Overview

Wires hundreds of services together on a visual canvas, and increasingly places LLM agents inside those flows. The licence is the thing to check first: it is source-available under the Sustainable Use License, not OSI-approved open source. Internal use and self-hosting are fine; reselling it as a hosted service is not.

What can you do with n8n?

Run the editor locally — npx n8n starts it immediately, or the docker.n8n.io/n8nio/n8n image with an n8n_data volume serves the canvas on port 5678.
Put agents inside workflows — The same canvas that wires 1500+ integrations can hand a step to a multi-step LLM agent with tool use, branching logic and a human approval gate before the flow continues.
Start from a published workflow — Alongside the 1500+ integrations the README points at 9,000+ workflow templates on n8n.io/workflows, so a flow can begin as an existing one rather than an empty canvas.
Drop into code inside nodes — JavaScript, Python and npm packages are available inside a node for the parts that visual building cannot express.

Documentation

Reproduced from the n8n-io/n8n README, published under Sustainable Use License. Read the original ↗

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n8n – The Platform for AI Agents and Workflow Automation

Fair-code platform to build and deploy AI agents and workflows. Combine a visual canvas with custom code, run it self-hosted or in the cloud, and connect to 1500+ integrations. AI automation you can trust with real work, from prototype to production.

n8n.io - Screenshot

Key Capabilities

AI-Native Automation Platform: Build and operationalize AI workflows and multi-step agents using your own data, models, and tools
Model Flexibility, No Lock-In: Connect to OpenAI, Anthropic, Google, or open-source models and switch providers without changing your architecture
From Prototype to Production: Design multi-step AI workflows with logic, tool use, human approvals, and full observability
Code When You Need It: Combine visual building with JavaScript, Python, and npm packages for advanced AI workflows
Enterprise-Ready AI: Self-host or deploy securely with role-based access, audit trails, and support for sensitive data
Leverage What Already Exists: 1500+ integrations and 9,000+ workflow templates to connect AI with your existing systems

Quick Start

Try n8n instantly with npx (requires Node.js):

npx n8n

Or deploy with Docker:

docker volume create n8n_data
docker run -it --rm --name n8n -p 5678:5678 -v n8n_data:/home/node/.n8n docker.n8n.io/n8nio/n8n

Access the editor at http://localhost:5678

Resources

Support

Need help? Our community forum is the place to get support and connect with other users: community.n8n.io

Join the Team

Want to shape the future of automation? Check out our job posts and join our team!

What does n8n mean?

Short answer: It means “nodemation” and is pronounced as n-eight-n.

Long answer: “I get that question quite often (more often than I expected) so I decided it is probably best to answer it here. While looking for a good name for the project with a free domain I realized very quickly that all the good ones I could think of were already taken. So, in the end, I chose nodemation. ‘node-’ in the sense that it uses a Node-View and that it uses Node.js and ‘-mation’ for ‘automation’ which is what the project is supposed to help with. However, I did not like how long the name was and I could not imagine writing something that long every time in the CLI. That is when I then ended up on ‘n8n’.” - Jan Oberhauser, Founder and CEO, n8n.io