The short answer: Fireflies is built around call automation and CRM. Which alternative fits depends on what you want instead.
- Minutes you can send as a document, for meetings that switch language, in a room or on a call → MeetNotes. On one real 89-minute two-language meeting, scored blind, MeetNotes came out at 8.7–9.2 and Fireflies at 4.7–5.2. One meeting is one meeting; the details are below.
- English video calls with a live transcript on screen → Otter.
- Sales calls with no bot in the meeting → Fathom.
- Your own typed notes, filled out → Granola.
- Engagement and sentiment scores, and coaching → Read AI.
- Transcription across many kinds of media, with subtitle exports → Notta.
- Call video, clips and sales templates → tl;dv.
- All-day wearable capture, or phone calls on an iPhone → a hardware recorder such as Plaud.
- Meetings that are already Teams calls inside a Microsoft company → Teams' own transcription.
If you run a sales pipeline through recorded online calls and want notes landing in the CRM automatically, Fireflies' workflow is genuinely deep and you may not need to leave. Every claim about another product below comes from the sources on our comparison pages, each with the date we checked it. There are no prices: they change, and a stale price on a comparison page is a false claim.
What Fireflies does, and why people look elsewhere
Fireflies joins meetings through an invited bot or by auto-joining from your calendar. Its mobile app records in-person meetings, and its desktop app for Windows and macOS captures meetings without a bot on the call. So the old line that Fireflies cannot do a room or a bot-free call is out of date.
The difference is what it is built around: volume of online calls, CRM push, cross-call search and team workflow. People look for a Fireflies alternative when what they actually need is something else:
- Minutes as a document. A PDF or Word file that goes to a client, a board or a site team, and opens for people who will never create an account.
- Meetings that switch language mid-sentence, where the minutes may need to go out in a different language from the one the meeting was held in.
- Something other than a sales workflow: a lecture, a consultation, a site visit, a family business review.
The published blind test
We put one real meeting through Fireflies and MeetNotes from the identical audio: 89 minutes, several speakers, English with Hinglish running through it, and dense technical vocabulary. Product names were stripped from both outputs and an AI assistant scored them blind.
| Fireflies | MeetNotes | |
|---|---|---|
| Overall | 4.7–5.2 | 8.7–9.2 |
The widest gaps were technical terms, the mixed-language sentences, and the decisions and follow-ups captured. Fireflies did not come out ahead on any criterion the judge rated, and its summary scored closer to ours than its transcript did.
What this does not prove: it is one meeting, one recording, one day. It is not a general ranking and not a claim about your audio. The full scorecard is in our write-up of the result, and every score and the rubric are on the open challenge page.
Don't take this page's word for it. Record one real meeting, run it through MeetNotes and whichever tool you already use, strip both product names off, and let an AI assistant score them blind. The protocol and the judge prompt are published in full, we publish the rounds we lose, and every result so far is on its own page: vs Fireflies, vs Microsoft Teams, vs Fathom. Send us your result, win or lose, and we credit 200 free minutes.
Fireflies alternatives at a glance
| Tool | How it captures | Built around | Where it fits |
|---|---|---|---|
| MeetNotes | Phone in the room; notetaker in Zoom, Meet and Teams; Mac and Windows app with no bot | Minutes as a document: PDF, Word, share link | Mixed-language meetings, rooms, minutes for people without an account |
| Otter.ai | Notetaker in Zoom, Teams and Meet; mobile app records | Online meetings, live transcript, calendar automation | English-language video calls |
| Fathom | Desktop app, no bot in the call | Sales workflow: scorecards, CRM sync, coaching | Online sales and customer-success calls |
| Granola | Your computer's audio, no bot; macOS, Windows, iOS, Android apps | Enhancing the notes you type yourself | People at a desk who already take notes |
| Read AI | Bot in Zoom, Meet and Teams; desktop app with no bot; phone app | Meeting reports, engagement and sentiment scores, coaching | Companies that meet on video and want to measure it |
| Notta | Bot for online meetings; desktop app with no bot; phone apps; file and link upload | Transcription across many kinds of media | Live transcripts, 58 languages, SRT and spreadsheet exports |
| tl;dv | Bot in Zoom, Meet and Teams; desktop app with no bot; phone app | Video of the call: clips, reels, sales templates | Sales coaching from call video |
| Plaud | A dedicated recording device | Hardware capture with subscription transcription | All-day wearable capture, phone calls |
| Microsoft Teams | The Teams call itself | Transcripts inside your company's Microsoft tenant | Meetings that are already Teams calls |
MeetNotes
MeetNotes is built around the minutes, not the call archive. It records in three ways: the phone on the table in a room (press record, nothing joins, no extra device), the MeetNotes Notetaker sent into Zoom, Google Meet or Microsoft Teams (paste the link, or add notes@getmeetnotes.com to a calendar invite you organise; it joins as a visible participant), or the Mac or Windows app with nothing joining the call. All three land in the same account.
