The 4 best AI orchestration tools in 2026

Imagine a movie set without a director. Actors are going off script, interns are on never-ending coffee runs, and the cinematographer and sound engineer are arguing while the latter begs for five seconds of silence to capture room tone. In short, chaos. 

Now swap the actors for large datasets and workflows, and the interns for a mess of apps and services. Without AI orchestration, your business set looks just as chaotic. To help you find the software that can play director, I've researched, reviewed, and tested all the top AI orchestration tools available. 

AI orchestration software is a very broad category—it means a lot of things to a lot of people—but my four picks cover the primary reasons you'd need AI orchestration. 

The 4 best AI orchestration tools

• Zapier for business orchestration

• LangChain for developer-first orchestration

• Prefect for data orchestration

• Amazon Bedrock for cloud orchestration

What makes the best AI orchestration tool?

You can do so much with AI orchestration that calling a piece of software simply an AI orchestration tool is a bit of a disservice. Just as directors have genres they work best in—Scorsese for gangster movies, Peele for socially-charged horror, Gerwig for contemporary coming-of-age pieces—orchestration software has its own subsets:

• Business orchestration (or process orchestration) helps teams manage internal tools, staff, and AI by connecting information and creating complex workflows. These are often user-friendly platforms with visual, no-code builders. 

• Developer-first orchestration includes tools geared toward the IT teams who spend just as much time in a code terminal as in team meetings. Developer-first tools are often full-code builders that offer extra flexibility and customizability (with more work attached).

• Data orchestration manages the flow of data across systems, tools, and workflows. These platforms ensure your data is always accurate, in the right place, at the right time. 

• Cloud orchestration allows users to manage workflows and processes in serverless use cases. The cloud isn't Narnia—it's a collection and collaboration of servers and software. Cloud orchestration can be the wardrobe that takes you to and from this mythical land (without tech headaches).

After in-depth research and testing, I selected one tool in each category to round out my short-and-sweet list. To help me land on these picks, I went in with the following criteria in mind:

• AI orchestration capabilities: All of my selections needed to have advanced orchestration capabilities. This includes features like support for chaining multiple AI steps together, mixing AI and non-AI actions in one workflow, and ways to manage prompts and models over time, like versioning and A/B testing.

• Integrations and data connectivity: AI orchestration platforms that can't connect to anything useful may as well be stationed on a stranded island in the Pacific. All of these tools need to be able to sync with a large array of apps and infrastructure, with multiple connection methods via APIs, webhooks, and/or SDKs. 

• Observability and governance: Teams need to check in on AI processes to make sure they're effective and working as intended. I prioritized robust monitoring and error tracking capabilities, as well as governance features like role-based access control, permissions, and audit trails.

• Ease of use: The term "easy" is relative. Advanced calculus is easy for an astrophysicist, but may as well be ancient Greek to a middle-schooler. I did my best to standardize this subjectivity by evaluating each of these apps on an ease-of-use scale based on its target market—so, if the software is geared toward a non-tech customer base, I made sure it would be reasonably easy for them to use.

• Scalability: There's almost nothing worse than outgrowing a software your business really loves—that means a new product, a new onboarding procedure, and new complaints from your staff. Each of these options can support your business needs (and budget) for the long haul.

The best AI orchestration tools at a glance

Best AI orchestration tool for business orchestration

Zapier (Web)

Zapier pros:

• Comprehensive workflow builder

• 8,000+ apps and integrations

• Built-in tools for AI agents, AI chatbots, databases, and forms

• AI Copilot to build complete business systems

Zapier cons:

• Free plan limited to two-step workflows

Zapier is an AI orchestration platform that empowers anyone to bring complex workflows to their organizational big screen. It's a no-code tool that eliminates fragmented systems and allows you to scale advanced AI processes in minutes, not months. Zapier helps you choreograph everything, whether you're working with LLMs, agents, or a constellation of internal tools.

You can start with the workflow builder, connecting 8,000+ apps and creating AI-powered sequences (with human-in-the-loop checkpoints) that keep business-critical work running in the background. For example, you could set up a marketing workflow that moves leads through your sales funnel, or a process that helps your IT team manage requests from employees. 

