by XCSme on 5/3/25, 2:31 PM with 99 comments
by _pdp_ on 5/3/25, 11:14 PM
It's not that the tool itself is inherently insecure - it's more about how users are encouraged to use it.
Nearly all workflows built using N8n that I've seen face some kind of prompt injection vulnerability. This is primarily because, in most cases, you configure the LLM by directly inserting external data into the system prompt. As many of you know, the system prompt has the highest execution priority, meaning instructions placed there can heavily influence how the LLM interacts with its tools.
While this isn't exploitable in every situation, it can often be exploited rather generically: by embedding prompts in your social media bio, website, or other locations from where these workflows pull data. Recently, I've managed to use this technique to prompt a random LinkedIn bot to email me back a list of their functions. That's not overly exciting in itself, but it clearly demonstrates the potential for malicious use.
This issue is not specific to N8n. Other tools do it too. But it seems to me there is little to no awareness that this is in fact a problem.
There is a better, safer way to incorporate external data into LLM prompts without jumping through hoops, but unfortunately, that's not how things are currently done with N8n, at least as of today.
by jasongill on 5/3/25, 3:14 PM
The one frustration we have with n8n is trying to create custom "apps" (triggers or destinations for workflows). It's clear that the custom apps are an afterthought and have gone through multiple iterations of "here's the best way to do it", and you end up having to just keep trying until you get it to do what you want. Annoyingly, there's no way to manage custom apps in the interface itself - you have to create a Javascript module and then inject it into a .npm directory somewhere inside of the applications Docker container, which just doesn't feel very "professional".
If n8n would add some kind of admin interface for managing custom apps - especially just supporting basic use cases like specifying a REST API as a reusable custom app - it would be great, but still has a ways to go in terms of features (like better user permissions management as part of the lackluster SSO) before it's truly going to be an enterprise grade solution.
That said, we tried Windmill first and while it was cool for the devs who were able to see the vision, the non-technical users hated it and have heavily praised n8n once we created a custom app to let them integrate with our system.
Overall I would say n8n is worth trying if you need something like this, but expect to do some tinkering if you go beyond what it does out of the box.
by photon_garden on 5/3/25, 6:46 PM
Pros:
- Good observability. It’s handy that they track all executions and let you see when workflows run.
- Usable for non-technical people.
- They’ve had all the integrations we needed.
Cons:
- Implementing parallel execution for async parts of the workflow is complicated and flaky.
- Pricing is expensive for the hosted version.
- Version control is bad.
- If you have engineering capacity, it’s faster and simpler to write some more backend code if you already have a backend.
by ChrisGammell on 5/3/25, 3:10 PM
https://blog.golioth.io/a-2-geofence-wi-fi-location-here-com...
by fzysingularity on 5/3/25, 7:40 PM
We also made a custom node for popular document/image/video ETL jobs like document-to-markdown, audio/video transcriptions with VLMs (Vision Language Models).
https://github.com/vlm-run/n8n-nodes-vlmrun
https://www.npmjs.com/package/@vlm-run/n8n-nodes-vlmrun/v/0....
by hypefi on 5/3/25, 5:58 PM
by preya2k on 5/3/25, 2:53 PM
by nico on 5/3/25, 3:03 PM
by kfogel on 5/3/25, 3:33 PM
TL;DR: The author originally tried to call n8n "open source" but while using a non-open-source license. After much discussion, he kept the license but stopped using the label "open source", to the relief of many people.
That half-decade-old thread is still what I point to when I want to explain to someone why preserving the specificity of the term "open source" matters.
by SKILNER on 5/3/25, 3:18 PM
by Jefro118 on 5/3/25, 7:25 PM
[1] - https://browsable.app
by behnamoh on 5/3/25, 2:50 PM
Aside from that, I've been thinking about no/low-code solutions for educational purposes. I'm an incoming professor of a university and most my students have little background in CS or related fields. The university insists on using tools like Alteryx but I want to see if free open-source solutions exist (because that way, students can use the tools after graduation).
So far I've seen Dify, Flowise, Langflow, n8n, Make. The last two seem to be more general while the other ones are tailored to LLMs (which is the focus of my courses—applications of LLMs in management).
by SansGuidon on 5/4/25, 7:49 AM
I guess N8N was not intuitive for simple things and seemed too complicated for me. I'm now happier with cron jobs/GitOps to manage my automations. On the other hand I also had to replace some IFTTT workflows with my own scripts.
More work for me but I gained quality and control.
by victorbjorklund on 5/3/25, 2:48 PM
by Tadpole9181 on 5/3/25, 11:46 PM
This makes it unusable for my purpose.
But in my (limited) research into options like Airflow or Dagster or Windmill, they weren't quite at the same level and it doesn't feel like a significant value-add over writing a simple webhook server.
by MattDaEskimo on 5/3/25, 4:58 PM
by Izmaki on 5/3/25, 3:19 PM
by bwfan123 on 5/3/25, 3:00 PM
by Valodim on 5/3/25, 2:51 PM
Can't say I'm a fan of the €55M financing round they took though. I mean, congratulations to them, but the growth they'll need to satisfy those investors is so very likely to lead to chasing numbers and enshittifying the product down the line.
by revskill on 5/3/25, 3:15 PM
Examples of those failure systems, is SimStudio, just a joke compared to n8n.
by m3kw9 on 5/3/25, 6:32 PM
by greatpostman on 5/3/25, 2:52 PM
by throwaway7783 on 5/3/25, 4:49 PM
by sa-code on 5/3/25, 6:40 PM
by EcommerceFlow on 5/3/25, 2:52 PM
I'm thinking why not just use APIs?