Windmill
by Windmill
Build internal tools, workflows, and scripts with a visual flow builder and auto-generated UIs Windmill is an open-source developer platform for building internal tools, scripts, workflows, and small applications. Founded in 2022 by Ruben Fiszel, an MIT alumnus and former Palantir engineer, Windmill is licensed under AGPLv3 with a separate enterprise edition; the project is headquartered in Paris and the team remains under twenty employees as of May 2026.
Performance Scores
7 rankings evaluated
Score range: 6.8 – 8.8
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#1Best ETL & Data Pipeline Tools 2026
Score: 8.5 · Best for: Code-first multi-language data workflows with enterprise orchestration
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#2Best Automation Tools for Developers and Engineering Teams in 2026
Score: 8.8 · Best for: Engineering teams wanting multi-language workflow-as-code with self-hosting
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#3Best Open Source Automation Platforms 2026
Score: 8.4 · Best for: Best for: engineering teams who prefer code-first automation and internal tool building
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#4Best Automation Tools by Price-Performance Value in 2026
Score: 8.3 · Best for: Developer teams running code-heavy data pipelines and internal tooling
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#5Best Open-Source Workflow Engines for Engineers in 2026
Score: 7.6 · Best for: Engineering teams building internal tools and workflows who want polyglot scripting with minimal operational burden
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#5Best Durable Workflow Engines for Production in 2026
Score: 7.6 · Best for: Platform engineering teams that want code-first orchestration plus internal-tools UIs in one platform
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#7Best Process Orchestration Platforms 2026
Score: 6.8 · Best for: Developer teams wanting script-based workflows with generated UIs
Key Facts
pricing
| Attribute | Value | As of | Source |
|---|---|---|---|
| Windmill pricing (July 2026) | Windmill pricing (verified July 2026): Free & Open-source (AGPLv3, self-hosted or Cloud) at $0 with unlimited executions (3 workspaces, 50 users, 10 SSO users), and Enterprise "from $120/month" via a seat+compute configurator — developer seat $20/mo, operator seat $10/mo, compute unit $50/worker/mo (1 CU = 2 worker-GB-month). The old flat "Team $10/user" tier was retired. | Jul 2026 | Windmill pricing |
| Cloud pricing (May 2026) | $10 per seat per month (Team plan, workspace-level, up to 10 users, 10,000 executions per user/month); free Cloud tier includes 1,000 executions per month | Jul 2026 | Windmill pricing page (Cloud tab; confirmed via page JSON-LD offers and docs/enterprise/plans_details) |
General
| Attribute | Value | As of | Source |
|---|---|---|---|
| Script Languages | Python, TypeScript, Go, Bash, PHP, C#, Rust, SQL, GraphQL and more (as of July 2026) | Jul 2026 | Windmill docs — Scripts quickstart |
| Built-in Scheduler | Supports scheduling and triggers for workflows | Jul 2026 | Windmill docs — Introduction |
| Git Sync | Integrates with Git for version control | Jul 2026 | Windmill docs — Introduction |
| Secret Management | Securely manages secrets and credentials | Jul 2026 | Windmill docs — Introduction |
| Worker Groups | Scalable worker groups for job processing | Jul 2026 | Windmill docs — Worker groups |
Core Features
| Attribute | Value | As of | Source |
|---|---|---|---|
| Visual Flow Builder | Build complex workflows visually | Jul 2026 | Windmill docs — Introduction |
| Approval Flows | Supports human-in-the-loop and approval workflows | Jul 2026 | Windmill docs — Approvals and prompts |
Limits & Quotas
| Attribute | Value | As of | Source |
|---|---|---|---|
| Auto-Generated UIs | Generates UIs for scripts automatically | Jul 2026 | Windmill docs — Introduction |
community
| Attribute | Value | As of | Source |
|---|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars (May 2026) | 17,300+ stars | Jul 2026 | GitHub API |
technical
| Attribute | Value | As of | Source |
|---|---|---|---|
| Supported languages | TypeScript (Deno, Bun, Node.js), Python, Go, PHP, Bash, PowerShell, Nu, Rust, C#, Java, Ruby, R, Ansible, GraphQL, SQL (PostgreSQL, MySQL, MS SQL, BigQuery, Snowflake) | Jul 2026 | Windmill scripts quickstart docs |
Strengths
- ●Multi-language support
- ●Native scheduling and orchestration
- ●Self-hostable with scaling
- ●Built-in approval flows
- ●Six language support (TS Python Go Bash SQL GraphQL)
- ●Workflow-as-code with clean Git export
- ●Built-in scheduling and approval flows
- ●Multi-language support (TS/Python/Go/Bash/SQL)
- ●Auto-generated UIs from scripts
- ●Built in Rust (fast)
- ●Kubernetes-native
