Updated February 2026. This article has been reviewed and updated to reflect the latest information.

Most conversations about robotic process automation start with enterprise sales teams pushing six-figure platform licences. Then come the implementation consultants, the change management workshops, and the 18-month roadmaps before a single bot goes live.

There is a better path. n8n, the open-source workflow automation platform, has grown into one of the most capable RPA tools available, and it costs a fraction of what traditional platforms charge. We have used it to automate everything from invoice processing to employee onboarding for Australian businesses, and the results speak clearly. One property services client saved over $250,000 per year by replacing manual inspection workflows with n8n-powered automation.

This guide covers how to use n8n for RPA, where it works well, and where you might still need a traditional tool. If you are an operations manager or business owner looking to eliminate manual processes without blowing your budget, this is written for you.

What RPA Actually Means in 2026

Robotic process automation used to mean one thing: screen scraping. Software bots that mimicked mouse clicks and keyboard inputs to interact with applications the same way a human would. It was clunky, brittle, and broke every time someone moved a button on the screen.

RPA in 2026 looks very different. The category has expanded to include any software-driven automation of structured, repeatable business processes. That includes API-based integrations, document processing with AI, intelligent data routing, and end-to-end workflow orchestration across multiple systems.

This shift matters because platforms like n8n, which were not built as traditional RPA tools, now handle the same workloads more effectively. When your RPA strategy is API-first rather than screen-scrape-first, you get faster execution, fewer breakages, and much lower maintenance overhead.

Why n8n Works as an RPA Platform

n8n was built as a workflow automation tool, but its architecture maps well to RPA requirements. Here is why it works.

API-first integration. n8n connects to applications through their APIs rather than simulating user interface interactions. This makes workflows faster and far more reliable than traditional screen-scraping bots. With 400+ built-in integrations and a flexible HTTP Request node for everything else, it covers the vast majority of business applications.

Self-hosted and on-premise. For Australian businesses in regulated industries, data sovereignty is non-negotiable. n8n can run entirely on your own infrastructure. Your data never leaves your servers. This is something most enterprise RPA vendors charge a premium for.

Extensible with code. When a pre-built node does not exist, you can write custom JavaScript or Python directly inside your workflow. You are never stuck waiting for a vendor to build a connector.

Visual workflow builder. Operations managers can see exactly what a workflow does by looking at it. Each step is a visible node on a canvas, making it straightforward to understand, debug, and modify processes without deep technical knowledge.

No per-execution pricing. On self-hosted n8n, you pay for your server infrastructure and nothing more. Run a workflow a thousand times a day or a million times a month. The cost does not change. For high-volume RPA use cases, this is a real advantage.

As experienced n8n consultants, we have deployed n8n-based RPA across a range of Australian businesses. The platform handles production workloads reliably when it is set up correctly.

n8n vs Traditional RPA Tools: An Honest Comparison

Enterprise RPA platforms like UiPath, Automation Anywhere, and Blue Prism have been the default choice for years. They are powerful tools, but they come with trade-offs that many Australian mid-market businesses cannot justify.

Cost Comparison (AUD)

This is where the conversation gets interesting. Here is what you are looking at for a typical mid-market deployment:

Platform	Annual Licence (AUD)	Implementation Cost (AUD)	Per-Bot Cost (AUD)	Total Year 1 (AUD)
UiPath	$60,000 – $150,000	$80,000 – $200,000	$12,000 – $25,000/bot	$150,000 – $375,000
Automation Anywhere	$50,000 – $140,000	$70,000 – $180,000	$10,000 – $20,000/bot	$130,000 – $340,000
Blue Prism	$70,000 – $180,000	$100,000 – $250,000	$15,000 – $30,000/bot	$185,000 – $460,000
n8n (self-hosted)	$0 (open source)	$15,000 – $60,000	N/A	$18,000 – $70,000
n8n Cloud	$3,000 – $9,000	$15,000 – $60,000	N/A	$18,000 – $69,000

The gap is hard to ignore. For the cost of a single UiPath licence, you can build and deploy a full n8n RPA solution with money left over.

