Make vs Zapier
Both are automation tools. Here is what separates them.
What Make is
Make is a visual automation platform for connecting apps, data sources and AI models into scenarios, its name for a workflow drawn on a canvas. Alongside scenarios, Make AI Agents can act and orchestrate workflows across the connected app catalogue. A scenario is assembled from modules and control blocks: routers for branching, iterators for stepping through lists, error handlers for when a call fails, and notes for documenting the canvas in place. HTTP and webhook modules let a scenario call any API and be triggered by an external system, so a missing connector is not a dead end. Make Code runs custom JavaScript or Python inside a scenario, AI Mapping transforms and maps data between apps, and custom apps can be built to reach proprietary in house systems. A templates library provides prebuilt scenarios to start from, and an analytics dashboard tracks scenario performance and provides observability. More than 3,000 verified prebuilt integrations are available, grouped into categories including AI and automation, commerce, communication, CRM and sales, marketing, HR and operations, and finance and accounting. More than 300 of those are generative AI apps. Maia builds automations and agents from a natural language conversation, and the Make MCP Server exposes existing scenarios as callable actions to AI clients, which turns work already built into tools an AI client can invoke. Make Grid gives a single view across an organisation's whole automation estate. Billing runs on credits, and each module action, adding a row to a Google Sheet for instance, counts as one credit. The Free plan costs 0 USD a month and includes up to 1,000 credits, but holds a team to 2 active scenarios, a minimum interval of 15 minutes between runs, 5 minutes of execution per run and 5 MB file transfers. The Make plan starts at 9 USD a month for 5,000 credits and lifts all four: unlimited active scenarios, a 1 minute minimum interval, 40 minutes of execution per run and 500 MB file transfers. The Company tier is custom priced and raises the file transfer cap to 1,000 MB. Annual billing saves 15 percent or more against monthly. Credits are the number to watch, because scenarios stop running once a team's credits are exhausted and stay stopped until more are added. Account owners are notified at 75 percent and 90 percent of consumption, and credits can be topped up automatically. Make holds SOC 2 Type II and SOC 3 attestations, supports GDPR obligations, and offers single sign on, encryption and role based access control.
What Zapier is
Zapier is an automation service that connects separate apps so an event in one triggers actions in another. Those workflows are called Zaps, and they sit alongside Tables, Forms, Chatbots, Agents and Canvas in the product line. The app directory lists more than 10,000 connected apps, and Agents can be grounded on uploaded FAQs, docs and public links. Billing runs on tasks, and what counts as a task is narrower than it first looks. Trigger steps never consume tasks, even though polling can run many thousands of checks a month. Filter and Paths steps, failed or halted actions, and Formatter, Delay, Looping, Digest, Storage and Zapier Manager steps also consume none. Some features cost more than one: Zapier MCP consumes 2 tasks for each successful tool call, and Lead Router consumes 5 for each lead routed successfully. The free plan includes 100 tasks a month, limits a Zap to two steps and checks for new data every 15 minutes. Professional shortens that check to 2 minutes, and Team and Enterprise to 1 minute. Other limits move with the plan in the same way: Tables hold 2,500 records on Free, 100,000 on Professional and 500,000 on Team, Agents allow 400 activities a month on Free and 1,500 on Professional and Team, and Code by Zapier gets 1 second of runtime on Free, 30 seconds on Professional and Team and 2 minutes on Enterprise. Paid pricing is tiered by task volume rather than sold as a flat seat price. Professional covers one user and, billed annually, costs 19.99 USD a month for 750 tasks, 49.00 USD for 2,000 tasks and 129.00 USD for 10,000 tasks; the monthly-billed equivalents are 29.99, 73.50 and 193.50 USD. Team covers 25 users at 69.00 USD a month for 2,000 tasks or 169.00 USD for 10,000, billed annually. Annual billing costs 33% less than monthly, and non-profits receive a further 15% discount, which does not apply to pay-per-task billing. Professional comes with a 14-day free trial. On the security side, Zapier is hosted on Amazon Web Services in the United States, encrypts data at rest with AES-256 and web application traffic with TLS 1.2 or above, holds SOC 2 Type II and SOC 3 certifications, and maintains GDPR and CCPA compliance. Accounts support two-factor authentication, and SAML single sign-on, SCIM provisioning and domain capture are available.
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