- ●Strong developer experience
- ●AGPLv3 license
- ●Free self-hosting with unlimited usage
- ●Multi-language support (TS Python Go SQL)
- ●Built-in scheduling and orchestration
- ●Clean workflow-as-code export
- ●Multi-language scripting — TypeScript, Python, Go, Bash, SQL — in the same workflow
- ●Auto-generated UIs for every script reduce boilerplate for internal tools
- ●Lightweight Deno and Bun runtimes offer fast cold starts compared to containerized engines
- ●Simple Docker Compose deployment — runs as a handful of containers without Kubernetes
- ●Multi-language script runner: TypeScript, Python, Go, Bash, SQL in one platform
- ●Built-in approval steps and retry semantics on flows
- ●Apache 2.0 license with an active community and a growing connector library
- ●Doubles as an internal-tools UI builder for back-office apps
- ●Multi-language scripts (TypeScript, Python, Go, Bash, SQL) in a single engine
- ●Suspend-and-approve steps make human-in-the-loop a first-class flow primitive
- ●Auto-generated user interfaces remove a separate internal-tools build
- ●Release cadence of several versions per week
Limitations
- ●Steeper learning curve
- ●Smaller community than alternatives
- ●Requires coding knowledge
- ●Smaller community than n8n or Pipedream
- ●Purely code-focused — no visual builder for non-devs
- ●Documentation still maturing
- ●Steeper learning curve for non-developers
- ●Smaller community than n8n
- ●Fewer pre-built integrations
- ●Code-first can be a barrier
- ●Smaller community (13,000 stars) and younger project than Airflow or Temporal
- ●Fewer native SaaS integrations — custom API calls require writing scripts
- ●Documentation is still maturing; advanced deployment patterns have fewer worked examples
- ●Smaller production reference base than Temporal or Airflow at large scale
- ●Durable execution semantics are less battle-tested than Temporal under failure injection
- ●Documentation depth is improving but trails the leading engines
- ●AGPLv3 with a proprietary enterprise compile flag; GitHub reports no single SPDX licence
- ●Smaller documentation surface than the older projects in this ranking
- ●The free self-hosted plan caps at 10 users
- ●Observability is a dashboard rather than a metrics-and-alerting stack
Based on evaluations in 7 rankings: Best ETL & Data Pipeline Tools 2026, Best Automation Tools for Developers and Engineering Teams in 2026, Best Open Source Automation Platforms 2026, Best Automation Tools by Price-Performance Value in 2026, Best Open-Source Workflow Engines for Engineers in 2026, Best Durable Workflow Engines for Production in 2026, Best Process Orchestration Platforms 2026
Pricing Plans
Free & Open-source (self-hosted or Cloud)
AGPLv3 self-hostable; unlimited executions
- ✓Unlimited executions
- ✓All languages (TS/Python/Go/Bash/SQL)
- ✓App builder, scheduling, webhooks
- !3 workspaces, 50 users max
- !10 SSO users, 4 groups
- !No audit logs / advanced triggers
Enterprise (Cloud or Self-hosted)
From $120/mo (configurator): developer seat $20/mo, operator seat $10/mo, compute unit $50/worker/mo
- ✓SSO/SAML, SCIM, audit logs
- ✓All advanced triggers (Kafka/NATS/SQS/…)
- ✓SOC 2 Type II, 24/7 support
- !Seat + compute-unit based
About Windmill
Windmill is an open-source developer platform for building internal tools, scripts, workflows, and small applications. Founded in 2022 by Ruben Fiszel, an MIT alumnus and former Palantir engineer, Windmill is licensed under AGPLv3 with a separate enterprise edition; the project is headquartered in Paris and the team remains under twenty employees as of May 2026. The pitch is a single platform that replaces the typical stack of Airflow plus Retool plus a custom job runner, with one runtime, one auth model, and one UI.
The platform exposes three primitives. Scripts are functions in TypeScript (Deno or Bun), Python, Go, Bash, SQL (PostgreSQL, MySQL, BigQuery, Snowflake), or PowerShell, each automatically given a typed UI form, an HTTP endpoint, a CLI invocation, and a schedule slot. Flows compose scripts into DAGs with branching, loops, error handlers, and approval steps. Apps are auto-generated UIs that wrap scripts and flows for non-technical users. Every primitive is versioned in a Git-backed workspace, runs in isolated workers, and emits structured logs.
Windmill targets the operational gap between "shell script on a cron" and "full Airflow cluster". A 4-vCPU worker on a single VM can sustain hundreds of script runs per minute; horizontal scaling is via worker groups, and benchmarks published by the project on its docs site claim 10x faster cold-start than Airflow for short Python jobs (with the caveat that "short" is the regime where this matters most). The scheduler is a Postgres-backed job queue, which removes the Redis or RabbitMQ dependency many competing platforms carry.
