Activepieces vs n8n
Activepieces scores higher on the AgentReady, 63/100 against 60/100. They differ on 9 of the 41 signals. Which ones decides whether an agent can adopt them without a person watching.
What each one is
Activepieces. AI automation platform that lets teams build agents and automations through chat, with enterprise-grade governance and 760+ integrations
n8n. AI Workflow Automation Platform - the world's most popular workflow automation platform for technical teams
Where Activepieces is ahead
Activepieces passes authentication documented, and n8n does not. That is understand, whether an agent can read the docs and work out how the API behaves before calling it.
It also holds operate: structured, predictable output, retry behavior documented, idempotency support and agent compatibility verified. n8n misses those.
Where n8n is ahead
n8n passes llms-full.txt / full agent docs, and Activepieces does not. That is discover, whether an agent can find the product at all without being told it exists.
It also holds adopt: agent-compatible signup flow, official typescript sdk and official python sdk. Activepieces misses those.
What neither does
Both fail structured api reference, openapi / spec quality, request examples provided, response examples provided, errors and status codes documented, limits / constraints documented, no mandatory sales call, programmatic credential creation, machine-readable errors, rate-limit behavior predictable. If your agent needs any of those, you will be building it yourself either way.
Score, pillar by pillar
The AgentReady splits into four pillars, scored separately, because a product can be easy to find and still impossible to adopt.
Discover. n8n leads 100 to 93. Activepieces misses llms-full.txt / full agent docs; n8n misses nothing.
Understand. Activepieces leads 31 to 23. Activepieces misses structured api reference, openapi / spec quality, request examples provided, response examples provided, errors and status codes documented, limits / constraints documented; n8n misses structured api reference, openapi / spec quality, authentication documented, request examples provided, response examples provided, errors and status codes documented, limits / constraints documented.
Adopt. n8n leads 80 to 52. Activepieces misses no mandatory sales call, agent-compatible signup flow, programmatic credential creation, official typescript sdk, official python sdk; n8n misses no mandatory sales call, programmatic credential creation.
Operate is whether an agent can run against it in production and recover when a call fails. Activepieces leads 76 to 35. Activepieces misses machine-readable errors, rate-limit behavior predictable; n8n misses structured, predictable output, machine-readable errors, retry behavior documented, idempotency support, rate-limit behavior predictable, agent compatibility verified.
Pricing
Activepieces does not publish a machine-readable starting price and has a free tier. n8n starts at $20/mo and has a free tier.
| Activepieces plans | n8n plans |
|---|---|
| - | Starter $20/mo, billed annually |
| - | Pro $50/mo, billed annually |
| - | Business $800/mo, billed annually |
| - | Enterprise Contact Sales |
| - | Start-up Plan 50% off Business |
| - | Community Edition Free |
Signal by signal
| Signal | Activepieces | n8n |
|---|---|---|
| AgentReady | 63 | 60 |
| Discovery | 93 | 100 |
| Understanding | 31 | 23 |
| Adoption | 52 | 80 |
| Operability | 76 | 35 |
| Public API | Yes | Yes |
| MCP server | Yes | Yes |
| OpenAPI spec | Unknown | Unknown |
| CLI | Yes | Yes |
| llms.txt | Yes | Yes |
| Self-serve signup | Yes | Yes |
| Free tier | Yes | Yes |
Which to pick
Activepieces clears more of the signals an agent needs, so it is the safer default for unattended use. Full profiles: Activepieces and n8n. Alternatives to each: Activepieces, n8n.
An agent can fetch this as data: POST /v1/compare {"slugs": ["activepieces", "n8n"]}