Six platforms that small and mid-sized businesses ask us about: Orkeste, CrewAI, Lindy, Relevance AI, n8n and Make. None wins everywhere. The right one depends on who will own the agents, which tools they must work in and whether you need code, instant triggers or self-hosting.
Six platforms, six best fits
Orkeste
No-code agent platform for team workflows in mainstream B2B tools, with human approval and EU hosting.
Teams of 10 to 200 without developers who want agents in Gmail, Outlook, HubSpot, Salesforce, Zendesk or Jira.
Pricing: Free plan; Starter €9.99 and Pro €39.99 a month; Business on quote
Strong at: Approvals, swarms and EU hosting without code, at small-team prices.
Limits: 26 native connectors plus MCP servers; new emails and tickets checked every 5 minutes, not instantly; no web access; not self-hostable.
CrewAI
Open-source Python framework for multi-agent systems, with a managed platform.
Engineering teams building custom agents in code.
Pricing: Framework free; managed platform with a limited free tier, enterprise on quote
Strong at: Full control of agent logic, any model, self-hosting.
Limits: Needs developers to build and maintain the agents.
Lindy
No-code platform for AI agents and assistants: email, meetings, calendar, phone.
Individuals and small teams automating email-centred work.
Pricing: Credit-based plans priced per seat
Strong at: Many integrations, instant triggers, phone and meeting features.
Limits: Per-seat pricing grows with the team.
Relevance AI
Agent platform with a strong sales and go-to-market focus.
Sales and marketing teams automating prospecting and outreach.
Pricing: Enterprise plan on quote, with vendor credits
Strong at: Go-to-market templates and web research.
Limits: No public self-serve price; less depth outside sales.
n8n
Workflow automation with AI agent nodes, self-hostable.
Technical teams that need data pipelines, instant triggers and control.
Pricing: Community Edition free to self-host; cloud plans billed by execution
Strong at: Control, reach and self-hosting.
Limits: Built and maintained by technical users rather than process owners.
Make
Visual automation across thousands of apps, with AI agents.
Operations teams automating data flows between many apps.
Pricing: Credit-based; free plan with 1,000 credits a month
Strong at: Reach, instant triggers and a mature builder.
Limits: Scenarios grow complex when the logic depends on reading text.
Side by side
Who builds the agents: Orkeste: Process owners, in plain language. CrewAI: Developers, in Python. Lindy: Anyone, no code. Relevance AI: Business teams, no code. n8n: Technical users, visual and code. Make: Ops users, visual scenarios.
Multiple agents: Orkeste: Swarms: sequence, parallel, conditions, manager. CrewAI: Crews and flows in code. Lindy: Agents hand work to each other. Relevance AI: Teams of agents. n8n: AI agent nodes in workflows. Make: Agents delegate to specialists.
Human approval: Orkeste: Validations queue per action. CrewAI: Human input, set in code. Lindy: Built-in approvals. Relevance AI: Approval mode and escalations. n8n: Send-and-wait steps. Make: Steps designed in the scenario.
Starts on: Orkeste: Manual, schedules, events (webhook, Stripe, email, ticket), API. CrewAI: Your code or platform. Lindy: Events and schedules. Relevance AI: Triggers, schedules, API. n8n: Webhooks, events, schedules. Make: Webhooks, events, schedules.
Integrations: Orkeste: 26 native connectors plus MCP servers. CrewAI: Tools added in code. Lindy: Large library. Relevance AI: Many, CRM focus. n8n: Hundreds of nodes plus HTTP. Make: Thousands of apps.
The right platform depends less on features than on who keeps the agents running.
2 to 20 people, no developer: Orkeste or Lindy. Lindy if the work is mostly one person's email and calendar; Orkeste if several people share the agents, approvals matter, or your tools are HubSpot, Zendesk or Jira.
20 to 100 people, an ops or RevOps lead, no engineers: Orkeste, so the person who owns the process also owns the agents, with every pending action in one Validations queue.
With one or two engineers: Orkeste for business-facing agents and n8n or Make for data plumbing. They connect through the Orkeste API and outgoing webhooks.
A product or AI team building custom agents: CrewAI for custom logic in code. Orkeste's API if you want a managed agent your product can call.
A sales-only motion: Relevance AI for its go-to-market depth. Add a horizontal platform when support and operations join.
What the real cost depends on
The plan: Subscription, seats and the usage included. Per-seat plans grow with the team; credit plans grow with usage.
Model usage: Bigger models cost more per run. In Orkeste, a run uses from 2 credits with Claude Haiku 5.5 to 235 with Claude Fable 5.1.
Maintenance time: Who updates the agents when the process changes: a developer, a technical user or the process owner. This is often the largest cost.
Five mistakes that stall agent projects
Starting with the most complex workflow. Pick the most repetitive job, not the most painful one.
No owner. An agent without a named person responsible becomes nobody's problem the first time it misbehaves.
Approvals nobody reviews. A queue that waits for days teaches the team that agents are not part of real work. Decide who reviews and when.
Instructions locked in code. The briefing should live where the business owner can read and edit it.
Ignoring exit costs. Before you commit, check how you would export briefings, knowledge and run history.
Frequently asked questions
What is the best AI agent platform for a small business?
It depends on who will own the agents. For a team without developers that wants agents in mainstream B2B tools with human approval, Orkeste fits well. For developers building custom systems, CrewAI. For a personal email and calendar assistant, Lindy. For sales-only automation, Relevance AI. For data plumbing and instant triggers, n8n or Make.
Which platforms let a person approve actions first?
All six offer a way: a Validations queue in Orkeste, Ask for confirmation in Lindy, approval mode in Relevance AI, send-and-wait steps in n8n, approval steps you design in Make scenarios and human input set in CrewAI code. The differences are who sets them up and where approvals are reviewed.
Do I need a developer?
Not for Orkeste, Lindy, Relevance AI or Make. CrewAI needs Python developers, and self-hosting n8n needs someone technical.
Which ones can be self-hosted?
CrewAI's framework and n8n's Community Edition. Orkeste, Lindy, Relevance AI and Make are managed services. Orkeste hosts data in the EU.
How long does a first deployment take?
Plan a few weeks for the first workflow: pick a repetitive job, connect the tools, keep every action behind approval at first, and loosen approval only on actions that proved reliable over many runs.