TL;DR: in 2026, an SMB picks Zapier to get started fast on simple, low-volume automations (paid plans from $19.99/month, billed per task), Make for the best price-to-capability ratio in the mid-range ($9 to $12/month for 10,000 operations), and n8n as soon as volume grows, logic gets complex, or data has to stay on its own servers (cloud around 20 euros per month, free license when self-hosted).

Key takeaways

The short answer: the billing model decides

If your automations fit in two or three steps and run a few hundred times per month, take Zapier: it is the easiest to learn, and the price premium is marginal at that volume. If your scenarios branch out (conditions, loops, data transformations) with a few thousand operations per month, Make offers the best balance. Once you cross a few tens of thousands of actions per month, once your workflows go past ten steps, or once your customer data has to stay on a server you control, n8n becomes hard to beat: it is the only one of the three that is open source and self-hostable.

The rest of this article walks through the three billing models, the tipping points, and the cases where the right answer is to change nothing.

Three tools, three ways of counting

Zapier, Make and n8n make roughly the same promise: connect your tools (CRM, email, spreadsheets, invoicing) and run scenarios with little or no code. The real difference is in the accounting, and at SMB scale it changes everything.

Zapier counts tasks

At Zapier, a task is one executed action. A scenario like "new lead, enrichment, CRM write, follow-up email" therefore burns three tasks per lead processed. The free plan caps at 100 tasks per month with workflows limited to two steps; paid plans start at $19.99/month, per the Parseur comparison (updated August 6, 2026). In exchange, Zapier remains the benchmark for simplicity, with the largest integration catalog of the three and an onboarding that requires no technical skill at all.

Make counts operations

Make counts one operation per executed module, a granularity close to Zapier's, but with much lower entry prices: the free plan covers 1,000 operations per month, and the first paid tiers give you 10,000 operations for $9 to $12/month, according to the comparisons by Digidop (updated January 25, 2026) and Parseur. Make's visual editor handles branching and iteration natively, which makes it the natural pick for scenarios with intermediate logic.

n8n counts executions

n8n counts neither tasks nor operations: one full run of a workflow counts as 1, whether it contains 3 or 90 steps. The cloud plan starts around 20 euros per month for 2,500 executions; the Community edition, installed on your own server, is free with unlimited executions. n8n also lets you drop in custom code and call any API, where the other two stay bounded by their module catalogs.

The gap gets concrete with an example. Take a 10-step workflow that processes 1,000 leads per month: Zapier counts roughly 10,000 tasks, Make roughly 10,000 operations, while n8n counts 1,000 executions, covered by its entry cloud plan or by free self-hosting. Multiply the volume by ten, and the cost ranking widens in the same order.

When is Zapier the right choice for an SMB?

When simplicity is worth more than optimization. An SMB with no technical profile that wants three or four convenience automations (a notification for every signed quote, invoices copied to a folder, form contacts added to the CRM) will be up and running on Zapier in an afternoon. At that volume, the price gap between the three tools amounts to a few dozen euros per month; the learning time saved is easily worth it.

Keeping Zapier is also the right answer when what you have works. Migrating workflows that run fine, with no cost or compliance problem, is rarely a good investment; that budget produces more value spent on a new automation than on a migration for its own sake.

When is Make the best compromise?

Make pulls ahead when your scenarios start looking like processes: conditions, loops over lists, data transformations between two tools. Its free plan at 1,000 operations lets you validate a use case with no commitment, and its paid tiers are among the cheapest on the market at equivalent volume. Several 2026 comparisons recommend it as the default mid-range choice for SMBs.

Its limit is structural: scenarios live in Make's cloud, with no self-hosting option, and very long or very frequent workflows end up expensive in operations. That is exactly the threshold where the n8n question comes up.

When does n8n win?

Three situations tip the scale toward n8n. Volume, first: per-execution billing makes long, frequent workflows much cheaper than with per-task competitors. Complexity, second: custom code, arbitrary API calls, fine-grained error handling; workflows of more than 90 nodes run in production without becoming unmanageable. Sovereignty, last: n8n is the only one of the three that can be self-hosted on a server in France or anywhere in Europe, which keeps customer data in-house and simplifies GDPR compliance.

There is a flip side: n8n demands more technical discipline than its two rivals. Self-hosting, free on paper, requires a server, security updates, backups and someone to own all of it. If nobody can carry that role, n8n's cloud plan or a provider who manages the hosting are more reasonable paths than a forgotten server in a corner.

What does it really cost, build included?

The license price is the tree hiding the forest. For all three tools, the real budget of an automation breaks down into three items: the subscription (from 0 to a few dozen euros per month for an SMB), building the workflow (the main item), and maintenance (APIs change, error cases surface over time).

A simple scenario can be built in-house in a few hours on Zapier or Make. A full, hardened pipeline, with error handling, retries and alerts, is developer work whatever the tool. To give you my own price points: a scoped automation starts as a Sprint from 400 euros; a full pipeline is quoted based on how many tools are connected and how many error cases need covering. Those amounts come on top of the subscription, not instead of it.

One last item is often forgotten: the cost of switching. None of the three tools imports automatically into the others; only the business logic carries over. Hence the value of picking, from day one, the tool aligned with your volume trajectory rather than the cheapest one this month.

What it looks like in production

My bias is on the record: I build on n8n, and the n8n automation page explains why. Two examples show where that choice starts paying off. IA Brew, an automated newsletter with no human in the loop, runs on a 93-node n8n workflow: at that size, per-task billing would be prohibitive, and a simpler tool would not hold the logic together. Conversely, the automated press-monitoring workflow built for the Ermitage cheese company could have started on Make; what tipped the scale was the need for fine-grained filtering and room to grow. In both cases, the tool followed the process, never the other way around.

The right automation tool is the one whose billing model matches the shape of your processes. Count first: how many steps, how many runs per month, and where does your data have to live? The answer to those three questions points to the tool almost every time.

Frequently asked questions

Can you migrate from Zapier or Make to n8n without rebuilding everything?

There is no automatic import between the three platforms: workflows have to be rebuilt. In practice, migration goes faster than the initial build, because the business logic, connected accounts and error cases are already known. The prudent approach is to migrate workflow by workflow, starting with the ones that burn the most tasks.

Is self-hosted n8n really free?

n8n's Community license is free with unlimited executions, but self-hosting has a real cost: a server, security updates, backups and monitoring. An SMB should only self-host if someone owns that role, in-house or through a provider; otherwise, the cloud plan at around 20 euros per month is the reasonable compromise.

Which tool should you pick to add AI to your automations?

All three platforms integrate AI models in 2026: Zapier and Make through dedicated modules, n8n through native AI nodes and unrestricted API calls. The difference is control: n8n lets you choose the model, where it is hosted and the exact format of the exchanges, which matters as soon as AI touches customer data.

How much does an automation built by a provider cost?

The tool subscription is the smallest line item: from 0 to a few dozen euros per month for an SMB. A provider-built automation starts, with me, as a Sprint from 400 euros for a focused workflow; a full pipeline (scraping, enrichment, CRM, email) is quoted based on scope. Maintenance runs through an optional monthly retainer.

If you are still hesitating, the shortest path is to count your actual steps and volumes over one month. Then describe the process you want to automate: in 30 minutes, I will tell you which tool fits, what it involves, and whether a simple Zapier is enough. Book a 30-minute call; it is free and without commitment.