I’m spending roughly $150-200 monthly on Make and Zapier for my business automations. The costs keep climbing and I’m wondering if switching to n8n would save money.
My current workflows include:
Transferring leads from Facebook ads to my Kommo CRM
Syncing call data between CloudTalk and Kommo for activity tracking
Triggering contract creation in PandaDoc via API calls
I’m thinking about hosting n8n on my own server but worried about complexity and upkeep. Has anyone moved from commercial platforms to n8n?
Did you actually save money after factoring in server costs and time investment? How reliable has it been for critical business processes?
Switched 8 months ago when my Zapier bill got ridiculous. Took a weekend to figure out, but wasn’t nearly as hard as I thought it’d be. Running it on a $20/month VPS with zero downtime on my main workflows. Beyond saving money, the flexibility is huge - you can build way more complex stuff than Make or Zapier without getting hit with tier upgrades. Your workflows sound pretty basic, so moving over shouldn’t be too painful. Just run both systems together for a few weeks while you test everything. The upfront work is totally worth it when your monthly bill drops to basically just server costs.
Been running n8n for about a year after ditching Make when it hit $180/month. Your workflows are perfect for n8n - I handle similar CRM integrations and API calls without problems. There’s a learning curve but it’s not bad if you’ve got basic tech skills. I’m on DigitalOcean at $25/month with solid reliability as long as you set up proper backups. Best part isn’t just saving money - it’s the debugging. When stuff breaks, you can see exactly what happened instead of waiting on support tickets. Took me two weeks of evening work to migrate everything, but the docs are way better now. You’re looking at roughly 85% cost savings once you get it dialed in.
just made the switch too! a lil tricky at first but n8n is saving me loads. i went for some low-cost hosting and my automations are running smooth. deff worth a shot!
Look, n8n works but you’ll still deal with maintenance headaches and server babysitting. I had the same setup last year - those monthly bills kept eating my profits.
Tried self-hosting for a few months. It worked, but I spent too much time on server updates, backups, and fixing random 2am issues instead of running my business.
I found a platform that gives you custom automation power without the hosting nightmare. Using it for all my CRM integrations and API workflows now. Your Facebook to Kommo setup would be easy, and CloudTalk syncing is perfect for this.
Monthly cost sits between basic Zapier and your current setup, but way more flexible than either. No server crashes during important campaigns.
Sometimes the middle path works best. Save money and time without becoming a sysadmin.
depends on how comfortable you are with tech. i switched from zapier last year - the savings are legit, but setup’s a pain. your workflows look simple enough though. just don’t expect it to work like paid services right out of the box. you’ll be doing your own troubleshooting when stuff breaks.