news-pipeline-n8n

📰 News Pipeline N8N

N8N Workflow Complexity File Size Nodes AI Processing Version License

Enterprise-grade automated news intelligence pipeline with AI-powered topic analysis

Transform tech/AI news streams into actionable business intelligence through sophisticated AI processing, topic matching, and automated Airtable storage.

🎯 What This Pipeline Does

This is a production-ready N8N workflow that collects news from 12 premium tech/AI sources, uses advanced AI to analyze and categorize content, then delivers structured intelligence to your Airtable workspace. Built for business intelligence, competitive analysis, and tech trend monitoring.

Key Capabilities

🏗️ Technical Architecture

Schedule Trigger (Daily 8:01 AM)
    ↓
Airtable Topics Config ← → 12 Tech/AI Sources (Parallel Collection)
    ↓                        ↓
    └─ Merge → Wait → JavaScript Processing
                           ↓
                      AI Analysis Chain (OpenRouter GPT-4o-mini)
                           ↓
                      Response Processing → Airtable Storage

Core Workflow Components

Component Type Purpose Complexity
Schedule Trigger n8n-nodes-base.scheduleTrigger Daily automation at 8:01 AM Low
Topic Management n8n-nodes-base.airtable Dynamic topic configuration Medium
News Collection 12x n8n-nodes-base.httpRequest Tech/AI source parallel collection Medium
Article Processing n8n-nodes-base.code JavaScript filtering & matching High
AI Analysis @n8n/n8n-nodes-langchain.chainLlm GPT-4o-mini with complex prompts Very High
Data Storage n8n-nodes-base.airtable Structured output with metadata Medium

📡 Tech/AI News Sources Integration

Premium Tech & AI RSS Feeds

Source Type Endpoint Coverage Update Frequency
TechCrunch RSS techcrunch.com/feed/ Tech Startups & Innovation Every 15 min
The Verge RSS www.theverge.com/rss/index.xml Consumer Tech & Culture Every 20 min
Ars Technica RSS feeds.arstechnica.com/arstechnica/index Deep Tech Analysis Every 30 min
VentureBeat RSS venturebeat.com/feed/ Enterprise Tech & AI Every 15 min
OpenAI Blog RSS openai.com/blog/rss.xml AI Research & Updates Weekly
Google AI Blog RSS ai.googleblog.com/feeds/posts/default AI Research & Tools Weekly
Anthropic Blog RSS www.anthropic.com/rss.xml AI Safety & Research Bi-weekly
Hugging Face Blog RSS huggingface.co/blog/feed.xml ML Models & Tools Weekly
Hacker News RSS hnrss.org/frontpage Developer Community Real-time
MIT Technology Review RSS www.technologyreview.com/feed/ Emerging Tech Analysis Daily
Bloomberg Technology RSS feeds.bloomberg.com/technology/news.rss Tech Business & Markets Real-time

RSS Feed Performance & Reliability

🤖 AI Processing Pipeline

Advanced Prompt Engineering

The workflow uses a sophisticated 10,160-character prompt that instructs GPT-4o-mini to:

  1. Analyze Topic Relevance: Match articles against dynamic topic lists
  2. Generate Structured Summaries: 2-3 sentence summaries focused on key developments
  3. Assign Topic Tags: 20+ predefined categories (smart devices, AI integration, etc.)
  4. Determine Development Status: 10 status types (announced, in progress, completed, etc.)
  5. Rate Significance: 1-5 scale for business impact assessment
  6. Extract Key Entities: Companies, products, technologies mentioned

AI Configuration

Sample AI Output

{
  "summary": "Company X released a new smart home device featuring advanced AI voice recognition that can understand natural language commands and learn user preferences over time.",
  "tags": ["smart devices", "AI integration", "voice assistants"],
  "status": "announced",
  "significance": 4,
  "key_entities": ["Company X", "Smart Device Y", "AI Voice Tech"]
}

📊 Data Structure & Metadata

Article Processing Results

Each processed article includes 25+ metadata fields:

