We use Zapier a lot to meet our client requirements, most of them are bloggers and always ask us to get the work done within the free plan of Zapier. I'm definitely going to give n8n a try. If this works out for them then this will definitely add value to the support we provide to them.
@janoberhauser Thank you for building this.
Ive been a huge zapier fan for ages (since 2012 ive been a paying customer) but after the recent price changes this looks far more attractive to be honest now. In my view zapier has really made a bad move on their newer pricing structure. Any features that do anything useful have now been reserved for the huge enterprise customers, and the free or cheap plans are for hobbyists and tinkerers. It leaves people like me completely cold (eg serious entrepreneurs, that have some cash to spend, but a facebook like enterprise budget). 600 USD a month to have 100,000 tasks is just insane. It sounds a lot of tasks on the surface, but what has also changed (in a sneaky way IMO) is that a "task" now consists of literally every step/filter in a zap so those really start clocking up fast (before I believe it was a simple "per zap" not per task cost structure which was much more reasonable).
I use to sing my love for Zapier from the rooftops, and I think their actual product is still the best offering on the market (support is pretty excellent so I do still have love for them to give!) but I think the heavily increased pricing makes no sense at all.
I also have kindof an issue with SAAS tools that charge monthly pricing just for the sake of charging more money and not based on actual costs. In this case zaps/tasks are really fairly arbitrary (sure, a fractional increase on server load but, com'on!) Zapiers charge per tasks basically just ends up crippling you from doing anything serious and it feels frustrating as a customer because you know deep it the extra task allocation costs next to nothing on their side. I get that they need to charge something, but think they've got the structure totally wrong.
Im going to look at moving everything over to n8n this year.
Thoughts @wadefoster ?
Congrats on launching, @janoberhauser ๐ We have quite a few scripts buried in our website code that do stuff like Slack notifications. For easier maintenance, I could totally imagine moving them to n8n.
You mentioned a hosted solution. Does that mean people can use n8n without having to set up a server with Docker etc, similar to Zapier where you just sign up? I think this would be a great addition, as the local/Docker version could be a blocker for some folks who are not familiar with deployment.
What are the next steps for n8n?
@einkoenig Thanks, that is very great to hear!
Yes, a proper hosted solution is planed and one actually already kind of exists. It is however currently not automated and I have to deploy it manually to the servers. Anyway, if anybody is interested they can write me an email to hosting@n8n.io
@africajam Thanks Ed! The project has already the Commons Clause attached to make sure that this will never happen. This however also means that n8n is currently not "Open Source" according to the OSI even though the source is open and people can use it for free.
I wrote a special section about that in the FAQ: https://bit.ly/335T0GS
Thanks a lot! Yes talked with him a few weeks ago but it does probably not really get interesting for his audience till the hosted version is in place.
Sorry to hear that you have problems. Does however not sound like an error message that you would get in n8n. Are you trying to create a workflow on n8n.io? If so be aware that you can only share workflows on the website to share them with other users. You currently have to either host n8n yourself or write an email (https://n8n.io/hosting) if you are interested in a hosted solution.
Super cool. I've run into limitations with Zapier and can see that there's room for a more robust and technical solution. is the idea that it's open source but you'll monetize through the hosted version?
@lnchoi Great to hear!
Yes, the idea is to earn money to further develop the project with a hosted version and support/consulting. More information about that and the license can be found here:
I wrote a special section about that in the FAQ: https://bit.ly/335T0GS
Hey! This looks fantastic @janoberhauser .
I work with an NGO that relies a lot on no-code apps and zapier but would love to give this a spin. How easy would it be to host on firebase instead of a server?
initial impressions.. .extremely impressive. Up in running in minutes and UI is fantastic. I have an idea for an MVP for a product I'd like to try out and didn't feel like spending the time to program myself, this may get me 100% of the way there!
@hai_le1 There are sadly no integrations for this services yet .You can add it to the list here:
https://community.n8n.io/c/featu...
People can then upvote and depending on the demand the integrations get created.
Thanks for hunting n8n, @chrismessina !
Very excited to have n8n now finally properly out in the open.
n8n is a free node-based "Open Source" (Apache 2.0 with Commons Clause) Workflow Automation Tool. It can be self-hosted, easily extended, and so also used with internal tools.
Currently, there is no hosted version yet but you can sign up on the website if you are interested to get informed once it is ready.
I created it initially because I realized that every time I wrote a script to automate a small task it took me a very long time. Depending on the task it normally involved: reading documentation, writing code, committing to Github, deploying on a server, error reporting, SSL, make sure it restarts on a crash, and so on. So even very small tasks took at least half a day or day till everything was up and running properly. Existing Open Source solutions were not up to the task and also commercial ones like Zapier did not work for various reasons. Some being that they do not work well with in-house tools or complicated tasks and it gets expensive quite fast, ...
So hope n8n is as helpful for other people as it is for me. Also, all help with further improving the project and create more integrations is very welcome!
You can find the source code on Github:
https://github.com/n8n-io/n8n
The whole project is written in TypeScript and uses Vue for the frontend. So it should be easily extendable for everybody with web development experience.
If you have any problems, questions or need an integration which does not exist yet you can post it to the forum:
http://community.n8n.io
Documentation can be found here:
https://docs.n8n.io
Your feedback is highly appreciated!
Thanks a lot!!
Can I just use the code base and integrate with my project ? should I pay for integrating the entire thing into my existing project to give more functionality and can I also modify it?
@prabu_dass_rajendran Is hard to say without knowing the specifics. Best you write an email to license@n8n.io explaining what you want to do. I will then try to get back to you asap.
@janoberhauser - Love what you've done with n8n.io and also congratulations on launching n8n.cloud. Where can I find a list (or if you can give me) a list of SaaS apps that might be powering their automation workfflow features with n8n.io? Would love to try them out and see how they have integrated n8n into their platforms. Thank you!
@gaurabhmathure Thanks a lot! Here a list of all available integrations/nodes: https://n8n.io/integrations
If you select one you will also see a link to the source code of it. Hope that is helpful!