Hi everyone,
I am working on a workflow to copy UGC TikTok‘s with my AI avatars and I would love to know if there is a way to set up ffmpeg on the cloud instance without self hosting anything.
Thanks in advance for your help.
@nevermind-s welcome, to actually be able to fully use an external python library with custom code, or setup, you either need to self host your n8n, or you can try this with execute command:
{only on self hosted} For n8n cloud you need to either look for a service which offers features like ffmpeg.
You actually can run FFmpeg workflows on n8n Cloud now, just not directly on the instance.
n8n Cloud doesn’t allow custom binaries or shell access, so you can’t install/run FFmpeg locally like you would on a self-hosted setup.
A good workaround (and honestly the easiest approach right now on n8n cloud) is to use an external FFmpeg service.
I’m the creator of renderio.dev and we built exactly that:
- RenderIO has an official n8n node that works on n8n Cloud and n8n self hosted
- You can run any FFmpeg command via API
- It’s fully integrated in the n8n UI (not just an HTTP request hack)
It’s basically FFmpeg-as-a-service:
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Send your command + input files
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We process it in the cloud
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You get the output back in your workflow
What’s coming next (very soon):
We’re adding built-in media ingestion so you’ll be able to:
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Download videos directly from YouTube / TikTok / Instagram Reels
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Pipe them straight into FFmpeg steps
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Build full end-to-end video workflows inside n8n
If you have any questions shout me a DM or here
@nevermind-s since you’re on cloud, jsut offload the ffmpeg work to a simple HTTP Request node hitting api.creatomate.com — they have a free tier, you POST your video URL + the operations you want (trim, merge, overlay) as JSON and get back the processed file URL, no binary installs needed. way simpler than trying to hack around cloud limitations