n8n benchmarking tool

Tool for executing benchmarks against an n8n instance.

Directory structure

packages/@n8n/benchmark
├── scenarios        Benchmark scenarios
├── src              Source code for the n8n-benchmark cli
├── Dockerfile       Dockerfile for the n8n-benchmark cli
├── scripts          Orchestration scripts

Benchmarking an existing n8n instance

The easiest way to run the existing benchmark scenarios is to use the benchmark docker image:

docker pull ghcr.io/n8n-io/n8n-benchmark:latest
# Print the help to list all available flags
docker run ghcr.io/n8n-io/n8n-benchmark:latest run --help
# Run all available benchmark scenarios for 1 minute with 5 concurrent requests
docker run ghcr.io/n8n-io/n8n-benchmark:latest run \
	--n8nBaseUrl=https://instance.url \
	[email protected] \
	--n8nUserPassword=InstanceOwnerPassword \
	--vus=5 \
	--duration=1m \
	--scenarioFilter=single-webhook

Using custom scenarios with the Docker image

It is also possible to create your own benchmark scenarios and load them using the --testScenariosPath flag:

# Assuming your scenarios are located in `./scenarios`, mount them into `/scenarios` in the container
docker run -v ./scenarios:/scenarios ghcr.io/n8n-io/n8n-benchmark:latest run \
	--n8nBaseUrl=https://instance.url \
	[email protected] \
	--n8nUserPassword=InstanceOwnerPassword \
	--vus=5 \
	--duration=1m \
	--testScenariosPath=/scenarios

Running the entire benchmark suite

The benchmark suite consists of benchmark scenarios and different n8n setups.

locally

pnpm benchmark-locally

You can filter to a specific scenario and setup:

# Run only the http-node scenario with the sqlite setup
pnpm benchmark-locally --runDir /tmp/n8n-data --scenarioFilter http-node sqlite

In the cloud

pnpm benchmark-in-cloud

Running the n8n-benchmark cli

The n8n-benchmark cli is a node.js program that runs one or more scenarios against a single n8n instance.

Locally with Docker

Build the Docker image:

# Must be run in the repository root
# k6 doesn't have an arm64 build available for linux, we need to build against amd64
docker build --platform linux/amd64 -t n8n-benchmark -f packages/@n8n/benchmark/Dockerfile .

Run the image

docker run \
  -e [email protected] \
  -e N8N_USER_PASSWORD=password \
  # For macos, n8n running outside docker
  -e N8N_BASE_URL=http://host.docker.internal:5678 \
  n8n-benchmark

Locally without Docker

Requirements:

• k6
• Node.js v20 or higher

pnpm build

# Run tests against http://localhost:5678 with specified email and password
[email protected] N8N_USER_PASSWORD=password ./bin/n8n-benchmark run

Benchmark scenarios

A benchmark scenario defines one or multiple steps to execute and measure. It consists of:

• Manifest file which describes and configures the scenario
• Any test data that is imported before the scenario is run
• A k6 script which executes the steps and receives API_BASE_URL environment variable in runtime.

Available scenarios are located in ./scenarios.

n8n setups

A n8n setup defines a single n8n runtime configuration using Docker compose. Different n8n setups are located in ./scripts/n8nSetups.