The two pieces every Zap needs
Trigger: the event that starts the Zap. "A new row is added to this spreadsheet." "A new email arrives with this subject line." "A form is submitted." Every Zap has exactly one trigger.
Action: what happens in response. "Send a Slack message." "Create a task in a project tool." "Add a row to a different spreadsheet." A Zap can have one action or a chain of several, each running in order after the trigger fires.
A concrete example
Trigger: a new response comes in on a contact form. Action 1: create a new contact record in a CRM. Action 2: send a Slack message to the sales channel with the lead's details. Action 3: add the lead's email to a mailing list. One trigger, three actions, three tasks consumed each time the Zap runs, as covered in the pricing guide.
Zapier triggers: instant vs polling
Every Zapier trigger is one of two kinds, and which one you get depends on the app, not on your plan. Instant triggers are webhooks: the source app pushes the event to Zapier the moment it happens. Zapier's own glossary is unambiguous about these: triggers labelled Instant “will always trigger Zap workflows immediately (regardless of pricing plan)”. Polling triggers are everything else: Zapier calls the app on a schedule and asks whether anything is new, because not every app offers webhooks. The schedule is the part your plan buys.
| Plan | Entry price | Polling interval |
|---|---|---|
| Free | $0 · 100 tasks/mo | 15 min |
| Professional | from $19.99/mo billed annually ($29.99 billed monthly) | 2 min |
| Team | from $69/mo billed annually ($103.50 billed monthly) | 1 min |
| Enterprise | custom | 1 min |
Read from zapier.com/pricing on 30 August 2026: the page ships a per-plan polling interval next to each plan's task allowance, which is where these four numbers come from. Entry price is the cheapest task tier on each plan; both the price and the task allowance climb steeply above it, and the interval does not change with the tier.
What that costs you in practice: on the free plan a polling trigger can sit on an event for a quarter of an hour before the Zap fires, and the two-minute interval is most of what the first paid tier buys you in responsiveness. An instant trigger ignores all of it. So if latency is the thing that matters, the question to ask before you upgrade is whether your trigger app offers an Instant event at all. If it does, the free plan is already as fast as Enterprise.
What are the different types of triggers in a Zap?
Instant and polling describe how a trigger is delivered. What starts the Zap is a separate question, and the answer falls into a handful of types. Most Zaps use the first one; the rest are Zapier's own built-in apps, which you pick like any other app in the editor.
| Trigger type | Starts the Zap when | Typical use |
|---|---|---|
| App event | something new or updated appears in a connected app: a row, an email, a deal, a file | New form response creates a CRM contact |
| Schedule by Zapier | a set time comes round: every hour, day, week or month | Monday morning report posted to Slack |
| Webhooks by Zapier | another system sends data to a Zapier URL, or Zapier polls a URL you give it | Your own app or a tool with no Zapier integration; needs a paid plan |
| Email by Zapier | an email arrives at a Zapier-issued inbox address | Forwarded invoices saved to cloud storage |
| RSS by Zapier | a feed publishes a new item | New blog posts shared to a team channel |
| Zapier Tables and Forms | a record is added or changed in a Zapier table, or a Zapier form is submitted | Intake form feeds an approval flow |
App event triggers usually come in two flavours, new and new or updated. The second fires more often, which matters on a paid plan because every run that gets past your filters spends tasks. Schedule and webhook triggers are the ones people reach for when an app's own trigger list does not have the event they need.
Filters and paths, the two common additions
- Filter: a condition that stops the Zap unless it's met. "Only continue if the form's 'company size' field is over 50," so the Zap doesn't run for every single submission.
- Paths: branching logic, sending the Zap down one of several possible action chains depending on the data. "If the deal size is over $10,000, notify the enterprise team; otherwise, notify the standard sales queue."
Neither is required. A large share of useful Zaps are just trigger plus one or two plain actions, no filters or branches at all.
How many actions the free plan lets you chain
Checked against zapier.com/pricing on 30 August 2026.
Frequently asked
Can a Zap have more than one action?
Yes. A single trigger can fire a chain of multiple actions in sequence, each one a separate task for billing purposes. Multi-step Zaps require a paid plan; Zapier's free tier only allows one trigger and one action.
How does Zapier know when to check for a trigger?
Two ways: instant triggers use webhooks, the source app notifies Zapier the moment something happens, with no delay. Polling triggers have Zapier check the source app on a schedule: every 15 minutes on the free plan, every 2 minutes on Professional, every 1 minute on Team and Enterprise (zapier.com/pricing, 30 August 2026).
What are the different types of triggers in a Zap?
Most Zaps start from an app event, such as a new row, email or deal in a connected app. Zapier's built-in triggers cover the rest: Schedule by Zapier runs at set times, Webhooks by Zapier receives data from other systems, Email by Zapier watches a Zapier inbox address, RSS by Zapier watches a feed, and Zapier Tables and Forms fire on new records or submissions. Separately, each trigger is either instant or polling.
What's the difference between a Zap and a workflow?
None, functionally. 'Zap' is Zapier's specific brand name for what other platforms call a workflow, scenario, or flow. The underlying concept, trigger plus actions, is the same across tools.