IFTTT vs Bardeen: Features, Pricing and Verdict
IFTTT vs Bardeen: IFTTT connects 1,000+ apps in the cloud from free, while Bardeen scrapes and enriches data in your browser. Features, pricing, and verdict.
By Galactic News Editorial · Published 2026-11-09T13:28:36+00:00 · Updated 2026-11-09T13:28:36+00:00
IFTTT vs Bardeen: Features, Pricing and Verdict
IFTTT vs Bardeen is a choice between two different kinds of automation. IFTTT connects over 1,000 apps and services with simple if-this-then-that rules. Bardeen runs automations inside your browser and focuses on web scraping, research, and lead enrichment. Both are no-code. Both have free entry points. They solve different problems, and picking the wrong one wastes money. This comparison uses only official pricing pages and product documentation, checked on 2026-11-09. Prices are in US dollars and change over time.
IFTTT vs Bardeen at a glance
| Attribute | IFTTT | Bardeen |
|---|---|---|
| What it is | Cloud automation platform connecting 1,000+ apps and services | Browser extension for scraping, research, and lead enrichment |
| How automations run | In the cloud, on a schedule, even when your computer is off | In your browser, using your logged-in sessions, while Chrome is open |
| Free tier | $0, unlimited Applets, 1,000 credits a month | $0, 100 free credits a month, always |
| Cheapest paid plan | Starter, $2.99 a month billed monthly, or $2.09 a month billed yearly | Basic, $10 a month, 100 extra credits a month |
| Top paid plan | Pro+, $19.99 a month billed monthly, or $13.99 a month billed yearly | Premium, $50 a month, 1,000 extra credits, or $480 a year |
| Metering | Credits per Applet run, query, filter, and AI action | Credits per output row: 1 for scraping, search, and AI; 3 for enrichment |
| Polling speed | Every hour on Free, every 5 minutes on Pro and Pro+ | On demand, when you run the automation in your browser |
| Best for | Smart home, social media, and cross-app routines | Sales research, lead lists, and data extraction |
What IFTTT does best
IFTTT is built around Applets. Each Applet has a trigger and one or more actions. A trigger fires when something happens in one service. The actions run in another. For example, a new email attachment can save itself to Dropbox. A tweet can cross-post to another network. IFTTT lists over 1,000 connected services, from smart home devices to productivity apps. Since October 2026, every plan gets all Applet features, including multi-action Applets, queries, filter code, and AI actions. The plans differ only in monthly credits, trigger-check speed, and support. Free gives 1,000 credits a month with hourly checks. Pro gives 20,000 credits a month with five-minute checks. Pro+ gives 100,000 credits a month, plus multiple accounts per service and dedicated support. When credits run out, Applets pause until the monthly reset. Unused credits do not roll over. IFTTT no longer offers a free trial. The free plan is the way to try it. Its limits are real. There is no branching logic in the way workflow tools mean it. There are no team accounts. Heavy users will hit the credit ceiling fast.
What Bardeen does best
Bardeen is a Chrome extension. It works in Chrome, Arc, Brave, and Edge. It automates what you already do on screen. Open a LinkedIn profile and copy the name into a spreadsheet. Search the web and pull results into a table. Find and verify contact details, then qualify the lead. Bardeen relaunched in early 2025 around go-to-market work: scraping, web search, enrichment, and AI tools. You build automations from ready-made Playbooks, or describe what you want in plain text in the Magic Box. Pricing is output-based. Each row an action creates costs one credit. Enrichment rows cost three credits. Utilities and import or export steps are free. Every account gets 100 credits free each month. Basic costs $10 a month and adds 100 credits. Premium costs $50 a month and adds 1,000 credits, or $480 a year. Unused credits expire at the end of each billing period. Bardeen's own pricing page shows a worked example. Scraping ten profiles, pulling contacts, verifying emails, and qualifying four leads uses 64 credits. That means the free 100 credits cover roughly fifteen profiles a month. The browser dependency is the main catch. Nothing runs unless Chrome is open. Bardeen also runs automations in your logged-in sessions, which is powerful and worth understanding before you connect work accounts.
IFTTT vs Bardeen on pricing
Both tools now bill in credits, but they count different things. IFTTT counts Applet runs and steps. Bardeen counts output rows. That makes a direct price comparison misleading. A light IFTTT user can run for free for a long time. One thousand credits a month covers simple daily routines. A light Bardeen user burns through the free 100 credits quickly. One small scraping job can use half of it. The entry paid tier tells the same story. IFTTT Starter costs $2.99 a month billed monthly, or $25.08 a year. Bardeen Basic costs $10 a month, with no annual discount published. At the top end, IFTTT Pro+ costs $19.99 a month billed monthly, or $167.88 a year. Bardeen Premium costs $50 a month, or $480 a year. Bardeen costs more because it sells data work, not simple triggers. Check the credit math for your own workload before you pay. Count the rows or runs you need each month. Then match the plan to that number.
IFTTT vs Bardeen on integrations and ecosystem
IFTTT's strength is breadth. It lists over 1,000 services and apps. Smart home devices, social networks, email, cloud storage, and productivity tools all connect through the same Applet builder. Published Applets from the community cover common routines, so you often start from a working template instead of a blank page. IFTTT also offers an MCP server that lets AI assistants like Claude, ChatGPT, and Cursor call into those services. That makes IFTTT a bridge between chatbots and your apps. Webhooks work on every plan, including Free, so developers can trigger Applets from their own code. Bardeen's strength is depth in the browser. It connects to Google Sheets, Airtable, Notion, and CSV export as destinations. Its integrations focus on the tools sales and research teams use daily. The Chrome extension can read the page you are looking at, which no cloud tool can do. That is why Bardeen can scrape a LinkedIn profile or a search results page. The trade-off is clear. IFTTT connects more services. Bardeen reaches deeper into the pages you visit. If your automations span many apps, IFTTT's directory wins. If your automations start from a web page, Bardeen's browser access wins.
Which one should you choose?
Choose IFTTT if your automations connect apps and services. Smart home routines, social media cross-posting, and file syncing are its home turf. It runs in the cloud, so nothing depends on your computer. The free plan is genuinely useful, with every feature unlocked and 1,000 credits a month. Choose Bardeen if your work is research and data extraction. Building lead lists, scraping prices, and enriching contacts are its home turf. It works inside your browser, so it can use the sites you are already logged into. Pick Bardeen when you need data out of websites. Pick IFTTT when you need apps to talk to each other. Some teams use both. IFTTT handles the daily routines. Bardeen handles the research sprints. That split plays to each tool's strength.
Bottom line
IFTTT wins for everyday cross-app automation. It is cheaper, runs in the cloud, and its free plan now includes every feature with 1,000 credits a month. Bardeen wins for browser-based data work. No other no-code tool in this price range scrapes, searches, and enriches leads as directly. If you only buy one, match the tool to the job. App-to-app routines mean IFTTT. Data out of websites means Bardeen.