Puente OS vs n8n: Comparison and When to Use Each

A workflow automation platform is a tool for building flows that connect applications and run steps on their own: a trigger, such as a webhook or a schedule, and a chain of nodes that read, transform and write data in other systems. Puente OS is the platform that builds the systems that run your business: apps, workflows, databases and agents that read from your systems, cross-reference the information none of them holds in full, decide on your rules and execute the action inside them. The workflow is one of those four pieces, and the other three complete the process.

I'm Cris Ugarte, CEO and co-founder of Puente OS. We work with retail, eCommerce and logistics companies in Chile, Peru and Mexico, and when we talk about automating processes, n8n comes up often: many technical teams know it, have tried it or already have flows running on it. The next question is direct: how is Puente different?

My answer is that Puente delivers the system that runs your process, up and running and with someone accountable for it. A workflow executes the steps, and around it the process needs a design, a screen for your team, business data, integrations with local systems and someone to keep it running. Here I go through what each one does, with public sources for everything I say about n8n, and when each one makes sense.

What is n8n and what does it solve?

n8n is a workflow automation and AI agent platform, founded in 2019 in Berlin by Jan Oberhauser, its CEO, according to its press page. Its home page presents it with the headline "AI agents and workflows you can see and control" and speaks to technical teams, offering them the flexibility of code with the speed of no-code.

What it offers, according to its website and its documentation:

Visual editor with code. Workflows are built on a canvas, node by node, and at any step you can write JavaScript or Python with the Code node. The n8n Assistant, in Preview, creates, edits, tests and fixes workflows through conversation.
Integrations. Its home page mentions over 500 integrations, with ready-made nodes for common apps and custom connections to any API for the rest. Its directory lists 2,329 and includes nodes built by partners and verified community nodes. For anything without a node, its documentation says to use the HTTP Request node.
AI agents. The AI Agent node takes a chat model and at least one tool, and the agent decides which one to use. Separately, an agent builder, in Preview, adds skills, sub-agents, a knowledge base, memory, channels like Slack, Telegram and Linear, and schedules.
AI control. With human approval per tool, the workflow pauses until someone approves or rejects the agent's action, through channels like Slack, Microsoft Teams, Gmail or WhatsApp. On top of that come a Guardrails node, which checks the model's input or output, and evaluations with metrics to measure its quality.
MCP. An instance-level MCP server lets assistants like Claude or ChatGPT search, run, create and edit workflows, and agents connect to other MCP servers with the MCP Client Tool node.
Deployment. n8n Cloud or self-hosted, with Docker Compose or on cloud providers like AWS, Azure, Google Cloud and DigitalOcean. Its home page also offers an on-prem and air-gapped option.
Enterprise features. SSO with SAML and LDAP, encrypted secret stores, version control, role-based permissions, audit logs and log streaming to your SIEM, workflow history, real-time alerts and usage dashboards, according to its home page.

Its community is large: over 200,000 members, according to its home page, 206,829 stars on its GitHub repository as of October 9, 2026, and 13,144 workflow templates published by the community. In October 2025 it announced its Series C, led by Accel, and in May 2026 SAP invested in the company and announced an integrated, managed n8n environment inside Joule Studio. In that announcement, n8n reports over 1,400 enterprise customers and 1.7 million monthly active builders.

A visual editor open to code, with agents, guardrails and deployment on your own servers, so your technical team builds and controls its flows: that is n8n's job.

What is Puente OS and what does it solve?

Puente OS is the platform that builds the systems that run your business. Your ERP records what happened. Your BI shows you what happened. Puente makes it happen. In your stack it is the system of action: it reads from your systems, cross-references the information none of them holds in full, decides on your rules and executes the action inside them.

What it builds comes from four pieces:

Workflows with explicit, auditable rules that start on their own when data changes or at a set time.
Databases that bring together context from several systems: the order, its receipt, its shipment and its settlement in a single record.
Apps where your team reviews, decides on and approves the exceptions.
Agents for the steps that take judgment, like an ambiguous complaint or a discrepancy that needs investigating.

With Puente OS you describe in natural language what your operation needs and get software running: apps, workflows, databases and agents. Puente's Growth Ops team builds each process with you and maintains it, and each one reaches production in 2 to 4 weeks. Puente acts on your systems, and where the operation lives in spreadsheets, it also keeps the record.

