Automation

Which automation tool should glue your apps together?

Automation platforms connect your apps: when a form is submitted, create a contact and send a text. They all do that. They differ in what they count when they bill you, whether there is a free plan that stays free, and whether you can run the thing on your own server. The billing unit row is the one to read twice.

Checked against each vendor's own pages on October 14, 2026. Every cell links to its source. Prices and plans change often, so click through before you buy.

Zapier

Zapier

Free plan
Yes: $0 free forever, 100 tasks per month (Zap workflows and MCP)Cap is 100 tasks a month. Polling triggers check every 15 minutes on Free; paid plans poll as fast as every 1 minute. The help page states no time limit on the Free plan.Zapier pricing Zapier Free plan help article
What you are billed for
1 task per successful action step. Triggers, Filters and Paths are free.Quote: "A task is any successful action that runs in Zapier." Zapier MCP counts 2 tasks per successful tool call; failed calls are not counted.Zapier task usage help article
First paid plan
Professional: from $19.99/month billed yearly ($29.99/month billed monthly), 750 tasks/monthEntry tier shown on the pricing page; annual is billed yearly (shown monthly price x 12) at 33% off the monthly rate. The 750-task figure is on the pricing page itself, not only the blog.Zapier pricing
Run it on your own server
No. Zapier is a cloud-based, fully managed platform. No self-hosted or on-premises license is published.Pricing page lists no deployment options and no self-hosting; Enterprise is custom via Sales. Zapier's n8n comparison pitches skipping Docker and server upkeep. Not an explicit denial, so ask sales if self-hosting matters.Zapier vs n8n comparison page Zapier pricing
Built-in AI steps
AI by Zapier step, no code. Models from OpenAI, Google and Anthropic (Claude). Metered per step at 1x (Standard), 3x (Advanced) or 5x (Premium) of the model rate, drawn from your task pool.Not Claude-only. Formula: tasks per run = (1 x model rate) + (tool calls x model rate). Model tier pricing is listed for Professional, Team and Enterprise, not Free; Free users can preview an unpublished Zap on Standard only. Bring Your Own Key is 1x with Advanced or Premium models. New steps default to Premium.Zapier AI by Zapier model tier pricing Zapier pricing
Runs on a schedule
Partial. Schedule triggers run a Zap every month, week, day or hour (hourly is the shortest built-in preset; a Custom frequency exists but its minimum is not stated). The help page marks Schedule as not available on the Free plan.Schedule trigger steps do not count toward task usage. No cap on scheduled runs is stated. Runs may land within a few minutes of the set time.Zapier control when your Zap runs help article Zapier Schedule help article
Our pick
The safest first automation: 100 free tasks a month. Each action step is a task, so count them.

Make

Celonis

Free plan
1,000 credits per month.The pricing page states the Free plan cap but gives no time limit either way, so it is marked partial.Make pricing
What you are billed for
Credits. By default 1 operation (one module run) equals 1 credit, regardless of data size. AI features can use more, based on tokens.Credit counts for AI modules vary: Make's AI Provider credits are based on tokens and operations. Only features triggered by scenario runs, or the AI agent's chat, use credits.Make help: Credits Make pricing
First paid plan
Not confirmed: Core, Pro and Teams plans exist, prices load in a widgetThe pricing page names the plans and bills in credits, but the price cards did not render as readable text in two browsers. Check the page directly.Make pricing
Run it on your own server
Only an on-prem agent, on the Enterprise plan. No self-hosted Make.The agent is installed on your own device (Java 11 or later) so scenarios reach local network apps through the HTTP Agent app. No license name or cost is published on the page. No self-hosted Make platform was found on the vendor page we checked.Make help: On-prem agent
Built-in AI steps
Yes, in part. Maia assistant, AI agents and Make's AI Provider features, all metered as credits from the same pool as scenarios. Specific AI module names are not published on the pages we checked.Make's AI Provider credits are based on tokens and operations. With a custom AI provider connection, credits are based on operations and you pay the provider directly for tokens. Automatic AI provider connections include token usage in credits.Make help: Credits Make help: Maia
Runs on a schedule
Yes. Default run every 15 minutes. Free-plan minimum not published.The page says the minimum interval depends on your plan and links to pricing. It states no cap on scheduled runs and says you can add as many run times as you need in the Daily schedule.Make help: Schedule a scenario
Our pick
Bills in credits, one per operation, which suits multi-step flows. Its price cards did not render in a readable form, so check the page.

n8n

n8n

Free plan
No hosted free plan. Self-hosted Community Edition is free, cap not publishedHosted trial only: 1,000 executions and 14 days. Community Edition has no published execution cap.n8n pricing page n8n self-hosting docs
What you are billed for
One execution per full workflow run, however many steps it hasSteps and data volume do not change the count.n8n pricing page
First paid plan
Starter: 20€/mo billed annually, 2.5K executions with unlimited stepsOnly the annual price is shown on the page we checked. Hosted by n8n. Includes 1,600 Assistant credits per month.n8n pricing page
Run it on your own server
Yes. Community Edition is free with no license key. Business self-hosted is 667€/mo billed annuallyBusiness is self-hosted only, 40K executions. The page footer links to an n8n community license and a Sustainable use license, but the pages we checked do not tie either to the Community Edition by name.n8n self-hosting docs n8n pricing page
Built-in AI steps
AI nodes on Starter. Assistant credits are metered at 1,600 per monthWhether AI steps count toward executions is not published. Pricing is stated as based on monthly workflow executions.n8n pricing page
Runs on a schedule
Timers run in seconds or cron. No free-plan minimum interval publishedDocs example uses 30 seconds. No cap on scheduled runs is stated. Missed-run grace defaults to 60 seconds.n8n Schedule Trigger docs
Our pick
The pick when someone technical is on the team: one execution per run regardless of steps, and free to self-host.

