n8n, Dify or FastGPT? Self-hosted workflows and licence checks

Write the scenario first, then look at tools

All three can be self-hosted but are positioned differently: n8n is general workflow automation, Dify is an LLM application development platform, and FastGPT focuses on knowledge-base Q&A. The table only maps scenarios to what to look at first; it does not compare results.[8][9][10]

Article sources[3][2][5][10]

Licenses: "open source and free" does not cover it

If you plan to use a workflow tool in your own product or for customers, also read free automation product checks; this article keeps only the license summary needed for choosing.

n8n's official documentation calls the community license the Sustainable Use License, a fair-code model rather than a conventional open-source license; it permits internal business, non-commercial or personal use, and restricts distribution, resale and multi-tenant use.[2]

The n8n FAQ gives examples: building automations for clients on your own instance is allowed if clients cannot create or edit them; hosting n8n as a service and letting clients build workflows is prohibited. The key condition in this example is that clients cannot create or edit workflows — who controls the workflow logic, not whether the UI is visible; other conditions in the FAQ also apply, so this one is not a sufficient test on its own.[3]

Dify's official license is a modified Apache 2.0 with additional conditions: commercial use is allowed per the license text, but without written authorization you may not operate a multi-tenant environment from the source (one tenant corresponds to one workspace), and when using the frontend you may not remove or modify the LOGO and copyright information in the console and applications. However, the Dify pricing page (checked on 2026-10-28) describes Community as for open-source enthusiasts, individual developers and non-commercial projects, alongside the license text that says commercial use is allowed. The pages read do not explain how the two apply to your case, so this is to be confirmed and no commercial-use conclusion is drawn; ask the vendor directly.[5][4]

FastGPT has no license or price evidence on this site yet, so this article draws no conclusion; read the license file in its official repository before adopting it.[10]

Deployment methods and resources

n8n officially lists a one-line script, Docker Compose, Docker and several cloud providers as deployment entries, and marks the npm installation path as deprecated from n8n 3.0. That page gives no single minimum spec across deployment methods; individual install guides (such as the Docker Compose guide) have their own prerequisites, but this site holds no evidence for the numbers yet, so add evidence before quoting them and check each guide when choosing.[1]

Dify officially says it runs anywhere Docker runs and gives Docker Compose and other deployment entries. Its documentation presents Kubernetes deployment as an Enterprise capability; whether the community edition has another official path was not verified here.[6][7]

• Deploy once on a test machine following the official steps and record actual memory, disk and dependent services.
• Confirm who maintains and backs up the database, vector store and other dependencies.
• Confirm the upgrade and rollback process and whether versions have breaking changes.

Selection example: one concrete input and expected output

Selection example (not a test result): Input — a small company wants "after a form is submitted, write the content to an internal sheet and notify colleagues" as an automation, for internal use only, with data kept off external services. Expected output — a working automation running on a server you maintain. For this input look at n8n first and check the internal-use license conditions, deployment entries and resources; if the need becomes "Q&A over company documents", look at Dify or FastGPT first and resolve the to-be-confirmed items on license and deployment. Whether any tool actually completes this was not deployed or tested here, and no judgement is made.[3][1]

Community versus commercial editions

n8n's official installation page says features differ between editions and links to a Compare editions page; this site holds no evidence for the detailed differences, so they are to be confirmed. Dify's Enterprise edition targets organizations that need multiple workspaces, SSO, custom SLAs and enterprise management. The exact feature lists follow the official pages.[1][7][4]

On model costs, the n8n and Dify pages read do not state verbatim who pays model costs when self-hosting, so this is marked to be confirmed and not inferred; check each item with the vendor for the deployment and model path you actually use.

Checklist before you decide

• State who it is for: yourself, your company, customers or a public service.
• Compare against the official license text for commercial use, multi-tenancy and branding clauses.
• Check whether the features you need are in the community edition and whether missing ones are essential.
• Record actual resource use in a test environment instead of relying on documentation alone.
• While "to be confirmed" items remain, ask the vendor or validate a minimal scenario before going to production.

Browse more tools in the development tools category. This article only organizes conditions stated by official sources; it is not legal advice and nothing was deployed or tested.