The discipline behind it is autonomous operations design: designing your operation so the repeatable work runs on its own, on your rules, and your team decides what takes judgment. For a closer look at the layer, see what a system of action is.

What does it take, around a workflow, to run a business?

It takes five more things: the designed process, the screen where your team works, your business database, someone accountable when something fails and integrations with local systems. The workflow executes the steps, and those five are what close the process.

Take reconciling marketplace sales in Chile:

The designed process. Before the first node, someone defines what triggers the process, which rules it applies, what its exceptions are and who resolves each one. This is the work that decides whether the flow is useful, because a flow built on a poorly mapped process automates the error.
The screen where your team works. Every exception needs a place: finance sees payment discrepancies, operations sees stalled shipments and whoever approves sees the full case before deciding.
Your business database. The order, its receipt, its settlement and its return sit in a single record, with their history. That is where each rule cross-references what no single system holds in full, and where your team measures.
Someone accountable when something fails. An API changes, a report arrives in a different format, a credential expires. Someone has to see the failure, understand what happened, fix it and get the process running again.
Local integrations. Mercado Libre, Bsale, the SII (Chile's tax authority), your invoicing system and your courier, each with its own API, format and calendar.

When those five live in different tools and with different people, coordinating them eats up your team's hours: that is the coordination tax. An autonomous operation meets three conditions: work starts on its own when data changes, your systems talk to each other with no person in the middle, and the system executes the clear cases and brings you what takes judgment. Workflows contribute to all three, and all three hold when the process also has its database, the screen where your team decides and a team that maintains it. Puente OS delivers all three together, on a single platform.

How do Puente OS and n8n compare, dimension by dimension?

Dimension by dimension:

Who builds. n8n: your technical team, in a visual editor with JavaScript or Python when needed, backed by community templates and the n8n Assistant, which builds workflows through conversation. Puente OS: the Growth Ops team builds each process with you. You describe in natural language what your operation needs and get software running, and every activation or irreversible change goes through your confirmation.
Who maintains. n8n: your team or a consultant you hire, for example from its partner directory. For self-hosting, its documentation calls for technical expertise to install and configure it, and its self-hosted license allows a consultant to build and maintain workflows for their clients on the consultant's instance. Puente OS: the Growth Ops team maintains each process as your operation changes, with a new channel, a new rule or a report that changes format, and responds when something fails.
Process design. n8n: the canvas, where the builder assembles the flow step by step. Puente OS: design is part of the work. Growth Ops maps what triggers each process, what it decides and what its exceptions are, and defines with you what happens to each one: the system resolves it or it reaches the right person with full context.
Apps and interfaces. n8n: the n8n Form Trigger, which generates a web page with a form that starts the workflow, and the n8n Form node, for multi-step forms; the Data tables tab, to view and edit data without building a workflow; Chat Hub, a chat interface with models and agents, with a chat user role that has no access to workflows; and approval of an agent's actions through nine channels, such as Slack, Microsoft Teams, Gmail or WhatsApp. Puente OS: web apps tailored to each process, hosted on Puente with their own link, where your team reviews, decides on and approves the exceptions, like a discrepancy dashboard for finance or a stalled-shipments inbox for operations.
Data. n8n: Data tables, table storage inside n8n to keep data between workflows; agent memory nodes on Redis, Postgres and others; and nodes to read and write external databases, like Postgres or MySQL. Puente OS: your business databases, with typed columns validated before saving, queries with filters, grouping and aggregation, and loads of up to 10,000 rows in a single operation. The workflows and apps of the same process read and write them.
Integrations. n8n: over 500 integrations according to its home page and 2,329 in its directory, which includes partner nodes and verified community nodes, plus the HTTP Request node for any API. In its directory, as of October 9, 2026, there are no nodes for Bsale, Defontana, the SII, Mercado Libre or Falabella, and there is a verified Mercado Pago node built by a partner. On npm there are community nodes, published by third parties and unverified by n8n, for Mercado Libre and for the SII, which run only on self-hosted instances according to its installation guide. Puente OS: native connectors for Mercado Libre (orders and shipping details), Bsale (stock and documents), Multivende, WhatsApp, Gmail and Google Sheets, among others. The Growth Ops team connects the rest, like the SII, your invoicing system or your ERP, through its API, over HTTP or Python, or by reading the ERP's database.
Error handling and monitoring. n8n: an error workflow that starts with the Error Trigger node, is assigned in each workflow's settings, can serve several workflows and lets you, for example, send alerts by email or Slack; retry per node, with 3 attempts by default according to its source code, and options to stop the flow, continue or follow an error output; each workflow's execution list, filterable by status, where a failed execution can be retried or opened in the editor with its data to fix it and run it again; and in Insights, executions, failures and failure rate for the last 7 days. Puente OS: each execution's detail shows the step where it stopped and, per step, the error, the traceback and the logs; there are failure alerts with an excerpt of the error, and failure policies per step and per iteration. Behind it is the team that responds: at an electronics seller in Mexico, every incident is recorded in a support log, and from August 1 to 12, 2026, the median resolution time was 10 minutes.
AI. n8n: an AI Agent node with tools, an agent builder with skills, sub-agents, knowledge base and memory, human approval per tool, a Guardrails node, evaluations with metrics and MCP as both server and client. Puente OS: the complete system is built with AI. You describe in natural language what your operation needs and get apps, workflows, databases and agents running: that is how, at an electronics seller in Mexico, one person built 20 apps and 75 processes in ten months. Inside each process, agents take the steps that call for judgment: they run inside workflows, with tools, history and an iteration cap, and a decision agent classifies and routes with closed questions.
Governance and deployment. n8n: version history with restore, Git source control and environments, instance and project roles, SSO with SAML and LDAP, and deployment on n8n Cloud, fully managed by n8n, or self-hosted, with an on-prem and air-gapped option, depending on the edition. Puente OS: every workflow save creates a new version, and rolling back means activating the previous one; in apps, every publish is saved as a version, with earlier ones kept as history. Each app is assigned the tables its process uses, with read, write and delete permissions, and irreversible actions, like issuing a tax document, are designed in two steps: a draft and a person's confirmation. Puente manages the platform where everything runs.

