What You'll Need

n8n Cloud or self-hosted n8n for workflow automation

Hetzner VPS or Contabo VPS for hosting your self-hosted stack

Namecheap if you need a custom domain for your applications

DigitalOcean as an alternative hosting option

Basic familiarity with Docker and command-line interfaces

Around 30 minutes to set up your first stack

Table of Contents

The Real Cost of SaaS Bloat

Where Self-Hosted Wins

Building Your First Self-Hosted Stack

Migration Strategy: Moving Off Expensive Tools

Security and Maintenance

Getting Started

The Real Cost of SaaS Bloat

I used to have 14 active SaaS subscriptions. Slack at $8/user, GitHub at $4/user, Zapier for automation, Make for backup, text-to-speech services, image processing tools, video editing APIs—the list went on. At the end of every month, I'd watch roughly $2,400 disappear from my company's account.

The problem isn't that these tools are bad. They're excellent.…