With the surge of LLMs, content regarding n8n has been flooding YouTube like a major trend. At first glance, I felt it was quite a practical tool. Currently, my company uses Nintex K2 as a low-code solution, but my experience with it hasn't been entirely positive.
The primary reasons for adopting low-code were the promise of "no-code" (or minimal code) and the ability to rapidly build applications. After several years of use, here are my observations:
My Nintex K2 Experience
Pros
• Operates like a powerful framework; DB access and UI methods are predefined, eliminating "plumbing" work.
• Strong Workflow management (Drag-and-drop, task assignment, and tracking).
• Paradoxically, its limited functionality allows us to reject complex requirements. Standard UIs keep things simple.
Cons
• Poor Performance: Loading 20k auto-complete items takes over a minute—standard front-end dev would never be this slow.
• ORM Issues: Refreshing "Smart Objects" (ORM-style objects) often causes UI timeouts on medium-sized DBs.
• Laggy UI Designer: Dragging modules can take 10+ seconds to respond, which is incredibly frustrating.
• Debugging Torture: No real debugging environment. You have to use message or email components to check values, similar to primitive console.log debugging.
• Inflexibility: Event handling in web form is restricted to predefined patterns.
• High Cost: Not exactly affordable for mid-sized enterprises.
Discovering n8n
Upon trying n8n, I noticed several significant advantages:
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Fast & Stable UI: The workflow canvas is responsive and reliable.
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Built-in Observability: Every node stores input/output data, making debugging and auditing seamless.
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Portability: Workflows are stored as JSON, making them easy to copy, backup, and share.
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Extensive Modules: A vast array of backend functions are available out-of-the-box.
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JS Flexibility: When custom logic is needed, the Code Node allows for JavaScript implementation—made even easier nowadays with LLM assistance.
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Cost-Effective: Using the Community license on-premise allows for unlimited workflows and executions.
Conclusion & Current Strategy
Lately, whenever a backend task arises—personally or professionally—I first evaluate if it can be handled via n8n. We have already addressed several requirements using n8n. Recently, I even fulfilled a request by combining n8n with a "vibe-coded" simple web UI, a task that previously would have been built by Nintex K2.
The only drawback compared to K2 is that n8n’s native web forms are very basic. However, by using a custom web form as a universal interface for workflows, I expect we will eventually replace K2 entirely.
As a team rooted in the Microsoft stack, it is a bit disappointing that n8n doesn't support MSSQL as its internal database (backend store), but I hope this will be added in the future. For now, we are using the default SQLite, and it has been running flawlessly for months.
If you haven't tried n8n yet, use it. Use it twice.