That said, cost is not the only factor. Enterprise RPA tools have capabilities that n8n does not, particularly around desktop automation and screen interaction with legacy applications that lack APIs. We will cover when those tools are the right choice later in this guide.

Where n8n Wins

Cost efficiency for API-driven processes
Speed of deployment (weeks rather than months)
Data sovereignty with self-hosting
Flexibility to combine automation with AI, custom code, and complex logic
No vendor lock-in thanks to the open-source model

Where Traditional RPA Wins

Desktop automation for legacy applications without APIs
Attended automation where bots assist users in real time
Enterprise governance frameworks with centralised bot management across thousands of users
Optical character recognition for processing physical documents at scale (though n8n can handle this with third-party OCR integrations)

Common RPA Use Cases With n8n

Here are the workflows we build most often for Australian businesses. Each of these replaces hours of manual work with reliable, automated processes.

Invoice Processing and Data Extraction

Invoices arrive by email in various formats. An n8n workflow monitors the inbox, extracts the attachment, sends it to an AI-powered extraction service (or uses built-in LLM nodes for simpler invoices), maps the extracted data to your accounting system’s fields, and creates the entry in Xero, MYOB, or QuickBooks. Exceptions get flagged for human review rather than blocking the entire process.

Employee Onboarding Workflows

A new starter triggers a workflow that creates accounts across your tools (Google Workspace, Slack, project management platform, CRM), generates their welcome documentation, assigns onboarding tasks to their manager, schedules orientation meetings, and sends the employee their first-day information pack. What used to take HR two hours per hire now happens in under a minute.

Report Generation and Distribution

n8n pulls data from your source systems, transforms it into the required format, generates the report (PDF, spreadsheet, or dashboard), and distributes it to the right people on schedule. Weekly board reports, monthly client updates, daily operational summaries, all handled without anyone manually pulling numbers.

CRM Data Synchronisation

Most businesses run multiple systems that should share customer data but do not. n8n keeps your CRM, accounting software, support platform, and marketing tools in sync. When a contact updates their details in one system, the change propagates everywhere. No more conflicting records, no more “which system has the correct phone number” conversations.

Email Processing and Routing

n8n can read incoming emails, classify them using AI, extract relevant information, and route them to the correct team or system. Support tickets get created automatically. Sales enquiries get added to your pipeline. Supplier invoices get routed to accounts payable.

Document Classification and Filing

Documents arrive from multiple sources and need to end up in the right place. n8n workflows classify incoming documents by type (contract, invoice, proposal, compliance document), extract key metadata, rename files according to your naming convention, and file them in the correct folder in your document management system.

For a deeper look at where these use cases fit into a broader strategy, see our guide on business automation.

Building an RPA Workflow in n8n: Practical Walkthrough

Let us walk through building a real RPA workflow: automated invoice processing. This is one of the most common requests we get from Australian businesses.

Step 1: Trigger setup. Configure an IMAP Email trigger node that monitors your accounts payable inbox. Set it to trigger on new emails with PDF attachments.

Step 2: Attachment extraction. Use a Move Binary Data node to extract the PDF attachment from the email.

Step 3: Data extraction. Send the PDF to an AI extraction service using an HTTP Request node or use n8n’s built-in LLM nodes to extract key fields: supplier name, ABN, invoice number, date, line items, GST amount, and total.

Step 4: Validation. Add an IF node to check that all required fields were extracted successfully. Route complete extractions to the next step and incomplete ones to a manual review queue.

Step 5: Duplicate check. Query your accounting system to check whether this invoice number from this supplier has already been processed. This prevents duplicate payments, which is a surprisingly common and costly problem.

Step 6: System entry. Use the Xero node (or HTTP Request for MYOB/QuickBooks) to create a draft bill with the extracted data.

Step 7: Notification. Send a Slack message or email to the approver with the invoice summary and a link to review and approve in the accounting system.

Step 8: Error handling. Wrap the entire workflow in an Error Trigger that catches failures, logs the details, and alerts your team so nothing falls through the cracks.

