Choosing between n8n, Make and Zapier
- Zapier — the quickest to set up and the largest catalogue of app connections; costs can rise quickly at high task volumes.
- Make — visual scenarios with more control over data transformation and branching.
- n8n — open-source and self-hostable, with strong support for custom code and complex workflows; useful when data residency or volume makes hosted tools impractical.
I will recommend one based on your volumes, data requirements, budget and who will maintain it.
Processes worth automating first
Good first candidates are frequent, rule-based, and annoying: lead capture and routing, CRM updates, onboarding checklists, invoice data entry, appointment reminders and recurring reports.
Built to fail safely
Each workflow includes validation, duplicate checks, retries for temporary failures, alerts for permanent ones and a log of what happened — so nothing disappears silently.