Klaviyo integrations cover a lot of ground out of the box. Shopify syncs orders automatically. Meta and Google Ads audiences push through with a few clicks. For most e-commerce brands, the native connectors handle 80% of what they need.

The other 20% is where things get interesting. Maybe you're syncing Klaviyo profiles with a custom CRM. Maybe you want to trigger a flow when someone fills out a Typeform. Maybe you're pulling order data from a headless commerce setup that Klaviyo doesn't natively support. Or maybe you're an agency building client onboarding automations that need to touch Klaviyo, Slack, and a Google Sheet at the same time.

This is where automation platforms come in. Zapier is the obvious choice, and it works fine for simple two-step connections. But once your workflows get more complex, you'll start hitting walls: limited branching logic, expensive pricing at scale, and no way to self-host or inspect what's actually happening under the hood.

Make (formerly Integromat) and n8n are the two strongest alternatives. They take different approaches, but both give you more control over your Klaviyo integrations than Zapier does. Here's how they compare and when to use each one.

Where Zapier falls short for Klaviyo automation

Zapier is built for simplicity. One trigger, one action, maybe a filter in between. That model works when you need 'new Shopify order creates Klaviyo profile.' It breaks down when you need anything more than that.

The first issue is branching. Zapier's Paths feature exists, but it's clunky. If you want to route contacts to different Klaviyo lists based on five different form responses, you're building five separate Zaps or wrestling with a Path setup that's hard to debug.

The second issue is pricing. Zapier charges per task, and tasks add up fast. A workflow that checks a webhook, filters data, transforms a field, and then creates a Klaviyo profile counts as four tasks. Run that 1,000 times a month and you're burning through your plan just on one automation.

The third issue is visibility. When a Zap fails, you get a notification and a log entry. But there's no visual way to see where in the flow it broke, what data it was carrying at the time, or how to replay just the failed step.

None of this means Zapier is bad. For quick, simple connections it's still the fastest option. If you need a two-step automation running in five minutes, Zapier wins every time. But if you're running complex Klaviyo integrations across multiple tools, dealing with conditional logic, error handling, or bulk data processing, you'll outgrow it.

Make: visual automation for Klaviyo power users

Make (formerly Integromat) is a visual workflow builder that handles complex multi-step automations well. It has a native Klaviyo module with support for profiles, lists, segments, and events.

What Make does better than Zapier

The big difference is the visual canvas. Instead of a linear trigger-action chain, Make lets you build branching, looping, error-handling workflows that you can actually see. You drag modules onto a canvas and connect them with lines. When something fails, you can see exactly which module broke and what data it was processing.

Make also runs on operations, not tasks. A single workflow execution counts as one operation regardless of how many steps it has. That pricing model makes complex workflows dramatically cheaper than Zapier at scale.

Practical Klaviyo + Make examples

Typeform submission triggers a Make scenario that checks if the profile exists in Klaviyo, creates it if not, adds it to the right list based on form answers, and tags it with UTM parameters from the submission URL
Daily scheduled scenario pulls all orders from a custom e-commerce API, formats them as Klaviyo events, and pushes them in batch. Useful for platforms Klaviyo doesn't integrate with natively
When a Gorgias support ticket closes with a specific tag, Make updates the Klaviyo profile with a custom property ('had_support_issue': true) so your flows can branch on it
Webhook from Stripe catches failed payment events and triggers a Klaviyo event that feeds into a dunning flow, separate from your standard abandoned cart sequence

Make's limitations

Make's Klaviyo module covers the basics, but it doesn't expose the full Klaviyo API. Some newer endpoints (like custom reports or catalog sync) require using the generic HTTP module with manual API calls. That's not hard, but it does mean writing JSON payloads by hand.

The other limitation is execution time. Make scenarios have a timeout, and if you're processing large batches (say, syncing 10,000 profiles), you'll need to design around pagination and chunking. It's doable, just not automatic.

n8n: self-hosted automation for technical teams

n8n takes a different approach. It's open-source, self-hostable, and designed for developers who want full control. You can run it on your own server, inspect every workflow execution, and write custom JavaScript inside any node.

What n8n does better than Make and Zapier

Self-hosting is the headline feature. Your data never leaves your infrastructure. For brands handling sensitive customer data or agencies bound by data processing agreements, that's a real advantage.

n8n also gives you code-level control. Any node in a workflow can contain a JavaScript function. Need to transform Klaviyo's API response into a specific format for your data warehouse? Write a function node. Need to deduplicate profiles before syncing? Add a code step. You're not limited to what the UI exposes.

The workflow editor is visual, similar to Make. But because n8n is open-source, you can inspect the actual execution data at every step, fork the project if you need custom behavior, and integrate with tools that don't have official connectors by writing your own.

