Nearly every AI notetaker records, transcribes and summarizes. The real differences are what the free tier caps (minutes, notes or history) and where the notes end up afterwards.
Circleback and Fathom have the most usable free tiers: unlimited AI notes (Circleback) and unlimited recordings with instant summaries (Fathom). Granola ($14/mo) is the pick if you take your own notes and want AI to merge them with the transcript.
| App | Free tier | Paid from | Top plan | Best for |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Circleback | Yes | $15/mo | $35/mo | Teams that want unlimited free AI meeting notes and only want to pay for deeper history and CRM automations |
| Granola | Yes | $14/mo | $35/mo | Teams that want meeting notes wired into their existing tools (Slack, Notion, HubSpot) plus MCP access to Claude/ChatGPT |
| Fathom | Yes | $20/mo | $34/mo | Sales call review, CRM-synced recaps, hiring interview notes |
| Otter.ai | Yes | $16.99/mo | $30/mo | Teams already living in Zoom, Teams, or Google Meet who want automatic notes and searchable transcripts |
| Fireflies.ai | Yes | $18/mo | $39/mo | Sales and ops teams who want meeting data piped automatically into CRM, Slack, and analytics tools |
| tl;dv | Yes | $29/mo | $39/mo | Sales and customer-facing teams that want unlimited free recording plus deep CRM and workflow integrations |
Monthly prices in US dollars before tax, from each vendor's official pricing (US list price; weekly-billed plans converted to a monthly figure). Updated October 7, 2026
Unlimited online and in-person meetings, AI notes and action items for free; the catch is 30 days of history. Pro adds unlimited history and Notion, HubSpot and Salesforce automations.
Pick it if: you want notes for every meeting and rarely look back more than a month.
Full Circleback pricing →Blends what you type during the call with the transcript into one summary, and Business adds MCP and API access for Claude or ChatGPT. Free history stops at 25 notes.
Pick it if: you jot key points yourself and want AI to fill in the rest.
Full Granola pricing →Unlimited recordings, transcripts and instant summaries for free; Business adds CRM field sync and coaching scorecards. The bot joins as a visible participant.
Pick it if: you review sales or hiring calls and want recaps pushed to your CRM.
Full Fathom pricing →The real-time transcription pioneer with deep Zoom, Teams and Meet integration and AI chat over your notes. Free's 300 minutes a month go quickly.
Pick it if: you want live transcripts during the meeting, not just a summary after.
Full Otter.ai pricing →One notetaker bot across 30+ apps that pipes meeting data into CRM, Slack and analytics. AI features are metered by separate credits, even on paid plans.
Pick it if: your ops or sales team wants meeting data flowing into other tools automatically.
Full Fireflies.ai pricing →Unlimited recordings and transcripts in 30+ languages on Free, plus 5,000+ integrations. AI notes are limited to about 10 meetings a month without Pro.
Pick it if: you mainly need searchable recordings and only occasional AI summaries.
Full tl;dv pricing →Otter caps minutes, Granola caps note history at 25, Circleback caps history at 30 days, tl;dv caps AI notes at about 10 meetings, and Read AI caps transcripts at 5 a month. Match the cap to how you work before comparing paid prices.
Circleback for unlimited AI notes (30-day history) or Fathom for unlimited recordings with instant summaries. Both are permanent free tiers, not trials.
Otter is better for live transcription inside Zoom, Teams and Meet; Fireflies for piping meeting data into CRMs and other tools. Both are priced per seat.
Yes, but full Notion AI including meeting notes requires the Business plan at $20/mo per user.
How we choose: prices come from each vendor's official pricing page and are re-checked every week. We take no affiliate fees, so rankings aren't for sale.