Google Apps Script

Google

Free plan
No $0 plan stated. Consumer quotas reset every 24 hours.Consumer caps are per day: 20,000 URL Fetch calls and 90 min total trigger runtime; no monthly cap is published. The page names no free plan and no price.Apps Script quotas
What you are billed for
No billing unit published. Quotas count per user, per day.The quotas page lists daily limits (URL Fetch calls, trigger runtime, 6 min per execution), not a per-step or per-run price.Apps Script quotas
First paid plan
No paid plan or price published on the pages we checked.The quotas page mentions a paid subscription only for converted trial accounts: limits rise once the domain has paid at least USD $100 cumulatively and 60 days have passed. No plan name, price or monthly allowance.Apps Script quotas
Run it on your own server
Not publishedThe overview says scripts run on Google's servers; no self-host, on-premises option or license name appears.Apps Script overview
Built-in AI steps
No no-code AI steps. The Vertex AI advanced service is called from code and needs a Google Cloud project with billing enabled.Setup and samples are all code-based; model use is billed through the Cloud project, not included in Apps Script. The page does not describe any no-code AI step.Apps Script Vertex AI service
Runs on a schedule
Yes. Time-driven triggers run as often as every minute.Consumer accounts get 90 min total trigger runtime per day (Workspace 6 hr) and 20 triggers per user per script, so frequent runs can hit the daily cap. Add-ons are limited to once per hour.Apps Script installable triggers Apps Script quotas
Our pick
Free and already inside Workspace. Right for Sheets and Gmail chores if you can write a little code.

Power Automate

Microsoft

Free plan
$0 Free license: 6,000 actions per 24 hours per user, standard connectors only.The pricing page offers only a 30-day trial, but the license page describes Free as no-cost for work or school accounts. The cap is per 24 hours, not monthly. During the transition period the limits page applies 10k per cloud flow instead of 6k per user.Power Platform request limits Types of Power Automate licenses
What you are billed for
Each trigger and each action run counts as one action.Actions in loops count once per iteration; successful and failed actions both count; shown as Power Platform Requests in admin reports.Power Automate licensing FAQ
First paid plan
Premium: $15.00 per user/month, paid yearly. 40,000 actions per 24 hours.Pricing page shows only the paid yearly basis and says prices are for marketing purposes and final price appears at checkout. Allowance is per 24 hours, not per month. Premium also includes 5,000 AI Builder credits per month. Process is $150 per bot/month paid yearly.Power Automate pricing page Types of Power Automate licenses
Run it on your own server
No self-hosted flow engine found. An on-premises data gateway is included with Premium.The gateway bridges cloud flows to local data; flows still run in Microsoft's cloud. The pricing page does not mention the gateway, so it was dropped as a source. No page states outright that self-hosting is unavailable.Types of Power Automate licenses
Built-in AI steps
AI Builder actions. 5,000 AI Builder credits per month per Premium license.Scenarios named include form processing, object detection and text classification. Credits are metered; more come from the AI Builder capacity add-on.Power Automate licensing FAQ Types of Power Automate licenses
Runs on a schedule
Yes. Minimum recurrence interval is 60 seconds, with no plan split shown; runs count toward the daily action cap.Limits page (dated 2026-07-17) lists 60 seconds. The billing FAQ (ms.date 2022, though refreshed 2026-09-22) says free-plan flows may run every 15 minutes; the two conflict, so the pick is the limits page. Free plan interval is therefore not confirmed.Limits of automated, scheduled, and instant f... Power Automate billing questions
Our pick
Free with Microsoft 365 for standard connectors, 6,000 actions a day. The default for a Microsoft shop.

Understand the unit before you build anything

Every platform bills in its own unit, and the unit decides whether a simple automation costs $0 or tens of dollars a month.

  1. 01Count the stepsAn automation with five action steps that runs 200 times a month is 1,000 units on a per-step platform and 200 on a per-run platform. Same work, five times the bill.
  2. 02Match the ecosystemIf everything is in Google Workspace or Microsoft 365, the built-in option is free and already has access. Reach for a third party when you cross ecosystems.
  3. 03Plan the exitA self-hosted option is insurance. You may never use it, but it gives you somewhere to go if the price changes.

Write every automation down in four lines before you build it: what it does, why, what it must never do, and what done looks like. The ones that fail quietly are the ones nobody documented.

Spearworks AI

Have a task you do by hand every week?

I build the automation on whichever platform fits your tools, document it in four lines, and show you how to tell when it has stopped working. Most are a half day.

Book a free consult

Nathan Spear · spearworksai.com

Spearworks Labs · All comparisons · Checked October 14, 2026. Not affiliated with any vendor listed.