Airflow vs n8n vs Temporal for API workflows

What You'll Need

n8n Cloud or self-hosted n8n instance
Hetzner VPS or Contabo VPS for self-hosting options
Namecheap for custom domain setup
DigitalOcean as an alternative cloud provider
Basic knowledge of REST APIs and webhook concepts
Docker (optional, for containerized deployments)

Why This Comparison Matters
Understanding Airflow, n8n, and Temporal
Architecture & Deployment Models
Building Your First API Workflow
Real-World API Integration Examples
Performance & Scalability Showdown
Cost Analysis & ROI
Getting Started

Why This Comparison Matters

I've built dozens of API workflows over the past five years, and I can tell you that choosing the wrong orchestration tool early costs you thousands in refactoring later. Airflow, n8n, and Temporal each solve the same fundamental problem—executing sequences of API calls reliably—but they approach it from completely different angles.

The stakes are real. You might choose Airflow because it's industry-standard, only to discover you're managing YAML configuration hell. Or you pick n8n for its visual builder and later hit scaling walls that shouldn't exist. Temporal offers rock-solid reliability but requires serious DevOps muscle.

This guide cuts through the noise. I'm comparing these three on what actually matters when you're building production API workflows: setup time, reliability, costs, and the mental overhead of maintenance.

Understanding Airflow, n8n, and Temporal

Let me break down what each tool actually does, not the marketing speak.

Apache Airflow is a task orchestration platform built on Python. It treats workflows as directed acyclic graphs (DAGs) where each node is a task. You define everything in Python code, giving you maximum flexibility but requiring real programming chops.

n8n is a node-based workflow automation platform with a web UI. You drag nodes together, connect them with wire logic, and ship. It's built on Node.js and emphasizes visual workflow design over code. I've used n8n for everything from Slack bots to API data pipelines.

Temporal is a microservices orchestration engine designed for durable execution. It's language-agnostic (runs Go, Python, Java, TypeScript) and built for workflows that can survive infrastructure failures. Think of it as a state machine on steroids.

Each targets a different user persona:

Airflow: Data engineers managing complex ETL pipelines
n8n: No-code users and teams needing fast API integrations
Temporal: Teams building distributed systems where reliability is non-negotiable

Architecture & Deployment Models

Here's where deployment realities force your hand.

Airflow's Architecture

Airflow runs as three core components:

Scheduler – reads DAGs from disk, creates task instances, triggers them
Executor – runs the actual tasks (local, Kubernetes, Celery, etc.)
Web UI – lets you monitor and trigger runs

When you self-host Airflow on a Hetzner VPS or Contabo VPS, you need:

# Install Airflow (Python 3.9+)
pip install apache-airflow==2.7.3

# Initialize the database
airflow db init

# Create a default admin user
airflow users create \
  --username admin \
  --firstname Admin \
  --lastname User \
  --role Admin \
  --email admin@example.com \
  --password airflow

# Start the web server (runs on port 8080)
airflow webserver

# In another terminal, start the scheduler
airflow scheduler

This setup requires a PostgreSQL or MySQL backend (SQLite won't cut it for production). You're managing stateful services, database migrations, and scheduler high availability yourself.

n8n's Architecture

n8n runs as a single Node.js application with a SQLite or PostgreSQL database backing it. One container, one process. When I deploy n8n Cloud, it just works:

# Docker Compose deployment (self-hosted)
version: '3.8'
services:
  n8n:
    image: n8nio/n8n:latest
    environment:
      - DB_TYPE=postgres
      - DB_POSTGRESDB_HOST=postgres
      - DB_POSTGRESDB_PORT=5432
      - DB_POSTGRESDB_DATABASE=n8n
      - DB_POSTGRESDB_USER=n8n
      - DB_POSTGRESDB_PASSWORD=secure_password_here
      - N8N_HOST=workflow.example.com
      - N8N_PROTOCOL=https
      - NODE_ENV=production
    ports:
      - "5678:5678"
    depends_on:
      - postgres
    volumes:
      - n8n_storage:/home/node/.n8n
    restart: unless-stopped

  postgres:
    image: postgres:15
    environment:
      POSTGRES_DB: n8n
      POSTGRES_USER: n8n
      POSTGRES_PASSWORD: secure_password_here
    volumes:
      - postgres_storage:/var/lib/postgresql/data
    restart: unless-stopped

volumes:
  n8n_storage:
  postgres_storage:

Deploy this to DigitalOcean or a Hetzner VPS, point your domain from Namecheap, and you're live in 20 minutes. The entire workflow state is stored in the database, so you can scale horizontally by spinning up multiple n8n containers behind a load balancer.