What does it look like in a real operation?

It looks like a complete system that runs on each customer's rules, with a team that maintains it. Two Puente OS customers:

Example 1: a multichannel electronics seller in Mexico, from order to shipping label

An electronics seller in Mexico runs without an ERP, and Puente has seven of its sales channels connected. Every order follows its path on rules: the address is validated, the carrier is chosen by zone, cost and insurance, the label is generated and the tracking number is written to the order. Other processes run around it: a report that consolidates 213,362 Mercado Libre orders via API, a competitor price capture that has collected 1,209,812 records and saves the team 33 hours a month, and a support log where every incident is recorded.

Of the 38,628 orders processed between November 2025 and August 2026, 97.9% got their shipping label with no human intervention: 37,815 labels. Generating the labels for a cutoff went from 5 to 7 hours to 15 minutes, and monthly volume grew 40% with the same operations team. From August 1 to 12, 12 of 2,051 orders had an incident, 0.59%, with a median resolution time of 10 minutes. Behind it are 20 apps, 75 processes, 7 channels and 19 APIs, built in ten months by one person.

Example 2: a pet retailer in Chile, with orders, shipping and margin on one platform

A pet retailer sells on four channels. Its OMS (order management system) on Puente processed 56,597 orders between January and August 2026, and every shipment is measured against the delivery promise: 33,192 shipments measured and 85.0% on-time delivery among those not canceled, calculated against the courier's API. A workflow calculates the margin of every sales line each day: as of August 2026 it had covered 247,626 lines, and 3,830 of them, 1.5%, showed a negative margin that nobody saw before. Prices are also executed from Puente, with 8,362 changes in its online store.

It runs 10 apps in production for six departments, with 167 versions deployed, built and maintained by one person. The time from requesting a new process to having it in production dropped from 105 days, on the first project, to 7.

Why choose Puente OS?

