The short answer. The strongest Make alternatives in 2026 are Zapier if you want the same visual model with a wider catalog, n8n if you want to self-host and escape per-unit metering, and Tray.ai if you need integration and AI agents governed on one platform. Workato and Microsoft Power Automate cover managed governance, Boomi suits ERP-heavy estates, and Celigo fits NetSuite-centric teams.
Two very different groups look for Make alternatives. One wants the same thing cheaper or with more connectors. The other has had a compliance conversation. Those lead to opposite ends of this list, so it is worth being clear which one you are before you start.
Make alternatives at a glance
| Platform | Type and hosting | Pricing | Best for |
|---|---|---|---|
| Enterprise platforms with built-in governance | |||
| Tray.ai | Enterprise orchestration, managed cloud | Plan plus usage · no published price | Integration and AI agents governed on one platform |
| Workato | Enterprise iPaaS, cloud and on-premises | Edition fee plus usage · no published price | Large IT-led estates on a shared recipe model |
| Boomi | Enterprise iPaaS, cloud and on-premises | Per connection · no published price | Legacy-heavy estates with SAP, Oracle, or EDI depth |
| Microsoft Power Automate | Workflow automation, managed cloud | Per user, or per bot for RPA · Premium $15/user/mo billed yearly | Organizations already standardized on Microsoft 365 and Azure |
| Visual automation, no infrastructure | |||
| Make | Visual automation, cloud only | Per credit · free tier, then from $12/mo | Visual builders who want the lowest published entry price |
| Zapier | Visual automation, cloud only | Per task · free, then from $19.99/mo billed yearly | The widest connector catalog and the fastest setup |
| Application-centric automation | |||
| Celigo | iPaaS, managed cloud | Per flow and endpoint · no published price | NetSuite-centric teams on template-driven automations |
| Open source, self-hosted | |||
| n8n | Source-available, self-host or cloud | Per execution · free self-hosted, cloud from €20/mo billed yearly | Technical teams that want control over cost and data |
Microsoft, n8n, Make and Zapier pricing last checked against their published pricing pages on 18 September 2026. n8n publishes in euros. Platforms marked sales led do not publish list prices, including Tray.ai.
Make is the cheapest published entry point on this list, and the unit changed: what used to be described as operations is now metered in credits, most actions consuming one and AI-provider actions consuming more. The headline price and the bill can diverge quickly on a busy scenario.
Enterprise platforms with built-in governance
Tray.ai
Best for: teams that need integration, automation, and AI agents governed on one platform and one contract.
Tray.ai is where teams land when the automations have stopped being departmental. No per-unit metering on every module action, no 40-minute execution cap, and access control that goes well past team level. Workflows can run for up to 14 days and concurrency has no per-workflow cap, which is the difference between automating a task and running a process. Integration, automation, and agents sit under one governance model.
There is a second product on the same foundation. Tray Helix is a governed runtime for the apps your people are already building with Claude Code, Codex, and Cursor: one command takes an app from an AI assistant to a live URL, with identity, managed credentials, and an audit trail attached as it ships. If Make spread through your company because capable people built their own tools, this is the same story one step further on.
On evidence: Cue delivers integrations in days rather than months. Wavo saved over $500K and increased campaigns managed per person by 69%. There is a direct comparison with Make for feature-level detail.
Trade-offs: we do not publish list pricing, so you cannot evaluate cost without talking to us, and it is managed cloud only. We are also the wrong answer for a small team running lightweight scenarios. If $12 a month covers what you need and nobody has asked you about access control, staying on Make is the better decision and we would rather say so.
Workato
Best for: large IT-led estates that want a polished builder and a broad recipe library.
Workato is a comfortable step up for teams that want governance without giving up a visual builder that non-engineers can use.
Trade-offs: the recipe abstraction constrains deep branching and nested logic, which will feel restrictive after Make’s routers and iterators. Roughly five concurrent executions per recipe and a 90-minute maximum execution time are the ceilings that matter at volume. Renewal pricing is a persistent theme in public buyer discussion, so you are trading a metering problem for a negotiation one.
Boomi
Best for: IT-led estates where SAP, Oracle, or EDI is the centre of gravity.
Boomi is on this list for the case where Make scenarios have quietly become ERP integration. That is a different discipline and Boomi has the depth for it.
Trade-offs: per-connection pricing, implementation cycles in weeks, and a platform assembled from acquisitions including Rivery, Thru, APIIDA, and Mashery. Our competitive research puts the honest total at two to three times the licence once certified resources are counted. The gap between this and a $12 plan is not a gap you cross casually.
Microsoft Power Automate
Best for: organizations already standardized on Microsoft 365, Azure, and Copilot Studio.
If everyone already holds a Microsoft licence, Power Automate is the cheapest governed option available, because identity and admin are already solved.
