Zapier vs Power Automate vs Relay.app (The Ultimate Guide)

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So, your search for the best automation software has come down to Zapier vs Power Automate, but you’re unsure which option is better.

In that case, you’ve come to the right place!

This comprehensive review includes everything you need to know to make an informed decision. We delve into every platform’s key automation features and integrations, pricing plans, and user experience.

Bonus: We decided to throw one more solution into the mix for all of you who’ll find that neither Zapier nor Power Automate does the trick for you: Relay.app.

Although we’re the team behind Relay.app, we reviewed and compared all three platforms as carefully and objectively as possible because we don’t want to waste your time — or ours.

In short, our research showed that:

Relay.app is the ideal choice if you want an advanced automation tool that allows you to keep human judgment and creativity an essential part of your automated workflows.
Zapier is an excellent pick if you need a no-code platform with a user-friendly interface and a rich depository of automation templates.
Power Automate is the perfect match if you need a tool primarily geared toward Microsoft 365 users with solid technical expertise.

And now, without further ado, let’s dive into the juicy bits, starting with a comprehensive review of each tool’s features.

👀 Short on time? Try out Relay.app for free and see if it’s a match right now.

differences between Zapier, Power Automate and Relay.app

Features - Relay.app vs Zapier vs Power Automate

All three tools we reviewed have distinct features that set them apart from their competitors, making them the best fit for their target market.

We’ll explain what makes Relay.app the perfect solution for users looking for an advanced automation platform with rich personalization options.

Relay.app Features

Unlike most other automation software, which allows for creating only fully automated workflows, Relay.app enables users to combine the best of automation and good, old human work.

With Relay.app, you can automate and streamline even the most elaborate workflows and enrich them with human creativity, judgment, precision, and all other traits that no machine can ever simulate.

Some of the advanced capabilities that drive users to opt for Relay.app over Zapier and Power Automate include the following:

Human-in-the-loop
1-Click AI
Multiplayer workflow automation

1. Human-in-the-Loop

Automating workflows increases productivity, saves time on repetitive tasks, and skyrockets efficacy, but it comes at a price.

With most workflow automation software, you have to sacrifice the one thing no solution can ever replace — the human touch, which is often critical for certain steps in the automation chain.

Realizing that this downside is one of the key factors that put people off automation, our team decided to offer users the option to include a human in their automated operations whenever necessary.

And that’s how the Human-in-the-Loop feature was born.

It branches into 4 different functionalities to cover the most versatile needs:

Approvals - Use this whenever a team member needs to approve a task before the workflow continues. For example, a manager might need to approve a contract draft before the final version is delivered to the customer. Once approved, the workflow continues, sending the customer a Docusign and waiting for its completion.
Task completion - You can assign tasks requiring human attention to appropriate team members, and the automation will pause until the task is completed. For instance, after a deal is closed according to a CRM update, the sales manager is assigned a Task to create a contract draft. Once the manager drafts the contract, the workflow continues, and the document is shared with the other parties' legal counsel for review.
Manual data input - This is particularly useful when you want to personalize certain parts of the process (e.g., when dealing with email outreach, you might want to add something personal for each lead) or provide team members with crucial insights (e.g., have a Sales Rep add their personal notes and remarks from a meeting with a lead).
Human decisions - While Relay.app can set up elaborate conditional steps, sometimes you’ll need a human to make the call. For example, when dealing with customer support requests, you might want a support team member to decide whether to email the customer or create a support ticket in Zendesk.

Why is the Human-in-the-Loop Feature Important?

As mentioned earlier, not everything can be delegated to technology.

Some human traits and abilities cannot be simulated and replaced by tech solutions, regardless of how powerful their capabilities are.

Moreover, once you completely exclude humans from automation, you leave the door wide open for oversights and glitches to go by unnoticed before it’s too late.

Finally, true personalization can never be achieved through technology alone - not to mention complex decision-making that usually requires human insight and intelligence.

With the Human-in-the-Loop, you can enjoy all the benefits of advanced workflow automation and still have an actual person jump in whenever needed, be it for:

Personalizing various email chains, from cold outreach to handling customer support requests and more, which is sure to result in higher open, response, and retention rates.
Making the right call when triaging customer feedback before automatically fixing bugs in Jira or other platforms.
Manually assigning an adequate team member to a certain task, such as deciding on the best Customer Support Rep whenever a new request is noted, etc.

Here’s a simple real-world example to help you understand how this feature works 👇

2. 1-Click AI

Although AI has the potential to make complex processes smoother and more efficient, many people struggle with figuring out the right prompts to feed into their AI models to get the desired outcome.

With the 1-Click AI functionality, you don’t need to be a first-rate prompt engineer to harness the power of AI.

Namely, Relay.app has pre-built in-context AI tools even novice users can easily incorporate into workflows.