This workflow replaces what is typically 15 to 30 minutes of manual work per invoice. For a business processing 200 invoices per month, that is 50 to 100 hours saved monthly.

Adding AI to RPA Workflows

This is where n8n-based RPA pulls ahead of most traditional RPA tools. n8n has native LLM nodes that connect to OpenAI, Anthropic, Google, and local models. You can add intelligence to any step of your workflow without bolting on a separate AI platform.

Practical applications we have built for clients:

Intelligent document classification that learns from corrections and improves over time
Natural language email parsing that understands context, not just keywords
Anomaly detection in financial data that flags unusual transactions for review
Smart routing that reads the content of a request and assigns it to the right team member based on expertise, workload, and urgency
Data enrichment that takes partial information and fills in gaps using external sources and AI inference

The combination of structured RPA workflows with AI-powered decision-making is what makes n8n particularly effective for processes that are mostly structured but have enough variation to trip up purely rule-based automation.

Error Handling and Monitoring

RPA workflows that run without oversight eventually fail silently, and silent failures are worse than no automation at all. Proper error handling is not optional.

In every n8n RPA workflow we build, we include:

Try/catch patterns using n8n’s Error Trigger node to catch and handle failures gracefully
Retry logic with exponential backoff for transient failures like API timeouts
Dead letter queues for items that fail repeatedly, so they can be reviewed and reprocessed manually
Execution logging that records what happened at each step for audit and debugging purposes
Alerting via Slack, email, or SMS when a workflow fails or produces unexpected results
Health check workflows that monitor your RPA bots and alert you if a scheduled workflow has not run when expected

Scaling RPA With n8n Queue Mode

Once you move beyond a handful of workflows, you need to think about scaling. n8n’s queue mode separates workflow triggering from workflow execution, allowing you to run multiple worker instances that process jobs from a shared queue.

This means you can scale horizontally. If your invoice processing workflow is handling 50 invoices simultaneously during a busy period, queue mode distributes the work across multiple workers so nothing backs up. Add more workers when demand increases, remove them when it drops.

For Australian businesses running serious RPA workloads, queue mode with Redis as the message broker is the production configuration we recommend. It handles thousands of concurrent executions reliably.

Real-World Example: Property Services Automation Saving $250k Per Year

One of our most successful RPA deployments was for a property services company managing thousands of rental inspections annually across South East Queensland.

The problem. Inspection coordinators were manually scheduling inspections, generating reports from handwritten notes, uploading photos, sending reports to property managers, and logging compliance data. Each inspection required roughly 45 minutes of admin work, and the company was processing over 10,000 inspections per year. That is approximately 7,500 hours of admin time, the equivalent of four full-time staff members doing nothing but inspection administration.

The solution. We built an n8n-powered RPA system that automated the end-to-end inspection workflow:

Scheduling automation pulled upcoming lease milestones from the property management system and auto-scheduled inspections based on required timeframes and inspector availability.
Mobile data capture fed inspection data and photos directly into n8n workflows via API, eliminating manual data entry from handwritten notes.
Report generation used templates populated with inspection data and photos, producing professional PDF reports within minutes of the inspection being completed.
Distribution workflows automatically sent completed reports to the correct property managers, filed copies in the document management system, and logged compliance records.
Exception handling flagged maintenance issues identified during inspections and automatically created work orders in the maintenance management system.

The result. Admin time per inspection dropped from 45 minutes to under 5 minutes. The company saved over $250,000 annually in labour costs, reduced report turnaround from 3 to 5 days to same-day, and eliminated the data entry errors that were causing compliance headaches.

The entire solution runs on self-hosted n8n infrastructure costing less than $200 per month.

Want to find savings like this in your operations? Book a free automation assessment.

When n8n RPA Is Enough vs When You Need Traditional Tools

n8n handles the majority of RPA use cases we encounter in Australian businesses. But it is not the right tool for every situation. Here is a simple decision framework.

