-technical people doing a moderate amount of automation — as long as you set workflows up to look at new information only, not re-check everything each time.

n8n

• Run it yourself: the software is free, with no limit on how much it runs. You only pay for somewhere to host it — usually about £4–6 a month on a basic server.
• n8n Cloud (managed for you): around £17 a month (paid yearly) for 2,500 executions, with no server for you to look after.
• The catch — two of them. First, "free" only applies if you're willing and able to run your own server. If that idea makes you nervous, n8n Cloud is your real starting price, not nothing. Second, that execution limit is unforgiving: one workflow that checks something every five minutes uses over 8,000 executions a month. That's enough to burn through the 2,500 Cloud allowance in about nine days. Hit the limit and your workflows can be paused until the next month or until you upgrade, so check how your plan handles it before you rely on it.

The honest comparison

Which should you pick?

There's no single right answer, but here's the choice that fits most small businesses.

Start on Make's free plan. It's the most usable free option, the credit system is forgiving enough for a couple of real automations, and it costs nothing while you learn. Build one thing that saves you real time before you pay for anything.

Move to Make Core (around £8–9 a month) when you outgrow two workflows or run out of credits. For most small businesses doing a moderate amount of automation, this is the sensible long-term home: cheapest per unit of the three, and no server to manage.

Choose Zapier only if an app you need connects there and nowhere else, or if a non-technical person has to manage the automations without help. You'll pay roughly £15–80 a month more for that convenience. Sometimes it's worth it; often it isn't.

Choose n8n if you (or someone you trust) are comfortable running a small server, or if your automations run at high volume, where paying per run works out much cheaper. Running it yourself is by far the cheapest at scale and keeps your data on systems you control. Just be honest about whether "can I run a server?" is a yes — the £4–6-a-month figure means nothing if it isn't.

The reality check

Here's what the pricing pages won't tell you.

The cheapest tool is the one you don't over-build in. Most cost surprises aren't about the tool's price — they're about how the workflow was put together. If a filter that removes unwanted entries sits at the end of a workflow instead of the start, you're paying to process entries you then throw away. Moving a single filter to the front can cut your monthly usage noticeably, with no change in results. Whatever tool you pick, how you build matters more than the plan.

"Check every few minutes" is the silent budget-killer. Any automation set to check for new activity on a timer multiplies your usage enormously. Where a tool can instead react only when something actually happens (often called a "webhook" or a "watch for new item" trigger — the event that starts an automation), use that. This one habit can cut usage many times over for the same work.

Work out a normal month and a busy month before you pay. All three tools either pause or charge extra when you go over your allowance. Estimate roughly how much your workflows will use in an average month, then in your busiest month, and pay for the busy one. Guessing low is the most common way people get a nasty surprise in month two.

"Free forever" always has a condition. n8n's free option assumes you'll run your own server; Make's assumes you'll stay under two workflows; Zapier's assumes your automations are very simple. All three are genuinely useful for learning. None is where a working business stays long-term. Expect to pay for a paid plan eventually and you won't be caught out.

Official pages to check

• Zapier pricing
• Make pricing
• n8n pricing

Prices and limits checked October 2026 against several independent pricing breakdowns and the tools' own pages. £ figures are approximate conversions from the tools' US dollar and euro pricing and will move with the exchange rate. These tools change their pricing from time to time — always confirm the current numbers on the official pricing page before you commit. This guide is independent and drafted with AI, then reviewed and fact-checked against hands-on experience with these tools before publishing (see How we make our guides). Where we link to tools we may, in future, earn a small commission at no cost to you, but the advice above is based on how these tools actually behave, not on what pays us.