Scalability
A system's ability to maintain performance as workload increases.
Why it matters
What works for 10 users needs to work for 10,000. Costs should scale linearly, not exponentially.
In practice
At 100 users: $0.35/day LLM cost. At 10,000 users: ~$35/day cost vs ~$49,000 revenue = 99.7% margins.
Related terms
n8n-First Principle
A design philosophy: every repeatable task is a workflow, not an AI call. AI is the last resort.
Cache (LLM Cache)
Storing previous AI responses for reuse. Saves costs and speeds up repeated queries.
Cost Tracking
Monitoring every AI call: model used, tokens in/out, cost, cache status. Essential for profitable operations.
Budget Controls
Spending limits per agent, workflow, or company that prevent runaway API costs.