Trade-offs: Premium is $15 per user per month billed yearly, so the bill tracks headcount rather than execution volume, which is better or worse than credits depending entirely on your shape. The full integration story spans Power Automate, Logic Apps, and Azure Data Factory, and flows are automatically disabled after 14 days of consistent throttling. Coverage of non-Microsoft applications is thinner than Make’s.
Visual automation, no infrastructure
Make
Best for: visual builders running lightweight automations at the lowest published price.
Staying is right for a lot of teams. The canvas is more structurally flexible than a linear trigger-action chain, routers and iterators make branching genuinely workable, and the Core plan at $12 a month with a free tier underneath is the cheapest published entry on this list. For a small team without a compliance requirement, nothing here beats it on value.
Trade-offs: metering is per credit, most actions consuming one and AI-provider actions more, so cost compounds with execution volume rather than with value, and teams consistently report bill surprises when a high-volume workflow goes live. Scenario execution is capped at 40 minutes. Access control is team-level, which is usually where a regulated-industry review stops. Cloud only, with no self-hosted option.
Zapier
Best for: the widest connector catalog and the fastest path from idea to running automation.
Zapier connects more applications than anything else here, which is the main reason to move sideways rather than up. If the thing blocking you is one missing connector, this is the shortest path.
Trade-offs: the engine is linear, with documented ceilings on steps, branching depth, and loops, so you would be giving up the structural flexibility that made Make attractive. Per-task billing is a different meter rather than no meter, and at the entry tier it is more expensive than Make. Governance is no better.
Application-centric automation
Celigo
Best for: NetSuite-centric teams running template-driven automations.
Celigo is worth naming if the Make scenarios you care about are order-to-cash or inventory flows around NetSuite. The templates cover that ground properly and you stop maintaining the logic yourself.
Trade-offs: outside NetSuite-adjacent work the fit drops off quickly, pricing is per flow and endpoint rather than published, and there is no dedicated agent builder.
Open source, self-hosted
n8n
Best for: technical teams that want self-hosted control over cost and data.
n8n is the direct answer to credit metering. The Community Edition is free and genuinely unmetered, with no execution counter at all, and the builder is at least as capable as Make’s for branching and code steps. For a team with somewhere to run it, the cost argument is decisive.
Trade-offs: self-hosting moves the operational burden to you. Our n8n security tracker lists 127 high and critical advisories published against n8n since December 2025, 41 of them critical, last checked 18 September 2026, each with the versions it affects and the release that fixes it. On 11 March 2026 CISA added one of them, CVE-2025-68613, to its Known Exploited Vulnerabilities catalog. Every one has a patch, and self-hosted, that queue is yours. Free is a price paid in someone’s time rather than a price of zero.
How to choose
- Lightweight scenarios, small team, no compliance requirement: stay on Make
- The same model with a wider connector catalog: Zapier
- No metering, and you can operate the infrastructure: n8n
- Integration and AI agents governed on one platform: Tray.ai
- Governance with a builder non-engineers can use: Workato
- Already standardized on Microsoft: Power Automate
- The scenarios have become ERP integration: Boomi
- NetSuite is the system of record: Celigo
What actually moves teams off Make
Three things come up repeatedly.
The meter runs on the wrong thing. Credits are consumed per action, so the bill grows with how many steps a scenario takes, not with what the scenario is worth, and the AI steps cost more than the rest. The workflows that matter most are usually the busiest, so cost rises fastest exactly where you can least afford to turn it off. Teams notice the month a new high-volume scenario goes live.
A scenario hit the wall. The 40-minute execution cap is fine until a job has to process a backlog, reconcile a month, or wait on a slow API. Splitting one scenario into several to get under a time limit is the point at which people start asking what else they are working around.
Somebody asked who has access. Team-level access control is a reasonable design for the product Make is, and it is not an answer to a regulated-industry review that wants per-user permissions, audit, and a list of every connection to a production system. That conversation, more than price, is what sends teams up-market.
Make is a good product and the cheapest published option here, and plenty of teams should stay on it. The reason to move is that the automation stopped being a convenience: once a workflow is load-bearing, the questions are about cost shape, execution limits, and who approved it, and those are answered somewhere else.
Sources
Vendor pricing, last checked 18 September 2026:
Vendor and public-body documentation:
- Microsoft Power Automate limits and configuration, for the 14-day throttling shutdown
- CVE-2025-68613 in the National Vulnerability Database
- CISA Known Exploited Vulnerabilities catalog
- Advisory counts from our own n8n security tracker, refreshed 18 September 2026
Customer figures are from the case studies linked above: Cue and Wavo.
The Make scenario cap and access-control model, the Zapier engine ceilings, the Boomi TCO multiple, and the platform ceilings attributed to Workato come from our own competitive research rather than published vendor documentation, and are set out in the side-by-side comparison. Tray.ai, Workato, Boomi, and Celigo do not publish list pricing, so no figure is quoted for any of them.