With these AI-driven capabilities, you can effortlessly handle a wide range of operations, including:

Summarizing data such as meeting notes, Notion content, etc.
Detecting errors in workflows and getting AI to help you fix them.
Extracting critical data from various sources such as emails, notes, etc.
Generating in-context sentences and paragraphs in emails, social media, and other content types.
Guiding intricate automation flows through logical pathways intuitively and more.

3. Multiplayer workflow automation

Many projects and workflows require joint efforts to deliver the best results.

Relay.app’s multiplayer workflow automation enables teams of all shapes and sizes to seamlessly collaborate on operation chains regardless of their complexity and individual team members’ automation skills.

Functions such as dynamic role assignments make assigning different tasks to adequate team members easy without disrupting or pausing the automated flow.

Thanks to it, you’ll be able to streamline a vast array of operations, such as:

Forwarding customer support requests to the most adequate representative.
Getting approvals from specific decision-makers before sending contracts to clients.
Assigning appropriate Customer Success Managers to each customer, etc.

There are as many possible scenarios as you can think of - all you need to do is plug in your apps and start playing.

Zapier Features

Zapier is probably the one workflow automation tool that everyone’s heard of since it’s one of the first solutions of its kind.

Some of the features that allowed Zapier to stay around for so long and keep thriving include:

1. A no-code visual workflow builder. An average user wants a tool with an intuitive interface, which Zapier’s team certainly had in mind when developing this feature. The drag-and-drop workflow builder gamifies automation and makes it easy even for non-technical users.

2. An extensive library of pre-built automation templates. Instead of building everything from the ground up, you can pick a ready-made template for complex and basic automations alike and deploy them within minutes.

3. AI assistant. Powered by generative AI, this automation builder allows you to create workflows by explaining what you need by writing simple prompts in plain English (e.g., “I want to capture more leads through Facebook Ads”).

4. Table and interface builders. Tables allow for collecting, consolidating, and storing data from different apps and sources, enabling the automation of various business processes. Interfaces enable users to create different forms, web pages, and simple apps without coding.

Interfaces and tables can also be integrated and connected to Zapier’s automation platform to create a more comprehensive automation solution.

Power Automate Features

Power Automate is a Microsoft automation platform that can be a great addition to your tech stack if you need a robust solution primarily designed for integrating and automating Microsoft apps.

The features that make Power Automate an attractive option for users include:

1. Task and process mining. This feature enables uncovering business automation opportunities and optimizing operations by applying specialized algorithms to event data that identify trends, patterns, and other process-relevant details.

2. Analytics and reporting. Power Automate has options for analyzing relevant data and providing valuable insights that can help you make data-driven decisions.

3. Several AI-driven capabilities. Microsoft is big on AI right now, so it’s no wonder that Power Automate has various AI-powered automation functionalities. These include Copilot, a conversational AI model that enables the creation of workflows through the use of natural language, AI insights that provide recommendations on improving workflows, etc.

Integrations - Relay.app vs Zapier vs Power Automate

Relay.app

Relay.app integrates with a wide variety of applications, with a focus on all the most important and widely used ones, such as:

Slack
DocuSign
Google Suit apps
HubSpot
Typeform
Jira, etc.

Truth be told, Relay.app doesn’t have as many integrations as solutions that have been around longer, such as Zapier.

However, our team is dedicated to continuously adding new integrations, striving to further improve Relay.app and make it more suited for an even broader range of users.

💡 Keep in mind, though, that the sheer number of integrations doesn’t mean much if they don’t work properly. This is why we’ve ensured all our integrations are robust, easy to deploy, and supported across workflows.

Zapier

Zapier has one of the richest integration libraries on the market, a key factor in its appeal.

It integrates with more than 7,000 apps, including Trello, Pipedrive, WordPress, etc.

To gain access to its premium apps, however, you have to subscribe to one of its paid plans - the free plan doesn’t include them.

Power Automate

Power Automate offers a solid range of app integrations, with over 1,000 pre-built connectors, including popular apps such as Salesforce, Adobe Suite, Office 365, and GitHub.

However, Power Automate focuses primarily on Microsoft 365 apps, a common trait of all Microsoft products.

This means that other app integrations might not work as seamlessly as you’d like them to.

Integrations Wrap Up

When it comes to the number of integrations, Zapier is undoubtedly the leader in the category, with thousands of readily available integrations.

Relay.app comes second, making up for what it lacks in numbers with the quality of its integrations and by including all the most widely used apps.

Finally, Power Automate has a decent number of integrations, but it works best with other Microsoft apps, which is a downside if automating the Microsoft suite isn’t your primary focus.

Pricing - Relay.app vs Zapier vs Power Automate

Pricing is one of the most important factors that come into play when picking a workflow automation solution, so let’s look at the costs you can expect with each of these three platforms.