Because you get your process running end to end and a team accountable for it: the apps where your team works, your business database, the workflows and the agents on a single platform, connected to your systems and designed around your operation by the Growth Ops team, which also maintains them. n8n is an excellent tool for a technical team to build its flows, and Puente OS goes all the way to the working process, with someone accountable for it. Six concrete reasons:

You get the complete process, ready to operate. It reaches production with its screen, its data, its rules and its agents, and your team works the exceptions in an app built for that process. At the pet retailer in Example 2, that adds up to 10 apps in production for six departments.
A team responds when something fails. Every execution shows where it stopped and why, alerts flag the failure and Growth Ops resolves it. At the electronics seller in Example 1, from August 1 to 12, 2026, 0.59% of orders had an incident, with a median resolution time of 10 minutes.
The process is designed before it's built. Growth Ops maps what triggers each process, what it decides and what its exceptions are, and defines with you where each one goes. The rules are written down explicitly, with history and rollback: changing one means editing it.
It works on the systems you already use. Puente has native connectors for Mercado Libre, Bsale and Multivende, and the team connects your invoicing system, your courier or your ERP through its API, over HTTP or Python, or by reading the ERP's database; your bank transactions come in from its statements. Puente reads, cross-references and writes back where it belongs, logging every action.
Each process builds on the last. Each one reaches production in 2 to 4 weeks and uses the connections and data the previous ones left in place. At the pet retailer, the time from requesting a new process to having it in production dropped from 105 days to 7.
The AI is in how it gets built. You describe in natural language what your operation needs and get software running. At the electronics seller, one person built 20 apps and 75 processes in ten months, and 97.9% of orders go out with their label with no human intervention.

That way your operation runs on your rules, and your team spends its time deciding what takes judgment.

When does each one make sense?

n8n fits when you have your own technical team that wants to build and run its flows, or when the automation has to run on your servers. Puente OS fits when you want the process working end to end, with a team that builds it with you and maintains it.

n8n, if your technical team wants to build, test and maintain its own workflows and agents, write code inside the flow, connect them to other agents through MCP or choose from hundreds of nodes and thousands of templates. Also if your policy requires self-hosting, on-prem or air-gapped deployment. Its community, its template library and its product pace are real strengths.
Puente OS, if you want the process left running with its apps, its data and its rules, connected to Mercado Libre, Bsale, your invoicing system or your ERP, with a team that designs it with you, maintains it and responds when something fails. Also if you want your team to spend its time deciding the exceptions, and the next process to be added on the same platform.

How do you start?

With a process that hurts, with volume and manual handoffs: generating shipping labels, reconciling a marketplace or matching documents. With Puente OS, each process reaches production in 2 to 4 weeks.

Pick the process. With volume, manual handoffs and a visible cost when it fails.
Take the baseline. Cases per month, hours of manual work per week and the share of cases that come out right the first time.
Take inventory of what already runs. The flows, spreadsheets and scripts that touch that process, with what they do, who maintains them and which systems they use. That list defines what gets connected and what gets redesigned.
Connect the sources. Your ERP, your store, your marketplaces, your invoicing system, your courier and your bank statements.
Write down the rules your team applies from memory. For example: "if an order still has no label two hours after the cutoff, it goes to operations with the full order in view."
Decide where each exception goes. The system resolves it, or it reaches a named person with full context in an App.
Measure from the first week and add the next process on the same platform.

That is autonomous operations design applied process by process: the repeatable work runs on its own, on your rules, and your team decides what takes judgment. To choose which steps go to a workflow and which to an agent, this guide on how to implement AI in your business can help, and if you sell on marketplaces, the same approach is in Puente OS vs Multivende.

We believe every company in Latin America can be operationally autonomous, and that starts with having every process running end to end, with its rules and a team that keeps it running.

Key takeaways

n8n is a workflow automation and AI agent platform for technical teams: a visual editor with code, over 500 integrations according to its website, forms, agents with human approval, guardrails and evaluations, and deployment on its cloud or on your servers.
Around a workflow, running a business takes five more things: the designed process, the screen where your team works, your business database, someone accountable when something fails and local integrations.
Puente OS delivers the complete system up and running: apps, databases, workflows and agents on a single platform, designed around your processes and connected to your systems.
Puente has native connectors for Mercado Libre, Bsale and Multivende, and the Growth Ops team connects the rest of your systems via API, such as the SII, your invoicing system or your ERP.
The Growth Ops team builds each process, maintains it and responds when something fails: at an electronics seller in Mexico, 97.9% of orders go out with their label with no human intervention, and from August 1 to 12, 2026, incidents were resolved with a median time of 10 minutes.
n8n fits a company with its own technical team that wants to build and run its flows, or with a self-hosting requirement. Puente OS fits when you want the process running end to end, in 2 to 4 weeks per process.

Want to see what a workflow looks like inside the system that runs your process? Let's talk about your processes, and we'll show you Puente OS running with cases like the ones in this article. Book a conversation with our team.

