- Zapier is a hosted platform with over 9,000 apps, n8n offers a canvas with self-hosting, and a script gives full control at the cost of your own work.
- The choice depends on who maintains it, how sensitive the data is and how complex the logic is.
- Start with the simplest tool that works and keep an exit plan.
When you want to automate a repeatable chore you have three broad routes: a platform hosted by a provider, a platform you can run yourself and your own code. Each makes sense in a different situation, and choosing “because everybody uses it” causes trouble after a year. This text compares three examples: Zapier, n8n and a script run for example in GitHub Actions, according to their documentation. A practical start in n8n is described in the article n8n from scratch.
The three approaches in brief
Zapier is a hosted automation platform. The developer documentation mentions access to over 9,000 apps, an MCP server, an SDK and the option of building your own integrations, and Zapier describes itself as a platform for automation without writing code. n8n is a fair-code platform with a visual canvas, with the ability to add code, to run on your own infrastructure or in the cloud and with over fifteen hundred integrations. A script is your own code that you run where you want. GitHub Actions is one mechanism for such running: workflows are stored in the repository, triggered by events or a schedule, run on GitHub-hosted or self-hosted runners and have a secrets mechanism.
| Zapier | n8n | A script (e.g. GitHub Actions) | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Model | A hosted platform | A fair-code platform, self-run or cloud | Your own code in a repository |
| Integrations | Over 9,000 apps | Over 1,500 integrations (per the README) | As many as you write or import |
| Hosting | By the provider | Self-hosted or cloud | A hosted or own runner |
| Control over logic | Medium | High, with code in nodes | Full |
| Entry barrier | Low | Medium | Higher, requires programming |
| Maintenance | On the provider | On you or the cloud provider | On you |
Questions that decide the choice
The first question: who will maintain it? If nobody on the team can manage a server, a hosted platform saves trouble. The second: where should the data live and which systems should it pass through? Sensitive data sometimes requires running on your own infrastructure, which favours n8n or a script. The third: how complex is the logic? Simple flows matching ready integrations are easiest on a platform with a large app library, and complicated transformations are better described in code. The fourth: what about AI? The recommendation from Anthropic’s write-up on agents is to look for the simplest solution and add complexity only when needed, and workflows have the edge on well-defined tasks.
AI and MCP servers
Both platforms describe connecting to AI agents. n8n’s documentation shows how to connect Claude Code and Codex CLI to n8n’s MCP server with the claude mcp add and codex mcp add commands, and Zapier offers its own MCP server that is meant to give clients such as Claude and ChatGPT governed access to apps. This is convenient, but it calls for caution: an agent with access to automation tools can perform actions in many systems at once. Apply the principles from the article on adding MCP servers: minimal permissions, consent for side effects and a log.
- 01TaskWhat exactly is to be automated?
- 02DataSensitivity and place of processing.
- 03MaintenanceWho fixes it when it breaks?
- 04ComplexityReady integrations or your own logic?
- 05TrialThe simplest tool, one task.
- 06ExitHow to move the logic if needed.
Three example choices
A freelancer wants form submissions to land in a spreadsheet and trigger a notification. Time matters to her and the data is not sensitive, so a hosted platform with a ready integration will be fastest. A small company processes customer enquiries with personal data and wants control over where the data lives: here n8n run on its own server makes sense, provided someone will update it and make backups. A team of developers wants to run checks on every change in the repository and publish the results: the natural choice is a script in the mechanism they already have next to the repository. It is clear that people and data decide the choice, not a ranking of tools.
An exit plan and good practice
Whatever you choose, take care of an exit plan: describe in one place what each automation does, what inputs and outputs it has and what credentials it uses. That way a migration to another tool does not start with archaeology. Limit the number of places where logic lives, because a rule scattered between a platform, a script and a spreadsheet is hard to understand half a year later. Set up error alerts and check regularly that the flows still do what they were created for. I write about choosing a process to automate in the article Workflow of the week: how to pick one process.
Last checked: 20 October 2026. Offers, licences and numbers of integrations change; check the providers’ current pages.