SHSelfHostIndex

Activepieces vs Inngest

A side-by-side comparison of two self-hosted automation & workflows options — licensing, setup difficulty, resource needs, and what each one replaces.

Not the right match-up?
Activepieces Open-source no-code business automation VS IN Inngest Event-driven workflow and background job platform
FeatureActivepiecesInngest
Deploy effortUnder-an-hour setupUnder-an-hour setup
Health score97 · Excellent90 · Excellent
CategoryAutomation & WorkflowsAutomation & Workflows
LicenseMITApache-2.0
LanguageTypeScriptGo
Setup difficultyMediumMedium
Min. RAM512 MB512 MB
Deploymentdockerdocker, binary
GitHub stars★ 24,701★ 5,879
First released20222021
ReplacesZapier, MakeZapier, AWS Step Functions

What are Activepieces and Inngest?

Activepieces

Activepieces is an open-source, no-code automation tool for building workflows that connect business apps. It targets teams wanting an open Zapier alternative with an accessible UI. It is deployed via Docker.

  • No-code flow builder
  • Growing library of pieces
  • AI-assisted automation
  • MIT-licensed core

Read the full Activepieces guide →

Inngest

Inngest is an open-source platform for building event-driven workflows and reliable background jobs. It provides durable step functions, automatic retries and a local development server, and the execution engine can be self-hosted.

  • Event-driven background jobs
  • Durable step functions
  • Local development server
  • Self-hostable execution engine

Read the full Inngest guide →

Activepieces vs Inngest: key differences

Activepieces is written in TypeScript, while Inngest is built with Go. Licensing differs — MIT for Activepieces versus Apache-2.0 for Inngest. Activepieces has the considerably larger community, at 24,701 GitHub stars versus 5,879.

Why pick each one

Choose Activepieces if…

  • Truly open-source license
  • Friendly no-code UI
  • Active development

Watch out for

  • Fewer integrations than n8n
  • Younger project
Activepieces details

Choose Inngest if…

  • Good developer experience
  • Reliable step execution

Watch out for

  • Some features tied to Inngest Cloud
Inngest details

Frequently asked questions

Is Activepieces or Inngest better?

Neither is universally better. Activepieces has the larger community; both share a medium setup difficulty, so the decision comes down to features and licensing.

Are Activepieces and Inngest free and open-source?

Yes. Activepieces is licensed under MIT and Inngest under Apache-2.0. Both can be self-hosted at no software cost.

Can I run Activepieces and Inngest with Docker?

Activepieces: yes. Inngest: yes.

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