Zapier also lets you build autonomous agents with Zapier Agents: think of them as virtual teammates that you can slot into any workflow. Work with Zapier Copilot to describe what you want it to do in plain English, and Copilot will build your agent for you. It can complete tasks across your tech stack, help your system intelligently adapt to new inputs, and keep processes moving around the clock.

In addition to Workflows and Agents, you can use these built-in tools and features to orchestrate your team's workflows:

• Canvas: Visual builder for mapping out complex workflows—including AI steps.

• Interfaces: Build forms, dashboards, and internal tools with zero code.

• Tables: Lightweight databases for storing and manipulating workflow data.

• Chatbots: Context-aware bots that can converse, collect data, or trigger flows.

• MCP: Connector that lets you trigger actions and automate workflows directly from your AI tools.

• Templates: Ready-to-run automations for everything from lead routing to meeting prep.

On top of that, Zapier doesn't make your IT or legal teams sweat. It's SOC 2 Type II and GDPR-compliant, supports SSO/SCIM, and logs everything for easy audits—making it a great fit for enterprise environments.

A lot of platforms are competing to be the best for this flavor of AI orchestration. Since you're on the Zapier blog right now, I'd suggest you get a second opinion from folks who've actually found success on Zapier.

Zapier pricing: Free plan available, Professional ($19.99/month, billed annually), Team ($69/month, billed annually), Enterprise (contact Zapier)

Best AI orchestration tool for developer-first orchestration

LangChain (Web)

LangChain pros:

• Open source framework and SDK

• 1,000+ integrations across models, tools, and data sources

• Comprehensive observability via LangSmith

LangChain cons:

• Code-intensive

• Steep learning curve

LangChain is less of a product than it is an ecosystem. LangChain is the software development kit (SDK) that powers the whole show. It's an open source framework—focused on Python and JavaScript—that developers can implement directly into their codebase. With LangChain, you can build chatbots and multi-step workflows and play around with retrieval augmented generation (RAG). If you're just getting started, you can customize one of the product's templates, swapping in your own API, webhook, or any of the 1,000+ integration possibilities.

LangGraph is like LangChain's cooler cousin. It allows you to go further with the technology and orchestrate advanced stateful workflows, perform human-in-the-loop checks, and build AI agents that can store conversation history and maintain context over time. In fact, I found the customizable agent workflows to be the most impressive feature. You can build a single-agent flow, a multi-agent system, or a hierarchical system that involves one "boss" AI agent overseeing all the others (therefore allowing you to dip your toe into agentic AI).

LangSmith is where it all comes together. This is the hub where you can see how your code is performing. Robust observability features can help teams track AI agent performance with real-time monitoring and usage statistics, latency metrics, and response quality evaluations. You can evaluate and improve agent quality, A/B test agent models, and deploy new agents directly on the hub.

LangChain is an outstanding ecosystem that's easy to use but hard to master. The SDKs are straightforward, and it's really easy to navigate in the LangSmith hub. Where it gets tricky is actually building what you can dream up. There are several helpful resources for getting started, but it's not easy to build your own multi-step agentic AI system. You may want to try a LangChain alternative if you're not a CS expert, but if you're comfortable with coding, this is a great option for your team. 

You can also connect LangChain to Zapier to extend its integration capabilities with Zapier. Automatically make requests or create databases in LangChain based on activity in other apps, or send data from LangChain to your other apps.

LangChain pricing: Free plan available, Plus ($39/seat/month), Enterprise (contact LangChain)

Best AI orchestration tool for data orchestration

Prefect (Web)

Prefect pros:

• Easy Pythonic interface and code application

• Cloud-oriented but flexible with different systems

• Strong GitHub and CI/CD integration

Prefect cons:

• The open source model has fewer key capabilities than the cloud-based model

• Can be complex to learn at scale

Prefect is an open source workflow engine that allows users to turn Python functions into production-grade data pipelines. It's primarily a Python-based SDK that allows you to improve data quality and visibility, build workflows, and set up automations.

Prefect has two main use cases/production methods: open source or cloud-based. The open source model allows teams to self-host their code and maintain everything on their own infrastructure. The cloud-based version requires teams to use Prefect through its hosted app and APIs.

An open source model is beneficial for businesses in certain use cases, but it's pretty disappointing in Prefect. Teams don't have access to webhooks, system metrics, permissions, automations, or a host of other key features that you'd probably want in an AI orchestration tool. That said, you could employ a hybrid approach (Prefect allows you to work on different systems), but it will be mostly cloud-oriented. 

