Bug Description

The below community post sums it up rather elegantly. Nested looping not supported.

https://community.n8n.io/t/n8n-nested-loop-tutorial-complete-end-to-end-guide/220142/3

To Reproduce

Scenario You have a list of 3 customers, and for each customer you need to process 2 orders. This requires nested loops.

Expected Result: Process 6 items total (3 customers × 2 orders each)

Solution 1: Using Sub-Workflow (RECOMMENDED) MAIN WORKFLOW Step 1: Create the Main Workflow Node 1: Manual Trigger

Add a “Manual” trigger node

This starts your workflow

Node 2: Create Sample Data (Code Node)

Add a “Code” node named “Create Customers”

Use this code:

const customers = [ { id: 1, name: "John Doe", email: "[email protected]" }, { id: 2, name: "Jane Smith", email: "[email protected]" }, { id: 3, name: "Bob Johnson", email: "[email protected]" } ];

return customers.map(customer => ({ json: customer }));

Node 3: Loop Over Items

Add “Loop Over Items” node

Name it “Loop Customers”

Connect it to “Create Customers”

Settings:

Mode: “Run Once for All Items” Node 4: Execute Workflow

Add “Execute Workflow” node

Name it “Process Customer Orders”

Settings:

Source: “Database”

Workflow: Select “Process Orders Sub-Workflow” (we’ll create this next)

Workflow Parameters: Leave empty or pass customer data as needed

Connect from “Loop Customers”

Node 5: Loop Complete

Connect “Execute Workflow” back to “Loop Customers” (creates the loop) Node 6: NoOp (Final Step)

Add a “NoOp” node named “All Done”

Connect from “Loop Customers” when loop completes

See the link above in the description.

Expected behavior

Expected behavior, you should not be able to create nested loops (interface should throw up an error) or it should just support them like every development language out there from the beginning of time.

Debug Info

Debug info

core

• n8nVersion: 2.20.7-exp.0
• platform: npm
• nodeJsVersion: 22.22.2
• nodeEnv: undefined
• database: sqlite
• executionMode: regular
• concurrency: -1
• license: enterprise (production)

storage

• success: all
• error: all
• progress: false
• manual: true
• binaryMode: filesystem

pruning

• enabled: true
• maxAge: 336 hours
• maxCount: 10000 executions

client

• userAgent: mozilla/5.0 (windows nt 10.0; win64; x64) applewebkit/537.36 (khtml, like gecko) chrome/148.0.0.0 safari/537.36
• isTouchDevice: false

cluster

• instanceCount: 1
• versions: 2.20.7-exp.0
• instances:
  • instanceKey: , hostId: , instanceType: main, instanceRole: leader, version: 2.20.7-exp.0
• checks:
  • check: hostid-clash, status: succeeded, warnings: -
  • check: lifecycle, status: succeeded, warnings: -
  • check: split-brain, status: succeeded, warnings: -
  • check: version-mismatch, status: succeeded, warnings: -

Generated at: 2026-05-18T17:57:58.743Z

Operating System

Ubuntu 24.4

n8n Version

2.20.7-exp.0

Node.js Version

22.22.2

Database

SQLite (default)

Execution mode

main (default)

Hosting

self hosted