What is n8n? A plain-English guide, with n8n vs Zapier, Make and Power Automate

Short answer: n8n is a workflow automation tool that connects your systems so work moves between them without anyone copying and pasting. A new order in your online shop can create a customer in your CRM and an invoice in Xero, for example. Compared with Zapier, Make and Power Automate, n8n is the most flexible and often the cheapest at scale, and it is the only one of the four you can run on your own server for free.

UK businesses are adopting AI quickly. According to the Office for National Statistics, AI use among firms with ten or more employees rose from around 12 percent to around 35 percent between late 2023 and mid-2026, with lack of expertise among the main barriers (ONS). Automation tools are often the way in, because they connect AI to the systems a business already uses.

What is n8n?

n8n, pronounced "n-eight-n", describes itself as a node-based workflow automation tool. It was founded in 2019 by Jan Oberhauser and is headquartered in Berlin (n8n). In May 2026 SAP invested in the company at a valuation of $5.2 billion, and n8n then reported 1.7 million monthly builders (n8n).

A workflow starts with a trigger, such as a form submission, an email or a schedule. Nodes then fetch, change and send data between systems. n8n has more than 2,300 ready-made integrations (n8n), and for anything else there is a node that can call any API.

n8n also has an AI Agent node. You connect a language model and one or more tools, and the agent decides which tools to use (n8n Docs). That makes n8n a common choice for AI agents that work inside a company's own systems.

What can you automate?

• Order to invoice. An order in Shopify or WooCommerce becomes an invoice in Xero or QuickBooks and a contact in your CRM.
• Leads. A form on your website is enriched with company data from Companies House, added to the CRM and sent to the right salesperson in Teams or Slack.
• Customer service. Incoming emails are sorted, summarised with AI and routed to the right queue.
• Reporting. Figures from ads, analytics and accounts are collected in a spreadsheet every Monday.
• Documents. Supplier invoices are read and sent for approval.

n8n vs Zapier, Make and Power Automate

Sources: n8n, Make, Make and Zapier.

The difference in how usage is counted matters more than it looks. A ten-step workflow that runs 1,000 times a month is 1,000 executions in n8n, but around 10,000 credits in Make and up to 10,000 tasks in Zapier. n8n counts an execution as one full run of the workflow, however many steps it has (n8n).

What does it cost?

Prices as of October 2026, billed annually for n8n and Zapier. VAT is added on top, and prices in euros and dollars will vary with the exchange rate (n8n, Make, Zapier). Check Microsoft's UK pricing page for current Power Automate prices in pounds.

Xero, QuickBooks and other UK systems

Most UK businesses want their workflows to reach the accounting system. Here the good news is that the big two are well covered:

• n8n has official nodes for both Xero (n8n Docs) and QuickBooks Online (n8n Docs), for things like contacts and invoices.
• Zapier has apps for Xero and QuickBooks with ready-made templates (Zapier).
• Power Automate relies on its connector library and the HTTP action when there is no ready-made connector (Microsoft Learn).

If a system has an API, it can be connected, and that is usually where n8n is the most flexible choice. Read more about how we connect QuickBooks and Xero and other tools through system integration, or see our guide to the Xero API.

Data, UK GDPR and the licence

• n8n Cloud stores data in the EU, on servers in Frankfurt (n8n). If you host n8n yourself, all data stays with you (n8n Docs).
• Make lets you choose an EU or US data centre when you create the account, and the choice cannot be changed later (Make).
• Zapier stores and processes data in the US and relies on the EU–US data transfer framework (Zapier).

Whichever tool you choose, workflows that touch personal data fall under UK GDPR, so you need a data processing agreement with the provider and should know where the data goes.

The licence. n8n is not open source in the strict sense. It uses its own Sustainable Use License. You can use and modify it for your company's internal purposes, and consultants can help you build workflows. You cannot resell n8n as a service or build a product where n8n is the core (n8n Docs).

n8n tutorial: your first workflow

n8n's own quickstart walks you through a first workflow in a few minutes (n8n Docs). In short:

1. Choose where to run it. Start a free trial of n8n Cloud, or self-host with a one-line install.
2. Add a trigger. For example a Schedule Trigger that runs every morning, or a form submission.
3. Connect your apps. Add credentials for the systems you want to use, such as Gmail, Slack or Xero.
4. Add logic. Use an If node to send data different ways depending on its content.
5. Test and activate. Run the workflow step by step, check the data at each node, then switch it on.

For a structured way to learn, n8n's free text courses go from beginner to advanced (n8n Docs).

How to choose

Choose Zapier if

• you want to connect two or three common tools quickly
• your workflows are simple and the volume is low

Choose Make if

• your workflows have many steps and conditions
• you want data in the EU without running your own server

Choose Power Automate if

• your business lives in Outlook, Teams and SharePoint
• you already have the licences

Choose n8n if

• your workflows are many, large or run often
• you want to build AI agents or write your own code
• data needs to stay in your own environment

We choose the platform based on the job. n8n is often our pick for larger workflows because it can run in your own environment, while Make and Zapier work well for simpler automations.