Pricing as of May 2026 is straightforward. Self-hosting is free under AGPLv3, with no feature gating on core functionality. Windmill Cloud is $10 per month per author with a free tier of 1,000 executions; the Enterprise Self-Hosted edition is quoted starting around $40 per month per author with SAML, audit logs, and high-availability worker pools. The GitHub repository (windmill-labs/windmill) passed 12,400 stars in May 2026, with active community contributions on the connector and UI side.
Editor's Note: A 60-person SaaS client replaced a 14-DAG Airflow deployment with Windmill flows in March 2026; deploy footprint shrank from 6 vCPUs and 12 GB RAM to 2 vCPUs and 4 GB, and the recurring AWS bill fell by roughly $310 per month. The honest caveat: Windmill's flow editor is excellent for under ~30-step pipelines and gets noisy beyond that. Two heavy ML pipelines stayed on Airflow because their fan-out patterns were easier to reason about as Python DAGs. Pick the boundary intentionally rather than migrating everything. — Rafal Fila, ShadowGen
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Best Durable Workflow Engines for Production in 2026
A ranked list of the best durable workflow engines for production deployments in 2026. Durable workflow engines persist execution state to a database so that long-running workflows survive process restarts, deployments, and infrastructure failures. The ranking covers Temporal, Prefect, Apache Airflow, Camunda, Windmill, and n8n. Tools were evaluated on production reliability, developer experience, scalability, open-source health, and documentation quality. The shortlist intentionally mixes code-first engines (Temporal, Prefect, Airflow) with hybrid visual platforms (Camunda, Windmill, n8n) to reflect how production teams actually choose workflow engines in 2026.
Best No-Code Automation Platforms in 2026
A ranked list of no-code automation platforms in 2026. The ranking covers visual workflow builders that allow non-engineering teams to connect SaaS apps, route data, and add conditional logic without writing code. Entries cover proprietary cloud platforms (Zapier, Make, Pipedream, IFTTT) and open-source visual builders (n8n, Activepieces). Scoring reflects integration breadth, pricing accessibility, visual editor ease, reliability and error handling, and self-hosting availability.
Questions About Windmill
How much does Keystroke cost in 2026?
Keystroke offers three tiers as of July 2026: Hobby (free forever, with $1/month of included usage credit), Pro ($20/month, including $20/month of usage credit), and Organization (custom pricing with SSO, RBAC, and audit logs). Usage is metered on every tier: $0.01 per agent or workflow run, $0.005 per empty poll, $0.007 per web search, roughly $0.067 per hour of sandbox compute, and a 1.1x markup on AI model calls unless you bring your own API keys.
Is Keystroke worth it in 2026?
Keystroke earns a provisional 6.5/10 in its July 2026 open alpha: the agent-native TypeScript model is genuinely differentiated and the free Hobby tier makes it safe to trial, but the platform is pre-1.0 (npm at v0.1.98, public repository published July 13, 2026), has no third-party production track record, and its Elastic License 2.0 restricts offering it as a hosted service. Worth trialing for teams that build through coding agents; too young for production-critical workflows.
What is Keystroke?
Keystroke is a code-first workflow automation and AI agent platform, launched July 13, 2026 by Y Combinator-backed Sprint Labs, that positions itself as an n8n alternative built for AI coding agents. Workflows are written as typed TypeScript in the user's own repository, usually by agents such as Claude Code, Cursor, or Codex, and deployed to Keystroke's managed cloud or self-hosted under the source-available Elastic License 2.0.
Is Keystroke a good n8n alternative?
Keystroke is a credible n8n alternative only for teams that build automations through coding agents such as Claude Code or Cursor, and even then as an experiment rather than a replacement as of July 2026: it launched July 13, 2026 and is pre-1.0, while n8n has 200,000+ users, 196,000+ GitHub stars, and a mature self-hosting story. For visual building, non-developer operators, or production-critical workflows, n8n remains the stronger choice.
Learn More
Temporal vs n8n 2026: Code-First Workflows vs Visual Automation
Temporal and n8n are workflow tools with different audiences. Temporal is a durable execution SDK for backend engineers building fault-tolerant distributed systems in Go, Java, TypeScript, Python, and .NET. n8n is a visual automation platform for operators and developers connecting SaaS applications. This 2026 comparison covers use cases, pricing, and where the two overlap.
n8n vs Windmill in 2026: Visual Open-Source vs Code-First Automation
n8n was founded in Berlin in 2019 and ships under a fair-code Sustainable Use License with a node-based visual canvas and 400+ built-in integrations. Windmill was founded in 2022, ships under AGPLv3, and ships a code-first runtime that executes TypeScript, Python, Go, Bash, SQL, and GraphQL with auto-generated UIs. Both can be self-hosted on a single Docker host; their target users are different.
API Integration Patterns for Automation
Technical reference for API integration patterns commonly used in automation platforms, including webhook and polling architectures, authentication strategies, error handling, rate limiting, and data transformation approaches. Updated with current data as of March 2026.