n8n vs Zapier Agents
n8n and Zapier Agents side by side: what each one is, what it costs to start, and whether you can try it free. Everything below comes from the vendors' own sites and other public sources, not from hands-on testing.
At a glance
| n8n | Zapier Agents | |
|---|---|---|
| Category | Autonomous Agents | Business & Ops |
| Starting price | From €20/mo (checked October 2026) | Free; paid plans from $33/mo (checked October 2026) |
| Free tier | Not listed | Yes |
| Profile | Read profile | Read profile |
Prices are in US dollars unless shown otherwise. Confirm the current price on the vendor's site before you buy.
Key differences
Zapier Agents lists a free tier and n8n does not.
Pricing is not directly comparable from the numbers we hold (n8n: From €20/mo; Zapier Agents: Free; paid plans from $33/mo), so check each vendor's pricing page.
They sit in different categories (Autonomous Agents and Business & Ops), so they overlap only partly.
About each tool
n8n
Workflow automation and AI-agent platform. Self-host the Community Edition or use n8n Cloud from €20/mo billed annually; billing counts workflow executions.
Who it is for
Teams and individuals who want to automate tasks across apps and build AI-agent workflows, and who either want a hosted service or can run their own instance. Higher tiers add admin roles, SSO and Git version control for larger organisations.
Strengths
- Cloud billing counts whole workflow executions; n8n says the number of steps in a run does not change the count
- All plans list unlimited users and workflows, and every integration
- Cloud plans include agents, MCP and AI nodes
- A standard self-hosted version is available on GitHub, with documentation at docs.n8n.io
- A free cloud trial is offered (the pricing page says no credit card is needed)
Limitations
- Starter cloud is capped at 2.5K executions a month, 5 concurrent executions and 5 minutes per execution
- Pro cloud is capped at 10K executions a month; admin roles start at Pro
- The Sustainable Use License limits use to internal business or non-commercial purposes; it is not an OSI-approved open-source licence
- SSO/LDAP, multiple environments, queue mode and Git version control are listed under Business
Zapier Agents
No-code AI agents that work across 9,000+ apps in Zapier. Free plan of 400 activities a month; Pro is $400 a year (about $33 a month).
Who it is for
The vendor positions it for teams and businesses, with example uses in sales, marketing, support, IT, HR and engineering. Its guide says it is open to anyone at an organization, whatever their technical skill.
Strengths
- A free plan, described as forever, with 400 activities a month, live data sources, web browsing and the Chrome extension
- The pricing page and the Agents page cite 9,000+ apps, although the Agents page's meta description says 8,000+
- According to the vendor's guide, agents can start on demand, on a schedule, from a Zap or from another app, read live data sources such as Google Drive, Notion and Asana, search the web and call other agents
- Oversight features listed in the guide: an activity dashboard with a Needs action flag, version-controlled instructions, Viewer, Editor and Owner sharing levels, and AI Guardrails for personal data, toxic language, prompt injection and negative sentiment
- The help article says activities do not count toward Zapier task usage, and on paid plans testing an agent does not use activities
Limitations
- Free allows 400 activities a month and 10 per run, tests count toward the quota, and there is no agent sharing. Pro allows 1,500 a month and 40 per run
- An activity is any trigger use, knowledge-source answer, action, web browse or scrape, web search or Chrome-extension message, so a multi-step run uses several. The help article's four-step example counts as 4
- When the limit is reached, agents stop running but you can still chat. The help article describes no way to buy extra activities and the pricing page states no overage terms
- A Zapier blog post dated 6 October 2026 says Agents is becoming AI by Zapier, with agent costs moving to Tasks. A help article says no shutdown date is set for Agents, so billing for standalone Agents may change
- We found no SOC 2, GDPR or other compliance claim on the Agents pages