Core Article Data

AI-Generated Analysis

Processing Metadata

⚙️ Installation & Configuration

Prerequisites

Step 1: Import Workflow

# Download the workflow
curl -O https://raw.githubusercontent.com/your-repo/news-pipeline-n8n/main/workflows/tech-news-tracker.json

# Import into N8N
# In N8N interface: Import → Upload JSON file → Select tech-news-tracker.json

Step 2: Configure Credentials

Airtable Setup

  1. Create Airtable base with two tables:
    • “Topics to Monitor” (table ID: tbl0UGDeOm5zulwqA)
    • “Articles Table” (table ID: tblil2WC8McQ9MPmQ)
  2. Add columns to “Topics to Monitor”: 
    | Topics |
|--------|
| artificial intelligence, machine learning, AI |
| blockchain, cryptocurrency, bitcoin |
| smart devices, IoT, home automation |
  3. Add columns to “Articles Table”:
    • Title, Summary, Source, AI Tags, Processed At
    • URL, Date Found, Author, Publication Date
    • Requires Review (checkbox)
  4. Generate Personal Access Token in Airtable
  5. Add to N8N credentials as “Airtable Personal Access Token account”

API Keys Setup

  1. NewsAPI: Register at newsapi.org → Get free API key
  2. OpenRouter: Register at openrouter.ai → Get API key for GPT-4o-mini
  3. Polygon.io (optional): Register for financial data access

Add all API keys to N8N credential system.

Step 3: Test & Activate

  1. Open workflow in N8N editor
  2. Test with “Execute Workflow” button
  3. Verify articles appear in Airtable
  4. Check AI processing quality
  5. Activate workflow (toggle switch)
  6. Confirm daily schedule is set to 8:01 AM

🔧 Customization Guide

Adding New News Sources

Add new HTTP Request node for RSS feeds:

{
  "parameters": {
    "url": "https://feeds.example.com/news.xml",
    "options": {}
  },
  "type": "n8n-nodes-base.httpRequest",
  "name": "New_Source_RSS"
}

Connect to “Merge Articles” node input.

Modifying AI Analysis

The AI prompt can be customized in the “Basic LLM Chain” node:

Topic Management

Update topics dynamically in Airtable:

Scheduling Options

Modify the Schedule Trigger node:

{
  "parameters": {
    "rule": {
      "interval": [{
        "triggerAtHour": 6,    // Change to 6 AM
        "triggerAtMinute": 30  // 30 minutes past the hour
      }]
    }
  }
}

📈 Performance Metrics

Production Statistics

Resource Requirements

🔍 Monitoring & Troubleshooting

Health Check Dashboard

Monitor these key metrics in N8N:

Common Issues & Solutions

Issue Symptoms Solution
No articles collected Empty Airtable results Check API keys, verify RSS feed URLs
AI processing fails Articles without AI analysis Verify OpenRouter credits, check prompt format
Topic mismatches Irrelevant articles Refine keywords in Airtable, use more specific terms
Workflow timeouts Partial execution Reduce article processing batch size
Rate limiting HTTP 429 errors Add delays between API calls, upgrade API plans
Airtable errors Data not saving Check base/table IDs, verify token permissions

Debug Mode

Enable detailed logging in Code nodes:

console.log('Articles processed:', articles.length);
console.log('Topics matched:', matchedTopics);
console.log('AI response:', aiResponse);
console.log('API status:', response.status);

View logs in N8N execution history.

🚀 Advanced Features

Batch Processing Optimization

The workflow includes intelligent batching:

AI Response Processing

Sophisticated JavaScript processing handles:

Quality Assurance

Built-in quality checks:

🔒 Security & Compliance

Data Privacy

Rate Limiting Compliance

📚 Documentation & Support

Additional Resources

Contributing

  1. Fork the repository
  2. Test workflow thoroughly in development environment
  3. Document any changes or improvements
  4. Submit pull request with detailed description

📄 License & Attribution

This project is licensed under the MIT License - see the LICENSE file for details.

Credits

🎯 Business Use Cases

Primary Applications

ROI Benefits

Built with ❤️ for data-driven organizations

Transform information chaos into actionable intelligence with enterprise-grade automation

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