What comes out is a transcript with each speaker labelled and timestamped, names you confirm once and that are recognised in later meetings, and minutes: a summary, key takeaways, decisions, and action items with an owner and a due date when one was said. There is no language to set before recording, a sentence that switches language halfway is transcribed as spoken, and the minutes can be written in any of 110 languages, whichever language the meeting was in. Export as a PDF, an editable Word file, Markdown, text to paste into WhatsApp, or a share link; recipients need no account and no app. There are also minute formats for particular kinds of meeting, such as a lecture, an OPD consultation or a board meeting.
On Android, MeetNotes can also turn the recordings your phone's own call recorder makes into short call notes: callbacks promised, follow-ups, to-dos, and one page per day listing what is still open. MeetNotes does not record the call itself; the built-in recorder depends on your phone model and country, and recording a call may need the other person's consent where you are. Not available on iPhone. See call recording transcription.
Where it fits: mixed-language meetings, meetings in a room, and meetings that must end in a document other people receive. Where it does not: if your team's pipeline runs through hundreds of recorded online calls and the CRM is the destination, Fireflies' auto-join, CRM push and cross-call search are a deeper workflow than ours.
Otter.ai
Otter's notetaker joins Zoom, Microsoft Teams and Google Meet. It shows a live transcript while the call is still running, and it has years of calendar automation and US-workflow integrations behind it. Its help centre lists six transcription languages (checked 24 August 2026).
Where it fits: English-language video calls where you want the transcript on your laptop during the meeting. If your meetings are in other languages, check that list first. MeetNotes vs Otter, and our round-up of Otter alternatives.
Fathom
Fathom captures online meetings from a desktop app, without a bot appearing in the call, and adds AI scorecards, CRM sync and an "Ask Fathom" assistant for your meeting history.
On one real 31-minute call in Hindi and English, scored blind, MeetNotes scored 8.1 and Fathom 5.7. Fathom named all three speakers and both companies correctly, which we did not, and that is published with the score. One call, one result.
Where it fits: a sales or customer-success team that wants the call to end in CRM updates and coaching review, with no bot in the meeting. MeetNotes vs Fathom.
Granola
Granola uses your computer's own audio and does not invite a bot, with apps for macOS, Windows, iOS and Android. It takes the notes you type during a meeting and fills them out.
Where it fits: you are at a desk, online, and you already type notes. If nobody in the meeting can type, or the output must go to others as formal minutes, look elsewhere. MeetNotes vs Granola.
Read AI
Read AI has a bot that joins Zoom, Google Meet and Teams with calendar auto-join, a desktop app that records without a bot, and a phone app for in-person meetings. It adds engagement and sentiment scores, speaker coaching, and search across meetings, email and messages. Its help centre says meetings where several languages are spoken are not fully supported and may give inconsistent results.
Where it fits: a company that meets mostly on video and wants analytics and cross-app search on top of its notes. MeetNotes vs Read AI.
Notta
Notta has a bot for Zoom, Meet, Teams and Webex, a desktop app with no bot, iOS and Android apps, and transcription of files and YouTube links. It lists 58 transcription languages with a bilingual mode, exports MP3, TXT, SRT, PDF, DOCX and XLSX, and sells a separate hardware recorder, Notta Memo.
