Zapier pricing in 2026, and cheaper automation alternatives

Zapier bills by usage, not just by seat, which makes it one of the harder tools to budget. The plan price depends on how many tasks you buy, and a few busy workflows can push you up a tier without anyone noticing. Here's how Zapier counts usage, what the plans cost, and how two alternatives count the same work very differently.

All prices below were checked on the vendors' own pricing pages on 19 October 2026. Prices change, so confirm them before you negotiate.

Zapier's plans

From Zapier's pricing page:

The price rises with the task volume you pick, and Zapier says paying yearly saves 33 percent.

Free allows two-step Zaps only, with 15-minute polling. Professional adds multi-step Zaps, premium apps, webhooks and 2-minute polling. Team adds 1-minute polling, shared Zaps and connections, SAML SSO and up to 25 users. Enterprise adds unlimited users, advanced admin permissions and a technical account manager.

How Zapier counts tasks

This is what drives the bill. A task is used when a Zap successfully completes an action. Triggers, polling, failed actions and Zapier's built-in tools (Filter, Formatter, Paths, Delay, Looping, Storage, Tables and Forms) don't count.

So a Zap that triggers on a new form entry, formats it, and then creates a CRM record and sends a Slack message uses two tasks per run: one for each action. A five-action Zap that runs 1,000 times a month uses 5,000 tasks.

If you go over your limit, Zapier offers pay-per-task billing at a higher rate than your plan's tasks. With it turned on, Zaps keep running. With it off, they pause until the next period.

Where the tasks go

Before you renew or move up a tier, open your task history and sort Zaps by usage. Usually a few Zaps use most of the tasks. For each of those, check:

• Does it run more than it needs to? Add a Filter step early, which costs no tasks, so the Zap stops before the paid actions when there's nothing to do.
• Are there redundant actions? A lookup followed by an update can sometimes be one step.
• Is it still needed? Zaps built for a one-off project often keep running for years.
• Are you paying overage? If pay-per-task charges show up most months, moving to the next task tier may cost less.

Cheaper alternatives

Make

Make (formerly Integromat) is a visual automation builder that bills in credits. Each module action in a scenario uses one credit in most cases. Router and error-handler modules are free. Its plans, priced for 10,000 credits a month:

Make says annual billing saves 15 percent or more, and you can choose higher credit volumes. Core adds unlimited active scenarios and one-minute scheduling. Teams adds team roles and shared templates. Unused credits expire at the end of each term.

Make counts modules much like Zapier counts actions, so the savings come from the price per unit. At these list prices, 10,000 credits on Core costs $12 a month, while Zapier's Professional plan starts at $19.99 for its lowest task tier.

n8n

n8n counts usage differently: an execution is one run of a whole workflow, however many steps it has. Its plans, billed annually:

n8n also has a self-hosted Community Edition on GitHub.

This is where long workflows get cheap. Take the five-action workflow from earlier, running 1,000 times a month. On Zapier that's 5,000 tasks. On n8n it's 1,000 executions, which fits within the Starter plan. The trade-off is that n8n is more technical to set up, and the Business plan is self-hosted only.

Which counting model suits you

What to do with this

Start with your task history, not the price list. Cutting wasted runs and redundant steps often drops you a tier with no migration. If your heaviest workflows have many steps, price them on a per-execution tool. Even if you stay on Zapier, that number is useful at renewal. For the step-by-step version, see how to negotiate a SaaS renewal.

You can see what companies post for Zapier on the Zapier vendor page. To get bids from sellers, post an RFP with what you pay for Zapier and the features your team uses. It's free, and you can post anonymously.