Automation is where AI saves you real hours. In this tutorial you’ll build a small but genuinely useful workflow in n8n, an open-source automation tool. Every morning it collects AI news from a few RSS feeds, asks an AI model to pick and summarise the most important stories, and sends you a clean digest.
You will build: Schedule → RSS → Merge → AI summary → Email/Telegram
Time: about 30 minutes · Cost: free on self-hosted n8n, plus a small AI API cost that depends on your model and how many items you send · Level: beginner
Written for n8n 2.x (October 2026). In n8n 2.0 the old Active toggle was replaced by Publish.
Step 1: Add a Schedule Trigger
Create a new workflow and add a Schedule Trigger node. Set it to run every day at 8:00. Check that your n8n timezone is set to Asia/Kolkata under workflow settings, or it will fire on server time.
Step 2: Pull the news with RSS Read nodes
Add two or three RSS Read nodes, one per source, each connected to the trigger. Paste in the RSS feed URLs of AI news sites you trust (most news sites list theirs in the footer or at
/feed). Run each node once to check that items come back.Step 3: Combine and trim
Add a Merge node to combine the feeds, then a Filter node that keeps only items published in the last 24 hours. Add a Limit node set to 20 items so you don’t send the AI a huge pile of text.
Step 4: Turn the list into one block of text
Add an Aggregate node to collect the titles, links and descriptions into a single item. That way the AI sees every story at once and can rank them against each other.
Step 5: Let AI pick and summarise
Add your AI provider’s chat model node (for example the OpenAI, Anthropic or Google Gemini node, or a Basic LLM Chain with a chat model attached) and connect your API credentials. Use a prompt like this:
Prompt for the AI nodeYou are an editor for busy professionals in India. From the news items below, pick the 5 most important AI stories. For each one write: a headline (max 10 words), a 2-sentence summary of why it matters, and the original link. Skip duplicates and press-release fluff. Output clean HTML with an <h3> per story.
News items: {{ $json.data }}
The expression in curly brackets inserts the aggregated items from Step 4. Click the field and pick the right field from the input panel if yours is named differently.
Step 6: Send the digest
Email: add a Gmail node, choose “Send”, set the subject to
AI digest – {{ $now.format('dd LLL') }}, set email type to HTML and map the AI output into the message.
Telegram: create a bot with @BotFather, add a Telegram node with the bot token and your chat ID, and send the AI output with parse mode set to HTML.Step 7: Test, then activate
Click Execute workflow and check the result. If the summary looks good, click Publish (n8n 2.x; older versions used the Active toggle). It will now run every morning on its own.
Level up
- Add an IF node that only sends when there’s major news.
- Save each digest to a Google Sheet to build an archive.
- Duplicate the workflow for other topics: crypto, gadgets or your industry.
Once this works, you’ve learned the pattern behind most AI automations: trigger → collect → AI step → deliver. Swap the parts and you can automate a surprising amount of your week.
Ready for something bigger? Try our AI-powered SEO automation workflow with n8n. Need help with the prompt in Step 5? Use the 5-part prompt framework.
FAQ
Is n8n free?
The self-hosted Community Edition is free. n8n Cloud is paid after a trial. AI API usage is billed separately by your provider.
Can I use this without an OpenAI key?
Yes. Use the Anthropic or Google Gemini chat model nodes instead, or any provider n8n supports.
