Bardeen vs n8n
 Bardeen |  n8n | |
|---|---|---|
| Sentiment | ||
| Score | 47/100 | 53/100 |
| Rank in category | #2 | #1 |
| Rated comments | 8 | 40 |
| Best for | Non-technical users automating simple, repetitive browser tasks; Light scraping of web pages into Google Sheets or similar | Technical builders and automation agencies who want code-level control; High-volume workflows where per-step pricing would get expensive; Teams that want to self-host and keep data on their own infrastructure |
| Skip it if | Complex flows behind logins or long multi-step form fills; Teams that need a large integration catalog like Zapier's | Non-technical users who want true no-code; Anyone unwilling to patch, secure and maintain a self-hosted instance |
| Starting price | $10/mo | 20€/mo |
| Pricing (vendor-stated) | Basic $10/mo with 100 credits per month; Premium $50/mo monthly or $480/yr annually (annual saves 20%) with 1,000 credits per month; Enterprise is custom. The page says you always get 100 free credits. Credits are charged per row (1 for scraping, web search and AI, 3 for enrichment) and expire at the end of each billing period. | Self-hosted Community Edition is free. Cloud plans billed annually: Starter 20€/mo (2.5k executions), Pro 50€/mo (10k executions); Business 667€/mo (40k executions, self-hosted only); Enterprise via sales. Executions count whole workflow runs, not steps. Annual billing saves 17%; cloud trial needs no card. |
Independent discussion is thin: of 71 Reddit mentions, only about eight non-promotional comments give a real opinion, and most of the rest name Bardeen in passing in tool lists. The users who do report on it use it for lightweight browser work, such as scraping pages into a spreadsheet, copying data between web apps and filling forms without code, while the one detailed critic says complex flows behind logins or multi-step forms outgrow it and are more reliable in Playwright. Nearly half of the mentions were promotional, mostly comments that name Bardeen in passing while plugging other products (one Reddit research tool alone accounts for eight), plus two near-identical comments from different accounts praising it in the same words.
Users like
- Handles simple but repetitive browser chores, such as copying data and clicking through pages, that would otherwise eat hours[1][2][3][4]
- Works for light scraping and lead research without writing code; one user says it kept handling Lever and Greenhouse job pages without monthly code fixes[1][2]
- Considered one of the easier automation tools to start with[1]
Independent users are largely positive: self-hosting keeps running costs low and flat, code nodes and branching handle logic that simpler tools cannot, and many now build workflows by having Claude drive n8n through its MCP server. The trade-off is that it is not really no-code, and self-hosters own the operational work, from security patches on exposed instances to expiring OAuth tokens and a bloating executions database. The sample leans heavily on r/n8n and r/selfhosted; about one in eight comments was promotional, including three accounts steering one thread toward the Blotato scheduler and plugs for Kareenos, Windmill, Ayrshare and a cheap VPS host.
Users like
- Self-hosting keeps costs low and flat: users run it on a Raspberry Pi or a small VPS for a few dollars a month, and pricing is per workflow run rather than per step[1][2][3][4][5]
- Code nodes, loops and branching handle complex logic and odd data transformations without workarounds[1][2][3][4]
- Works well with AI assistants: users have Claude build and fix workflows through the n8n MCP server, though it still makes mistakes on complex expressions[1][2][3][4]
- Execution logs and the visual flow make it easy to find the slow or failing step and to hand workflows to non-technical clients[1][2][3]
Users complain about
- Steeper learning curve than Make or Zapier, and self-hosting is beyond most people's idea of no-code[1][2][3][4][5]
- Self-hosters carry the security risk: it has had pre-auth remote code execution CVEs, and webhook endpoints stay publicly reachable by design[1][2]
- Ongoing maintenance: Google OAuth apps left in testing mode expire tokens every seven days and stop workflows, and an unpruned executions database (1.66 GB in one case) slows the instance[1][2]
- Some developers find it unnecessary or limiting next to plain code, CI tools or AI coding agents[1][2][3][4]