I automate the boring parts of my one-person business — lead capture, follow-ups, invoices. The two tools everyone compares are Make and Zapier. I tested both. Here is the honest difference.
What they do
Both tools connect your apps so work moves by itself: a new lead in a form becomes a row in a sheet, a Slack message, and a follow-up email — without you touching anything. The difference is how they think about it.
Zapier calls each workflow a “Zap”: trigger, then actions. It is the simplest way to explain automation to anyone.
Make calls each workflow a “scenario”: a visual flowchart where you see data move from one app to the next. It looks more technical, and it is — in a good way.
Pricing (checked November 2026)
Zapier
Free — $0/month: 100 tasks a month, two-step Zaps, Tables and Forms included.
Professional — from $19.99/month: multi-step Zaps, unlimited premium apps, webhooks, AI fields. New accounts get a 14-day trial of Professional, no card needed.
Team — from $69/month: 25 users, shared Zaps and app connections, priority support.
Enterprise: contact for pricing.
A “task” is one successful action. Checking for new data costs nothing — only completed actions count.
Make
Free: 1,000 credits a month. Most actions cost 1 credit each.
Paid plans (Core, Pro, Teams): sold as monthly credit bundles — the more credits you buy, the more your scenarios can do. Annual billing is cheaper than monthly. Check current prices on make.com/pricing before you decide, because Make prices its plans by credits, not by a flat feature list.
Ease of use
Zapier wins if you want something running in 10 minutes. Pick a trigger, pick an action, turn it on. I built my first Zap — new form submission to a Google Sheet — without reading any docs.
Make wins if you like seeing the whole workflow. The visual builder shows every step, every branch, every filter. It takes longer to learn, but when something breaks, you can see exactly where.
Power and flexibility
Make is stronger for complex work: data transformation, branching, error handling, and custom apps for any service with a public API. It also lets you manage the platform itself through 300+ REST API endpoints.
Zapier is stronger for breadth: 9,000+ apps, the biggest library anywhere. If a tool exists, Zapier probably connects to it. Its Tables and Forms are included in every plan, which makes it a decent lightweight system on its own, not just a connector.
My verdict
Starting out, or automating simple things? Zapier. The free plan is genuinely useful, and Professional at $19.99 is fair for what it does.
Complex workflows, lots of data moving, tight budget? Make. The credit system is cheaper at volume, and the visual builder pays off once your automations get serious.
Running a team? Zapier Team if you want shared workspaces and simple admin; Make Teams if your workflows are complex and you want finer control.
I use Zapier for quick, simple connections and Make when a workflow has real logic in it. You don’t have to pick one forever — both have free plans, so test your actual workflow on both before paying.
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