The cloud-based app is fairly easy to use and navigate. There are clear tabs on the left side of the screen, and every function seems to have a hyperlink to a community resource. So, if you wanted to build a new Python data flow, you could quickly access the how-to guide for doing so. 

Prefect's data engineering capabilities are also quite comprehensive. You can deploy and refresh analytics pipelines, automate data quality checks, build custom alerts and failure notifications, and monitor data safety with audit trails and SLA-style tracking. Teams can even connect their entire data analytics stack across dbt, data warehouses, and BI tools.

The workflow orchestration capabilities are just as robust. Prefect takes a "you build it, we track it" type of approach—which is, for me, the standout of the entire app. All you need to do is code your workflow, and the app will manage how it works and notify you with updates. The analytics dashboard tracks data like error logs and performance metrics, while state tracking can monitor runs and tasks across workflows and your entire infrastructure. 

Feature-wise, you can build human-in-the-loop workflows, set intelligent retries for LLM/AI agent applications, and connect systems via APIs and webhooks. Developers can connect their GitHub repositories to automatically sync with commits, and teams can run hybrid AI execution across multiple environments, like their own systems or the cloud.

Like LangChain, Prefect may take some time for you to get up to speed on. That said, if you're looking for comprehensive AI orchestration and data management features, it's hard to do much better. 

Prefect pricing: Free plan available, Starter ($100/month), Team ($400/month), Pro (contact Prefect), Enterprise (contact Prefect), Customer Managed (contact Prefect)

Best AI orchestration tool for cloud orchestration

Amazon Bedrock (Web)

Amazon Bedrock pros:

• Rich LLM choice

• AWS ecosystem access

• API, SDK, and app integrations

Amazon Bedrock cons:

• Usage-based pricing can get expensive for smaller teams

• Complex learning curve

Amazon Bedrock is a cloud-based powerhouse that specializes in building generative AI applications and agents, automating workflows. It fits seamlessly into the wider AWS ecosystem and affords all the benefits of it—from connecting models to other AWS services to accessing enterprise-grade security features like AWS Key Management Service (KMS) and centralized logging and audit trails. 

You'll access the platform through the AWS console and Bedrock playground: a middle-ground interface that's not quite an SDK, not quite a SaaS hub. From here, you can play around with code, program AI models, and access user guides and examples if you need help achieving liftoff. I wouldn't say it's easy to use since it's so complex, but it's definitely easy to navigate.

Despite its wealth of features, the platform's bread and butter is its AI agents. To build an AI agent, you need access to some type of LLM to work from. Many agent builders include the classics—Gemini, Claude, OpenAI models—but very few offer 83 different models. While some of these models are different versions of the same platform, I was blown away by the possibilities with AWS.

After deciding on your model, the world is your oyster. You can train the model to produce desired outputs with Amazon Bedrock Agents, link APIs and webhooks, and establish memory retention for task continuity. You can build a RAG system, construct a multi-agent collaboration system, or design a sophisticated multi-step workflow. I could keep typing all the features I found useful, or I could just leave you with this: if you have an idea for an AI agent, I can almost guarantee you can build it in Bedrock.

All in all, Amazon Bedrock is another complex system that I wouldn't want to embrace without a solid CS background (or a trusted developer). That said, if you want a comprehensive AI agent builder that sits neatly in the broader AWS ecosystem, don't waste any time looking elsewhere.

If you'd like to take AWS even further, connect Amazon Bedrock with Zapier. You can automatically send messages and requests to Amazon Bedrock, allowing you to use the power of Bedrock across your entire tech stack. Learn more about automating Amazon Bedrock.

Amazon Bedrock pricing: Custom, usage-based pricing

Orchestrate AI systems with Zapier

The right AI orchestration tool can send your business to Sundance or Cannes, but only if it fits your needs. Full-code platforms allow flexibility, but if you want a no-code powerhouse that can help you bring home a Palme d'Or, choose Zapier.

Zapier is a comprehensive, easy-to-use AI orchestration tool that empowers you to build complex, AI-powered workflows across 8,000+ apps, without a team of developers.

Related reading:

• Process orchestration: The ultimate guide

• The best AI project management tools

• The best AI agent builder software

• What is orchestration in software? 4 examples