Microsoft Power Automate vs Zapier
Microsoft Power Automate and Zapier are both workflow automation software. Microsoft Power Automate is a commercial product from Microsoft. Zapier is a commercial product from Zapier.
Which to pick
- Pick Microsoft Power Automate when
- A Microsoft 365 organisation wants approvals and automations around SharePoint, Outlook and Teams.
- Pick Zapier when
- A non-technical team wants to connect SaaS apps quickly and the widest app catalogue matters most.
Side by side
Microsoft's workflow automation with cloud flows across connectors, desktop RPA and approvals inside Microsoft 365.
No-code automation connecting thousands of apps with triggers and actions, plus tables, forms and AI steps.
Premium connectors and RPA need extra licences, and error handling is clumsy.
Task-based pricing gets expensive at volume, and complex logic is awkward.
Production-ready (both)
Cloud service and desktop app
Cloud service
Not published (both)
Closed source, sold by Microsoft
Closed source, sold by Zapier
Closed source: you use it under the maker's terms and cannot change or resell the code. (both)
483 Wikipedia readers a month on phones
1.5k Wikipedia readers a month on phones
Other comparisons
More workflow automation tools
Both sides were judged on 2026-11-03 from makers' descriptions, Wikipedia, READMEs and GitHub data. License, age and popularity lines are worked out directly.