Glean vs n8n
A detailed side-by-side comparison to help you choose the right AI productivity agent for your needs.
Glean
Glean is the leading enterprise AI work assistant — a search-and-answer engine that indexes your company's entire content footprint (Slack, Google Drive, Confluence, Notion, Jira, GitHub, Salesforce, ...
- Indexes 100+ enterprise apps with permission-aware retrieval
- Glean Assistant: chat with your company's entire knowledge
- Glean Protect: real-time DLP + sensitive-data classification
- Glean Agents: build custom AI workflows on company data
- Cross-app search results sorted by personal relevance
- Permission-aware retrieval — no data-leakage risk across employees
- 100+ integrations cover most enterprise stacks out of the box
- Cited answers ground AI in your actual company knowledge (not hallucinated)
- Premium pricing — typical mid-market commitments start ~$30-50/employee/year
- Sales-led with no transparent pricing or self-serve trial
n8n
n8n is a fair-code workflow automation platform that has emerged as the open-source go-to for technical teams who want Zapier-style automation but need self-hosted deployment, source-available code, a...
- 600+ pre-built integrations + custom HTTP nodes
- AI Agent nodes with tool-use loops
- Native LangChain integration
- Vector store nodes (Pinecone, Weaviate, pgvector, Qdrant)
- Self-host or cloud (your choice)
- Self-hostable — full data sovereignty, no Zapier-style egress fees
- Native AI agent + LangChain support — built-in for AI builders
- Open-source community drives extensive integration coverage
- Steeper learning curve than Zapier for non-technical users
- Self-hosting requires infrastructure expertise (Docker, K8s, etc.)
Verdict: Glean vs n8n
Pick Glean if you need ai-powered enterprise workplace search across slack, gdrive, jira, and 100+ apps. Pick n8n if you need open-source workflow automation alternative to zapier with native ai agents.
Glean supports 3 models.
Glean integrates with 13 platforms.
Who should buy this
Glean
- Mid-market or enterprise CIO / CTO consolidating internal AI search
- Knowledge worker drowning in Slack threads + scattered docs across 20+ apps
- IT / security org wanting AI search WITH permission enforcement (not retroactive cleanup)
- SMBs and startups (cost prohibitive — ChatGPT Team or Notion AI fit better)
- Teams not on a sprawling app stack (Glean shines with 10+ data sources)
Enterprise per-employee licensing — typically $30-50/employee/year (mid-market) to $100+/employee/year (large enterprise). Glean Protect + Agents are additional.
Verified 2026-05-03
n8n
- Engineering team needing self-hosted automation for compliance / cost / sovereignty reasons
- AI builder constructing multi-agent systems with LLM + vector store + tool-use loops
- Mid-market RevOps team wanting Zapier-level capability without per-task pricing at scale
- Non-technical users wanting plug-and-play (Zapier's UI is more polished)
- Buyers without devops to self-host (cloud tier compensates)
Self-hosted: free (infrastructure cost only). Cloud: $20-$50/mo Starter/Pro. Enterprise: custom contracts (typically $5-30K/yr).
Verified 2026-05-03
Capabilities at a glance
| Capability | Glean | n8n |
|---|---|---|
| 100+ enterprise app integrations | — | |
| Permission-aware retrieval | Inherits source ACLs | — |
| Cited / sourced AI answers | — | |
| Glean Protect (DLP + sensitive-data) | Add-on | — |
| Glean Agents (custom workflows) | Add-on | — |
| Slack / Teams native apps | — | |
| Public API | ||
| On-prem / self-hosted | VPC deployment for select customers | — |
| Self-hosted deployment | — | Source-available |
| AI Agent nodes with tool-use loops | — | |
| Native LangChain integration | — | |
| Vector store integrations | — | Pinecone, Weaviate, pgvector, Qdrant |
| 600+ pre-built integrations | — | |
| Custom code in any node (JS/Python) | — |
Security & compliance
| Standard / control | Glean | n8n |
|---|---|---|
| SOC 2 | Type II | Type II |
| ISO 27001 | ||
| HIPAA | — | |
| GDPR | ||
| Self-hosted option | — | |
| SSO / SAML | ||
| RBAC | ||
| Audit logs | ||
| Trains on customer data | No | No |
What users say
Glean
Plaid, Pinterest, Redis, Zapier, Databricks, Webflow, Grammarly, Duolingo, WealthSimple, Citi, Intuit, Samsung, Booking.com, Instacart, Zillow, Rivian, Samsara
n8n
Open-source community, Engineering teams self-hosting workflows, AI builders
Frequently asked questions
What AI models do Glean and n8n use?+
Glean runs on GPT-4 family, Claude family, Glean proprietary retrieval models. n8n runs on Any LLM via OpenAI, Anthropic, Google, custom endpoints, LangChain native.
What is the main difference between Glean and n8n?+
Glean is positioned as best ai-powered enterprise workplace search across slack, gdrive, jira, and 100+ apps, while n8n is positioned as best open-source workflow automation alternative to zapier with native ai agents. Pick the one whose strength aligns with your primary use case.
Which has better integrations, Glean or n8n?+
Glean integrates with Slack, Microsoft Teams, Google Drive, Notion and 9 more. n8n integrates with GitHub, Slack, Notion, Salesforce and 8 more.
What are the main weaknesses of Glean and n8n?+
Glean's main drawback: premium pricing — typical mid-market commitments start ~$30-50/employee/year. n8n's main drawback: steeper learning curve than zapier for non-technical users.
Are Glean and n8n worth it in 2026?+
Both remain competitive productivity options in 2026. Glean stands out for permission-aware retrieval — no data-leakage risk across employees. n8n stands out for self-hostable — full data sovereignty, no zapier-style egress fees. Choose based on which trade-offs fit your workflow and budget.