Frequently asked questions

What is n8n and what is it used for?

n8n is a workflow automation and AI agent platform, founded in 2019 in Berlin. A technical team uses it to build flows in a visual editor, with JavaScript or Python when needed, connect over 500 apps or any API with its HTTP Request node, and build agents with tools, memory, human approval and guardrails. It runs on its cloud, n8n Cloud, or installed on your servers. According to its May 2026 announcement, it has over 1,400 enterprise customers and 1.7 million monthly active builders.

Does n8n work for companies without a technical team?

Its documentation recommends n8n Cloud for people without technical expertise, because there n8n takes care of hosting, updates and scaling, and for self-hosting it calls for technical expertise to install and configure it, according to its guide to choosing how to use n8n. Its home page speaks to technical teams, and the n8n Assistant, in Preview, helps create and fix workflows through conversation. In both options, each flow is built and maintained by your team or a consultant you hire. On self-hosted instances, its license allows a consultant to build and maintain workflows for their clients on the consultant's instance, as long as the clients don't access it; n8n Cloud is governed by its own terms. Puente OS is made for the company that wants the process working: the Growth Ops team designs it with you, builds it and maintains it, and your team decides the exceptions.

Is n8n open source?

n8n describes itself as fair-code, a term it coined to describe its licensing model, and its documentation explains why it doesn't call itself open source: the Open Source Initiative allows no usage limits in an open source license, and n8n's license has them. Under the fair-code model, the source code is available and its authors restrict commercial use. n8n publishes its code on GitHub under the Sustainable Use License 1.0, which according to its license FAQ governs the self-hosted version; n8n Cloud has its own terms. The license allows you to use, modify, create derivative works from and redistribute the software, with three limits: use or modify it only for your business's internal purposes or for personal or non-commercial purposes; distribute it or make it available to others only free of charge and for non-commercial purposes; and keep the license, copyright and licensor notices intact. Files with ".ee." in their name or ".ee" in their folder name fall under the n8n Enterprise License, according to its LICENSE.md. According to the same FAQ, a consultant can build and maintain workflows for their clients on the consultant's instance, as long as the clients don't access it directly, and can install n8n on the client's server as long as the consultant doesn't also provide the hosting. The license excludes hosting n8n as a service for customers to build their own workflows, and white-labeling it by removing the n8n brand.

Does n8n have AI agents?

Yes. Its AI Agent node takes a chat model and at least one tool, and the agent decides which one to use. An agent builder, in Preview, adds skills, sub-agents, a knowledge base, memory, channels like Slack, Telegram and Linear, and schedules. n8n also offers human approval per tool across nine channels, a Guardrails node that checks the model's input and output (for example, for personal data, jailbreak attempts or secret keys), evaluations with metrics and an MCP server so assistants like Claude or ChatGPT can search, run, create and edit workflows.

Does Puente OS have AI agents?

Yes, and Puente OS's AI starts earlier: it's in how the system gets built. You describe in natural language what your operation needs and get software running; at an electronics seller in Mexico, one person built 20 apps and 75 processes in ten months. Inside that system, the agent is one of the four pieces, along with apps, workflows and databases, and it runs inside a workflow: a simple agent to draft or summarize, an advanced agent with tools, history and an iteration cap, and a decision agent that classifies and routes with closed questions. Each step gets what fits it: a workflow for the rule, a model for reading, an agent for judgment and a person for the exception, as I explain in how to implement AI in your business.

Does n8n integrate with Mercado Libre and Bsale?

In its integrations directory, as of October 9, 2026, there are no nodes for Mercado Libre or Bsale, or for Defontana, the SII or Falabella. For a service without its own node, its documentation says to use the HTTP Request node, which connects to any API, and it also lets you install community-built nodes. On npm there are community nodes, published by third parties and unverified by n8n, for Mercado Libre and for the SII, which according to its installation guide run only on self-hosted instances. There is a verified Mercado Pago node, built by a partner. Puente OS has native connectors for Mercado Libre (orders and shipping details), Bsale (stock and documents) and Multivende, and the Growth Ops team connects the rest via API.

What happens to the flows I already have in n8n?

They go into the inventory first. The Growth Ops team reviews with you the flows that touch each process, what they do and who maintains them, and decides which ones keep running where they are and which get redesigned within the process in Puente OS, with its app, its data and its rules. Each process reaches production in 2 to 4 weeks.

