n8n Pricing

n8n's pricing model is one of its most compelling features for growing businesses. Unlike task-based competitors that charge more as you automate more, n8n's execution-based cloud pricing and free self-hosted option make it economically scalable. This guide breaks down n8n's pricing options and helps you choose the right plan.

MJK Supplies · Dec 28, 2025 · 3 min read

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n8n Pricing Options

n8n offers three primary ways to access the platform:

n8n Cloud: Managed cloud hosting by Anthropic [n8n team]. Pay based on workflow executions per month. No infrastructure management.

n8n Self-Hosted: Run n8n on your own infrastructure. The n8n engine is free (fair-code licence). You pay only for server infrastructure.

n8n Cloud Enterprise: Custom pricing for large organisations needing advanced security, compliance, and support features.

n8n Cloud Plans

Starter: ~$20/month

2,500 workflow executions/month
5 active workflows
Community support
1 user

Pro: ~$50/month

10,000 workflow executions/month
Unlimited active workflows
Email support
5 users

Business: ~$120/month

50,000 workflow executions/month
Unlimited workflows
Priority support
15 users + additional at cost

Enterprise: Custom

Custom execution limits
Enterprise security features (SSO, audit logs, custom data retention)
Dedicated support

Note: check n8n.io/pricing for current prices as these change.

What Counts as a Workflow Execution

A workflow execution is counted each time a workflow runs — regardless of how many nodes are in the workflow. A 3-node workflow and a 50-node workflow both count as 1 execution.

This is a key advantage over Make.com's operations-based pricing (which counts each node as an operation). A complex 30-step workflow in n8n is 1 execution; the same workflow in Make.com is 30 operations.

Calculation example: 100 new HubSpot contacts per day → each triggers a 15-step enrichment workflow → 100 executions/day × 30 days = 3,000 executions/month. The Starter plan would cover this; Pro is more comfortable.

Self-Hosted Pricing

The self-hosted option is free in terms of n8n licensing. You pay only for the infrastructure to run it.

Infrastructure costs for typical workloads:

Small team (100-1,000 executions/day): A €5.92/month Hetzner CX21 (2 vCPU, 4GB RAM) is sufficient.

Medium team (1,000-10,000 executions/day): Hetzner CX31 or similar (~€12/month). Add a managed database service (~€10/month for PostgreSQL) for production use.

Large deployment (10,000+ executions/day): Multiple VPS nodes with Redis queue mode, load balancer (~€50-150/month total infrastructure).

Total self-hosted cost: €15-150/month for most businesses — significantly less than equivalent cloud plans.

When to Use Self-Hosted vs. Cloud

Use n8n Cloud when:

You want zero infrastructure management
Your team lacks DevOps resources
Volume is low to moderate (under 10,000 executions/month)
You want managed updates, backups, and uptime

Use self-hosted when:

Volume is high (10,000+ executions/month — self-hosting becomes significantly cheaper)
Data residency requirements (data must stay on your infrastructure)
You have DevOps resources to manage the deployment
You want to run community nodes or custom nodes not available in cloud
Maximum control over n8n configuration and customisation

Migration path: Many businesses start on n8n Cloud for speed, then migrate to self-hosted when volume grows. The migration is straightforward — export all workflows as JSON, import to self-hosted, re-configure credentials.

Cost Comparison with Alternatives

At 50,000 workflow executions/month:

Platform	Approximate Cost
n8n Cloud Business	$120/month
n8n Self-Hosted	$15-30/month (infrastructure)
Make.com (at 10 modules/workflow)	$500,000+/month (50k × 10 = 500k operations)
Zapier (at 5 tasks/workflow)	$600+/month

Make.com and Zapier's operations/task-based pricing becomes expensive at high automation volume. n8n's execution-based pricing (and self-hosted option) scale much better.

Recommended Tools

n8n — Platform; start with cloud, migrate to self-hosted at scale
Hetzner — Best-value VPS for self-hosted n8n
DigitalOcean — US-focused VPS option
Claude API — AI layer for n8n workflows (separate cost)
Apollo.io — Enrichment data (separate subscription)

“n8n's self-hosted option fundamentally changes the economics of automation. At scale, the savings pay for dedicated automation engineering resources.”