Practical Klaviyo + n8n examples

Shopify webhook fires on order creation. n8n enriches the order data with customer lifetime value from your Snowflake data warehouse, then pushes a custom Klaviyo event with the enriched data. Your flows now know whether this is a first-time buyer or a repeat customer worth $2,000+
Scheduled workflow pulls Klaviyo flow performance metrics via the API every morning, formats them into a summary, and posts to a Slack channel. The agency team sees daily performance without logging into Klaviyo
Supabase database trigger detects a new user signup, n8n creates the Klaviyo profile and triggers a custom onboarding event, since Supabase has no native Klaviyo integration
Airtable webhook detects a record change (client status moved to 'Active'), n8n creates a corresponding Klaviyo segment and pushes initial profile data. Used by agencies to automate new client onboarding

n8n's limitations

You need to host it yourself (or pay for n8n Cloud). Self-hosting means managing infrastructure: server, SSL, backups, updates. For a solo marketer, that's overhead that Make or Zapier don't require.

The Klaviyo node in n8n is more limited than Make's module. You'll probably end up using the HTTP Request node to call Klaviyo's API directly. That works perfectly, but you're writing raw API calls, not clicking through a UI.

The trade-off is clear: more power, more setup. n8n is the right choice when you have technical capacity and want full control. It's the wrong choice if you just need a quick connection between two SaaS tools.

When to use which tool

Stay on Zapier if...

Your automations are simple: one trigger, one action, maybe a filter
You don't want to manage infrastructure or learn a new platform
You run fewer than 500 tasks per month and cost isn't a concern

Move to Make if...

Your Klaviyo workflows have branching logic, loops, or error handling
You're an agency managing multiple client accounts and need cost-effective automation
You want a visual builder but don't want to self-host anything
You process more than 1,000 operations per month (Make's pricing scales better)

Move to n8n if...

Data sovereignty matters: you need to self-host and control where customer data flows
You have a developer on the team who's comfortable with JavaScript and APIs
You're integrating Klaviyo with tools that have no native connectors (Supabase, custom databases, internal APIs)
You want to version-control your workflows in Git alongside the rest of your codebase

Getting started: your first Klaviyo automation outside Zapier

Pick the simplest workflow that Zapier currently handles poorly for you. Don't try to migrate everything at once. The goal of your first project isn't to replace Zapier entirely. It's to learn the new platform on a workflow where the stakes are low and the improvement will be obvious.

For Make: create a free account, search for the Klaviyo module, and rebuild one existing Zap as a scenario. The interface takes about an hour to learn if you've used any automation tool before. Start with a webhook trigger and a Klaviyo 'Create/Update Profile' action.

For n8n: the fastest path is n8n Cloud (starts at $20/month). If you want to self-host, a $5/month VPS from any cloud provider will handle it. Pull the Docker image, set an environment variable for your Klaviyo API key, and you're running in ten minutes.

In both cases, use Klaviyo's API v2 endpoints for everything. The older v1 API is deprecated and will stop working. The v2 API is well-documented, consistent, and handles pagination properly. If you're building workflows that process profiles in bulk, familiarize yourself with the cursor-based pagination in v2 before you start. It behaves differently from the offset-based pagination you might be used to from other APIs.

One practical tip: build your first workflow with test data and a separate Klaviyo list. Don't point it at your production lists until you've watched it run successfully at least ten times. Automation bugs that silently corrupt profile data or create duplicate events are much harder to fix than they are to prevent. I've seen a misconfigured Make scenario add incorrect purchase history to 3,000 Klaviyo profiles in under a minute. The cleanup took the brand's marketing team two days.

Real-world migration: moving a Klaviyo workflow from Zapier to Make

To make this concrete, here's a walkthrough of migrating an actual workflow. The scenario: a DTC brand uses a post-purchase survey (Typeform) to collect customer preferences. Based on the answers, the customer gets tagged in Klaviyo with preference data that feeds into personalized product recommendation flows.

In Zapier, this required three separate Zaps: one to catch the Typeform submission, one to look up the Klaviyo profile and update it, and one to trigger a custom event. Each Zap consumed tasks independently, and when one failed, the others kept running, creating data inconsistencies.

In Make, this became a single scenario with seven modules:

Typeform webhook catches the submission
Router module branches based on the survey response type
HTTP module calls Klaviyo's API to search for the existing profile
If found: update module patches the profile with new preference properties
If not found: create module makes a new profile with the submission data
Event module triggers a custom 'survey_completed' event on the profile
Slack module posts a summary to the brand's internal channel

The entire flow runs as a single operation in Make, regardless of how many modules execute. The visual canvas shows exactly where data flows and where errors occur. When the Klaviyo API returns a rate limit error, the built-in retry logic handles it automatically instead of failing silently like it would in a linear Zap.

Total migration time was about two hours, including testing. The monthly cost dropped from $49 (Zapier Pro) to $9 (Make Basic), because the workflow only consumed one operation per execution instead of twelve tasks.

Common mistakes when building Klaviyo automations

Regardless of which platform you choose, a few patterns cause problems consistently:

Not handling Klaviyo's rate limits. The API allows 75 requests per second for most endpoints. If your workflow processes bulk data, build in delays or batch your requests.
Forgetting to deduplicate. If your trigger fires on every form submission, and someone submits twice, you'll create duplicate profiles or duplicate events. Add a lookup step before creating anything.
Testing against production data. Always use a separate Klaviyo list for testing automations. A bug in your workflow that adds 10,000 profiles to your VIP segment will cause real damage before you notice.
Skipping error notifications. Both Make and n8n can send alerts when a workflow fails. Set this up on day one. Silent failures compound quickly in marketing automation.

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