External sources cited

Everything this post says about n8n comes from its website, its documentation, its blog, its GitHub repository, the npm registry and SAP's announcement, reviewed on October 9, 2026. Puente OS customer figures are production measurements as of August 2026; label generation time, the hours saved on price capture and the request dates for each process come from follow-up with the customer.

n8n: product

n8n, home page: headline "AI agents and workflows you can see and control"; speaks to technical teams with "the flexibility of code with the speed of no-code"; over 500 integrations, with ready-made nodes for common apps and custom connections to any API; JavaScript or Python at any step; deployment on its infrastructure or yours, with an on-prem and air-gapped option; "Enterprise-ready" block with SAML and LDAP SSO, encrypted secret stores, version control, RBAC permissions, audit logs and log streaming to a SIEM, workflow history, real-time alerts and usage dashboards; over 200,000 community members.
Choose how to use n8n (n8n documentation): recommends n8n Cloud for people without technical expertise and describes it as fully managed, with n8n handling hosting, updates and scaling; self-hosting requires an installation and technical expertise to install and configure; describes n8n Cloud and the self-hosted editions.
Host n8n (n8n documentation): self-hosting options with Docker Compose and on AWS, Azure, Google Cloud, DigitalOcean, Hetzner, Heroku and OpenShift.
Queue mode and multi-main (n8n documentation): high availability with multi-main is available on self-hosted Enterprise and unavailable on n8n Cloud.
Code node (n8n documentation): runs JavaScript (Node.js) or Python inside the workflow.
n8n Assistant (n8n documentation): chat agent, in Preview, that creates, edits, tests and fixes workflows and also builds agents.
n8n Form Trigger (n8n documentation): starts a workflow when a user submits a form and generates the form's web page.
n8n Form (n8n documentation): multi-step forms for users, in a workflow that starts with the n8n Form Trigger.
Chat Hub (n8n documentation): centralized chat interface with multiple models and agents, with a "Chat user" role that has no access to workflows.
Data tables (n8n documentation): tabular storage inside n8n to persist data between workflows; the Data tables tab lets you view and edit data and manage tables without building a workflow.
Postgres node and MySQL node (n8n documentation): select, insert, update and delete rows, and run SQL queries on those databases.
Service Partner Directory (n8n): directory of n8n partners you can hire to build automations.
Workflow templates (n8n): 13,144 automation workflows published by the n8n community.
n8n-io/n8n repository (GitHub): 206,829 stars as of October 9, 2026; license in LICENSE.md.

n8n: integrations

Integrations directory (n8n): lists 2,329 integrations, including nodes built by partners and verified community nodes. Search in the site's search box on October 9, 2026: "Bsale", "Defontana", "Servicio de Impuestos Internos", "Mercado Libre", "MercadoLibre" and "Falabella" return 0 results; "SII" returns only Nusii Proposals, an unrelated result. The directory URLs for bsale, defontana, sii, mercado-libre, mercadolibre and falabella return 404.
Integrations (n8n documentation): for a service without its own node, says to use the HTTP Request node to connect to its API; also lets you install community-built nodes.
Mercado Pago node (n8n): verified node, built by a partner, that creates payment links and downloads release and settlement reports.
Install and manage community nodes (n8n documentation): unverified community nodes are unavailable on n8n Cloud and require self-hosting.
@sg_innova/n8n-nodes-mercadolibre (npm): community node for the Mercado Libre API (products, orders, shipments, questions, messages and categories), version 0.1.1 from July 2026; absent from the n8n directory. Reviewed on October 9, 2026.
n8n-nodes-sii-chile (npm): community node for the SII (electronic invoicing and RUT validation, Chile's tax ID, among other functions), version 2.0.0 from January 2026; absent from the n8n directory. Reviewed on October 9, 2026.

