Make Vs N8N

Make or Break: The Truth About Make.com & n8n
(That No One Tells You)

Make vs n8n is the battle that could make or break your business automation game. If you’ve ever felt like you’re duct-taping your systems together with wishful thinking and Gmail filters, it’s time to rethink how you work smarter, not harder.

Date published: 1st April 2025 By Kerry Greener Updated: 2nd April 2025

Now - Let me guess: you've got 24 tabs open, your to-do list is longer than a Prime Minister's apology tour, and you're wondering if automation might just be your golden ticket out of this mess. You're not alone. As a business coach who's lived and breathed the rollercoaster of entrepreneurial life (mostly powered by coffee and passive-aggressive post-it notes), I know just how seductive the promise of automation can be. But here's the kicker: choosing the wrong automation platform could send your business into a tailspin faster than you can say "Zapier pricing tiers".

Enter the contenders: Make.com and n8n. Both are lauded as the darlings of the no-code/low-code automation world, but they're fundamentally different beasts under the hood.

In this post, I'm lifting the velvet curtain on the real-life drama, power, and pitfalls behind these tools. If you run an online business, manage client workflows, or simply want more time to walk your dog without thinking about integrations, this Make Vs N8N article is for you.

We’re breaking down:

• What actually makes Make.com and n8n so different
• How each performs in the real world (spoiler: it’s not what you think)
• What the pricing really looks like when the rubber hits the ROI road

By the end, you’ll know which platform is worth your precious minutes and which one’s likely to eat them for breakfast.

MAKE VS N8N - USER-FRIENDLY OR A DEVELOPER’S DREAM?

Let’s talk UX: the sweet spot where intuitive design meets maximum efficiency.

Make.com: Polished, pretty, and poised like it’s just stepped out of a tech startup spa. Its visual workflow builder is like building a train set for grown-ups—colourful, modular, and fun to play with. It’s perfect for marketers, solopreneurs, and anyone who wants drag-and-drop simplicity. Real-time execution? Yep. Error handling? Absolutely. Watching your flows in motion feels like programming meets Pixar.

n8n: This one’s for the tinkerers. If Make.com is a luxury Tesla, n8n is a self-built muscle car - powerful but raw. Open-source and self-hostable, it lets you customise like mad. You can code inside your workflows, build your own nodes, and control everything down to the API call. The learning curve? More like a learning cliff. But once you get there, it’s paradise for power users.

Value Tip: If you're prone to fiddling with the toaster just to see how it works, go with n8n. If you consider turning it on an achievement, stick with Make.com.

MAKE VS N8N - INTEGRATION NATION OR DIY WONDERLAND?

The point of automation is connecting your digital dots. So who plays better with others?

Make.com: It boasts over 1,000 pre-built integrations. Everything from Google Sheets to obscure CRMs you’ve never heard of is covered. Want templates? They've got libraries of them. Everything’s polished and tested, like buying automation from John Lewis.

n8n: Here’s where it flips. The integrations are fewer out of the box, but you can make your own (pun intended). Got a niche tool with an API? You can create your own node. Or write your own function. Or build an entire castle out of webhooks. It's power over polish, every time.

Value Tip: Need obscure tools talking to each other like drunk uncles at a wedding? n8n. Want it done with zero faff and all polish? Make.com.

MAKE VS N8N - THE PRICE OF POWER: COSTS, CLOUDS & CONTROL

The sticker price is only half the story. What’s the real cost of automation?

Make.com: Think Netflix subscription for your workflows. Starts off cheap (£9/month), but grows fast with usage. If you're running big automations, expect to move up the tiers.

• Bonus: managed hosting and top-notch support if you’re on Enterprise.
• Downside: you don’t own it, and vendor lock-in is real.

n8n: Here’s where the rebels win. Self-hosting? It’s free (other than your server costs). Cloud plans start at around £20/month. You’ll pay in time and developer brainpower, not in strict operations quotas. The total cost? It depends on whether you’ve got tech talent or a spare cousin who codes.

Value Tip: If you’d rather spend £30/month than wrestle with a VPS at 2am, Make.com. If you enjoy midnight updates and Docker jokes, n8n’s your jam.

MAKE VS N8N - WHICH AUTOMATION PLATFORM DO YOU ACTUALLY NEED?

So where does that leave us?

Here’s the brutal honesty you didn’t know you needed:

• Make.com is the automation gateway drug. It’s user-friendly, pretty, and solves most problems right out of the box. Perfect for coaches, creatives, and consultants who want results without coding.
• n8n is for the rebels with a cause. If you crave customisation, have the skills (or the dev team), and want to own your infrastructure, it's unbeatable.

The real decision isn’t about which tool is better. It’s about which one fits the real you. The you with the budget, the skills, the goals, and yes, the tech tolerance.

But hang on... What's that one thing no-one is telling you? 

MAKE VS N8N: THE TRUTH NO ONE’S TELLING YOU - YOU CAN USE BOTH!

Here’s the twist: it’s not always about picking just one.

Many businesses, especially those growing quickly or juggling a mix of technical and non-technical teams, are using Make and n8n together to build a hybrid automation system that plays to the strengths of both tools.

How this works in the real world:

• Use Make.com for the quick wins, standardised workflows, visual ease and fast deployment.
• Use n8n for complex logic, deeper API control, and long-term scalability.

Typical combo: Make.com pulls in your leads and handles your CRM updates, while n8n works behind the curtain, verifying data, triggering custom scripts, syncing across platforms with tailored logic.

Value Tip: Don’t choose between control and speed - combine them. The best workflows use Make to handle the “show” and n8n to handle the “smarts”. You’re not indecisive - you’re strategic.

Want someone to show you how to blend the best of both?

👉 Join AI Automations By Jack, a Skool community where you’ll learn exactly how to stitch these two powerhouses together into one seamless, scalable system.

Check out Jack's community here... 
(I'm a member and I highly recommend joining. If you want to get ahead with automations - this is the place to be!)

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