Use n8n when:

Your target processes interact with applications through APIs or web interfaces
You want to self-host for data sovereignty or compliance
Cost is a factor and you cannot justify six-figure platform licences
You need to combine RPA with AI, custom code, or complex business logic
Your team has basic technical capability or you are working with a consultant

Use traditional RPA (UiPath, Automation Anywhere) when:

You need to automate desktop applications that have no API (legacy Windows applications, mainframe terminal emulators)
You require attended automation where bots work alongside users in real time
You need enterprise-grade governance across hundreds of bots managed by a centralised team
Screen-level interaction is the only way to interface with your target systems

Use both when:

You have a mix of modern API-driven applications and legacy desktop systems. Use n8n for the API-based workflows and a traditional RPA tool for the desktop automation, then connect them.

For more detail on how n8n compares to other automation platforms, our n8n vs Make vs Zapier comparison covers the wider picture.

Getting Started With n8n RPA

The fastest path from manual processes to working automation is straightforward:

Identify your highest-value target. Pick the process that consumes the most staff time, has the most errors, or causes the most frustration. Start there.
Map the process end to end. Document every step, every decision point, every exception. You cannot automate what you have not defined.
Build a proof of concept. Get a basic version running in n8n to validate the approach before investing in a full production build.
Harden for production. Add error handling, monitoring, logging, and retry logic. This is where the difference between a demo and a reliable system lives.
Measure and iterate. Track time saved, errors eliminated, and costs reduced. Use the data to justify expanding to additional processes.

If you want help identifying the right processes to automate and building n8n-based RPA that actually holds up in production, get in touch with our team. We have done this across a range of Australian businesses and we can tell you within a single conversation whether n8n RPA is the right fit for your situation.

Frequently Asked Questions

Is n8n a real RPA tool or just a workflow automation platform?

n8n is a workflow automation platform that handles the vast majority of RPA use cases. The distinction between “workflow automation” and “RPA” has blurred significantly as most business processes now interact through APIs rather than desktop interfaces. For API-driven processes, n8n is more capable, more reliable, and far more cost-effective than traditional RPA tools. The main gap is desktop automation for legacy applications without APIs, which traditional RPA tools still handle better.

How much does n8n RPA cost compared to UiPath or Automation Anywhere?

Self-hosted n8n is open source and free to use. Your costs are server hosting (typically $50 to $200 per month for a production setup) and implementation. A typical n8n RPA project costs between $15,000 and $60,000 AUD to implement, compared to $130,000 to $460,000 AUD for an equivalent deployment on a traditional enterprise RPA platform. Ongoing costs are also much lower because there are no per-bot licence fees.

Can n8n handle the same volume of work as enterprise RPA platforms?

Yes, when configured correctly. n8n’s queue mode with Redis allows you to scale horizontally across multiple worker instances, handling thousands of concurrent workflow executions. For the volumes most Australian mid-market businesses deal with, a properly configured n8n instance handles the workload comfortably. We have clients processing tens of thousands of automated transactions per month on n8n without performance issues.

Do I need a developer to build and maintain n8n RPA workflows?

You need some technical capability, but you do not need a full-time developer. n8n’s visual workflow builder means that many workflows can be built and modified by technically-minded operations staff. For the initial setup, particularly self-hosting, database configuration, and building production-grade workflows with proper error handling, working with an experienced n8n consultant will save you significant time and avoid common pitfalls.

How does n8n handle sensitive data in RPA workflows?

When self-hosted, n8n processes all data on your own infrastructure. Nothing is sent to external servers unless your workflow explicitly calls an external API. This gives you complete control over data residency, which is important for Australian businesses subject to the Privacy Act, APRA regulations, or industry-specific compliance requirements. You can host n8n on Australian cloud infrastructure (AWS Sydney, Azure Australia East, or on-premise) to ensure all data stays within Australian jurisdiction.

Can I add AI to my n8n RPA workflows?

Yes, and this is one of n8n’s strongest advantages for modern RPA. n8n has native nodes for OpenAI, Anthropic, Google Gemini, and supports local model hosting. You can add AI-powered decision-making, document understanding, natural language processing, and intelligent routing to any workflow. This allows you to automate processes that have traditionally been too unstructured for rule-based RPA.

Robotic Process Automation With n8n: The Practical Guide for Australian Businesses