Native Integrations Threaten Zapier's Core

This reveals that Zapier’s real risk is losing the highest value workflows, not losing integrations altogether. When Airtable or HubSpot keeps key actions inside its own product, it keeps setup, data mapping, and user behavior in house. Zapier still covers the long tail, but the head of demand is where the best experience, the most usage, and the most expansion revenue usually sit.

• A native integration is usually better because the user stays inside the app they already know. Instead of opening Zapier, making a second account, and wiring generic fields between two tools, the app can prefill context and guide the exact workflow it wants the user to complete.
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• That is why partners start limiting access. Zapier makes apps more discoverable and sticky, but it also makes them interchangeable. A former partner described the tradeoff clearly, the app gets broad connectivity, but gives up product control, usage visibility, and some protection from being compared side by side with substitutes.
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• Airtable is the clearest nearby example. It grew from roughly $156M ARR in 2021 to about $478M in 2024, and its product increasingly bundled database, automations, and integrations in one place. As platforms get bigger, they have more reason to absorb common automation jobs themselves and leave Zapier with edge cases.
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The market is heading toward a split model. Big apps will keep building first party integrations for their top 10 or 15 workflows, because that is where activation and retention improve fastest. Zapier’s path forward is to move closer to the system of record and own more of the workflow itself, so it remains central even when partners tighten access.