Where it fits: transcription across many kinds of media, with real-time transcripts and subtitle or spreadsheet exports. MeetNotes vs Notta.
tl;dv
tl;dv records the video of your online calls. Its bot joins Zoom, Google Meet and Microsoft Teams and can record from your calendar even when you are not there, and there is a desktop app with no bot and a phone app for in-person meetings. It makes clips and reels, offers sales templates such as MEDDIC, and pushes moments into your CRM. Its help centre describes transcript download as copying to the clipboard, with a Pro or Enterprise plan on both sides.
Where it fits: sales teams that coach from call video, which is a Fireflies-adjacent workflow with video at the centre. MeetNotes vs tl;dv.
Plaud (hardware)
Plaud sells dedicated recording devices (Note, Note Pro, NotePin) with subscription transcription tiers. A microphone worn on a shirt is better at all-day and long-range capture than a phone on a table, and it picks up phone calls that no iPhone app can record.
Where it fits: all-day wearable capture, phone calls on an iPhone, and very large rooms. For a handful of people around a table, read whether you need a dedicated recorder first. MeetNotes vs Plaud.
Microsoft Teams built-in transcription
A Teams transcript carries each speaker's name and a timestamp, and is stored in the organiser's OneDrive for Business. Microsoft lists 40+ transcription languages, with live translated transcription on Teams Premium. Transcription runs on one selected spoken language per meeting; if people speak another, Teams prompts the organiser to change it, and the change applies to everyone.
On one real 38-minute call scored blind, MeetNotes came out at about 8.8 and Teams at about 6.8. Teams caught more words; MeetNotes got the product names right. The full write-up.
Where it fits: online meetings inside a Microsoft company, where the record must live under your company's compliance and retention controls. MeetNotes vs Teams.
How to choose a Fireflies alternative
- Is the CRM the destination? If yes, compare Fathom and tl;dv against Fireflies. If the destination is a document, that points elsewhere.
- Where do your meetings happen? Online, in a room, or both. Most tools here now have a phone app; check which one was designed around a room.
- Can a bot appear in the call? If not, use a desktop app with no bot. Most of the tools above have one.
- What language does the room speak? Especially whether it switches mid-sentence. Look up each tool's own language page, then test one mixed sentence.
- Who reads the output, and do they have an account? Clients and site teams usually do not.
- Do you need hardware? Only for all-day capture or iPhone phone calls.
Run your own blind test
Our Fireflies result is one meeting. Yours is the one that matters. Record one real meeting, run the same audio through Fireflies and the alternative you are considering, delete every product name from both outputs, and have an AI assistant score them blind with our published judge prompt. We publish the head-to-heads we lose. Start at the open challenge page, and read how to test transcription accuracy for what to look for.
FAQ
What is a good Fireflies.ai alternative for meeting minutes?
If the output you need is formal minutes rather than a call archive, look at a tool built around the document. MeetNotes writes a summary, decisions and action items with owners and due dates, and exports them as a PDF, an editable Word file or a share link that opens for anyone without an account.
Is there a Fireflies alternative for meetings that mix languages?
MeetNotes has no language to set before recording and transcribes a sentence that switches language halfway as it was spoken, then writes the minutes in any of 110 languages. On one real 89-minute English and Hinglish meeting, scored blind, MeetNotes scored 8.7–9.2 and Fireflies 4.7–5.2. That is one meeting, so run the same test on your own recording before switching.
Which Fireflies alternative works without a bot in the call?
Fathom, Granola, Read AI, Notta, tl;dv and MeetNotes all have desktop apps that capture a call with no bot joining, and Fireflies has one too. MeetNotes also records meetings in a room from the phone, with nothing joining at all.
Can Fireflies record in-person meetings?
Yes. Fireflies' mobile app records in-person meetings, according to fireflies.ai/mobile (checked 15 September 2026). The difference between the tools is less whether they can record a room and more what each is built around: Fireflies around online call volume and CRM, MeetNotes around minutes you can send.
Is there a free Fireflies alternative?
MeetNotes gives every account 100 free minutes to try it on real meetings. Other tools' free plans change often, so check each one's own pricing page rather than a comparison post.