Temporal's Architecture

Temporal requires a dedicated cluster. You deploy:

Temporal Server – manages workflow state, task queues, and history
Worker Processes – execute your workflow code
UI – visibility into executions

# Using docker-compose for local Temporal development
version: '3.8'
services:
  temporal:
    image: temporalio/auto-setup:latest
    environment:
      DB: postgres
      DB_PORT: 5432
      POSTGRES_USER: temporal
      POSTGRES_PASSWORD: temporal
      POSTGRES_DB: temporal
    ports:
      - "7233:7233"
      - "6933:6933"
    depends_on:
      - postgres

  temporal-ui:
    image: temporalio/ui:latest
    ports:
      - "8080:8080"
    environment:
      TEMPORAL_ADDRESS: temporal:7233
    depends_on:
      - temporal

  postgres:
    image: postgres:15
    environment:
      POSTGRES_USER: temporal
      POSTGRES_PASSWORD: temporal
      POSTGRES_DB: temporal
    volumes:
      - postgres_temporal:/var/lib/postgresql/data

volumes:
  postgres_temporal:

Temporal is stateful and database-heavy. You need dedicated infrastructure to run it. But once running, it handles workflow durability—if your worker crashes mid-API call, Temporal remembers where you were and retries seamlessly.

Building Your First API Workflow

Let me show you how to build the same workflow in all three tools: fetch data from an API, transform it, and send it to another API.

Airflow Approach

from airflow import DAG
from airflow.operators.python import PythonOperator
from airflow.operators.bash import BashOperator
from datetime import datetime, timedelta
import requests
import json

default_args = {
    'owner': 'data_team',
    'retries': 2,
    'retry_delay': timedelta(minutes=5),
    'start_date': datetime(2024, 1, 1),
}

def fetch_user_data(**context):
    """Fetch user data from JSONPlaceholder API"""
    response = requests.get('https://jsonplaceholder.typicode.com/users/1')
    response.raise_for_status()
    user_data = response.json()
    context['task_instance'].xcom_push(key='user_data', value=user_data)
    return user_data

def transform_user_data(**context):
    """Extract and transform relevant fields"""
    user_data = context['task_instance'].xcom_pull(
        task_ids='fetch_user_data',
        key='user_data'
    )
    transformed = {
        'id': user_data['id'],
        'name': user_data['name'],
        'email': user_data['email'],
        'company': user_data['company']['name'],
        'processed_at': datetime.now().isoformat()
    }
    context['task_instance'].xcom_push(
        key='transformed_data',
        value=transformed
    )
    return transformed

def send_to_webhook(**context):
    """Send transformed data to external API"""
    transformed_data = context['task_instance'].xcom_pull(
        task_ids='transform_user_data',
        key='transformed_data'
    )
    webhook_url = 'https://webhook.site/your-unique-id'
    response = requests.post(
        webhook_url,
        json=transformed_data,
        headers={'Content-Type': 'application/json'}
    )
    response.raise_for_status()
    return f"Data sent successfully: {response.status_code}"

dag = DAG(
    'api_workflow_example',
    default_args=default_args,
    description='Fetch, transform, and send API data',
    schedule_interval=timedelta(hours=1),
    catchup=False,
)

task_fetch = PythonOperator(
    task_id='fetch_user_data',
    python_callable=fetch_user_data,
    dag=dag,
)

task_transform = PythonOperator(
    task_id='transform_user_data',
    python_callable=transform_user_data,
    dag=dag,
)

task_send = PythonOperator(
    task_id='send_to_webhook',
    python_callable=send_to_webhook,
    dag=dag,
)

task_fetch >> task_transform >> task_send

This DAG runs hourly, with automatic retries if tasks fail. You manage it via the Airflow UI or CLI. One gotcha: data between tasks flows through XCom (cross-communication), which isn't meant for large payloads. For bigger data, you'd write to S3 or a database.

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n8n Approach

In n8n, you'd build this visually, but here's the JSON configuration export:

{
  "name": "API Data Pipeline",
  "nodes": [
    {
      "parameters": {
        "triggerTimes": {
          "item": [
            {
              "mode": "everyHour"
            }
          ]
        }
      },
      "id": "schedule_trigger",
      "name": "Schedule Trigger",
      "type": "n8n-nodes-base.cron",
      "typeVersion": 1,
      "position": [250, 300]
    },
    {
      "parameters":