n8n: AI

AI Agent node (n8n documentation): you connect a chat model and at least one tool, and the agent decides which one to use; since version 1.82.0 it works as a Tools Agent.
Build and manage agents (n8n documentation): agent builder in Preview, with model, instructions, tools, web search, skills, channels (Slack, Telegram, Linear), schedules, sub-agents, knowledge base and memory, draft and published versions, and approval of tool calls.
How memory works (n8n documentation): Simple Memory and memory nodes on Redis, Postgres, Motorhead, Xata and Zep.
Human-in-the-loop for tools (n8n documentation): the workflow pauses until someone approves or rejects a tool call, through n8n chat, Slack, Discord, Telegram, Microsoft Teams, Gmail, WhatsApp Business Cloud, Google Chat or Outlook.
Guardrails node (n8n documentation): validates AI input or output with rules for keywords, jailbreak, NSFW, personal data, secret keys, topical alignment, URLs, a custom LLM guardrail or regular expressions.
Use metrics to measure quality (n8n documentation): evaluations with a dataset and metrics like Correctness, Helpfulness, String Similarity, Categorization and Tools Used.
Connect to the n8n MCP server (n8n documentation): instance-level MCP server so clients like Claude or ChatGPT can search, run, create and edit workflows and data tables; MCP Server Trigger node.
MCP servers (n8n documentation): connection to MCP servers from a registry inside the nodes panel, and the MCP Client Tool node for any other MCP server.

n8n: errors, versions and permissions

Handle errors gracefully (n8n documentation): an error workflow is assigned in the workflow settings, runs if an execution fails and starts with the Error Trigger node; one serves several workflows; it lets you, for example, send alerts by email or Slack when an execution fails; the Stop And Error node forces a failure.
Work with nodes (n8n documentation): Retry On Fail and On Error options (Stop Workflow, Continue or Continue using error output).
workflow-execute.ts (n8n source code on GitHub): Retry On Fail uses 3 attempts by default (between 2 and 5) and a 1-second wait by default (up to 5 seconds).
View executions for a single workflow (n8n documentation): filter by status (Failed, Running, Success or Waiting) and retry of a failed execution, with the saved workflow or with the original.
Debug and re-run past executions (n8n documentation): loads data from a previous execution into the editor; with a failed one, "Debug in editor" lets you fix the workflow and run it again; available on all n8n Cloud plans and on the self-hosted Registered Community, Business and Enterprise editions.
Insights (n8n documentation): banner with executions, failures and failure rate for the last 7 days on all plans; the full dashboard depends on the plan.
View change history (n8n documentation): versions from the last 24 hours for all users, 5 days on Cloud Pro and full history on Enterprise; restore, clone, download as JSON and name versions.
Workflow reviews (n8n documentation): visual diff and approval before publishing, on Enterprise and in Preview.
Source control and environments (n8n documentation): Git source control and environments on the Business and Enterprise plans.
Permissions and roles (n8n documentation): Owner, Admin and Member instance roles; Admin, Editor and Viewer project roles; custom roles on Enterprise.

n8n: license and company

Sustainable Use License (n8n documentation): n8n explains that it doesn't call itself open source because an open source license allows no usage limits, that it coined the term fair-code to describe its model and that fair-code software has its source code available and its commercial use restricted by its authors; the license allows using, modifying, creating derivative works and redistributing, with three limitations (use or modify only for internal business purposes or for personal or non-commercial purposes; distribute or make available to others only free of charge and for non-commercial purposes; leave the licensing, copyright and other licensor notices unaltered and in view); files with ".ee." in their name fall under the n8n Enterprise License.
LICENSE.md (n8n repository on GitHub): files with ".ee." in their name or ".ee" in their folder name fall under the n8n Enterprise License.
License FAQ (n8n documentation): the Sustainable Use License applies only to the self-hosted version, and n8n Cloud has its own terms; it allows building, running and maintaining workflows on the consultant's own instance on behalf of their clients, with no direct client access, installing n8n on the client's server when the consultant doesn't also provide the hosting, and embedding it as a backend engine; it excludes hosting n8n as a service for customers to build workflows, letting external users configure their own workflows, forking it to launch an automation product and white-labeling.
Press (n8n): founded in 2019, based in Berlin; founder and CEO, Jan Oberhauser.
Series C (n8n blog, Oct 9, 2025): Series C announcement, led by Accel, with Meritech, Redpoint, Evantic and Visionaries Club.
n8n and SAP (n8n blog, Jan Oberhauser, May 12, 2026): strategic investment from SAP; n8n integrates natively into Joule Studio; over 1,400 enterprise customers and 1.7 million monthly active builders.
New Joule Studio (SAP News, May 13, 2026): SAP announces an integrated, fully managed n8n environment inside Joule Studio for visual agent orchestration.

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